Notes, Musings, Reflections

on the History of Winemaking in Northern California

by RPM

While this started out as an historical tour, and we will definitely talk about Northern California -- mostly Sonoma and Napa counties -- wine history, not all of the wineries we visit will be historic -- there are many reasons for this: in some cases, BV for example in Napa, it's really a tourist place and we're not in a position to get anything really behind the scenes there that would justify spending your time and money. This despite the fact I think their best wines are still very good, and very good values. I would love to be able to recreate some of my visits there many decades ago, but it's not the same place, and none of the people you'd have wanted to meet are still there or involved. The two most important temples of fine wine in Napa county from the old days, of course, were BV and Inglenook. Surprisingly for those of whose memories of wine begin after 1965, it was Inglenook that was had the highest reputation before Prohibition and the two were pretty much regarded as equals (though each had their partisans) until Inglenook was sold in 1964 to a giant, the winemaker left, and quality declined - sadly through some of the greatest years in the mid-20th century - 1964, 1968 and 1970 - until a renaissance began with the 1973s made by Jon Richburg. BV was sold in 1968 or 1969, but Andre T stayed as winemaker and made some of his best wines in those years.

A small personal aside: in an article I ran across about BV's early history a dozen years ago or more, the author said BV's first recognition for fine wine was the result of Georges de Latour's hiring my great uncle, Antonio Perelli-Minetti (pictured at right), as winemaker. Tony was academically trained as an oenologist in Italy as was his older brother Guilio, who was the winemaker at Swiss Colony in the early years of the 20th century.   more ...
 

Tasting Wine

Tasting Wine - The RPM Method also see this Tasting Form you can use to keep notes

Many of us are familiar with Ann Noble's (Prof Emeritus at UC Davis) exceptionally Wine Aroma Wheel and Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel. While they certainly are not exhaustive, and lack some of the romance we like in wine descriptions, they provide a reasonably workable common vocabulary -- in language that almost everyone can understand -- for talking about wines and identifying aromas and tastes. I suggest anyone who doesn't have them order them from Ann Noble. The Wine Aroma Wheel Web Portal is at http://www.winearomawheel.com

Because our group includes wooters with various levels of experience with wine generally and wine tasting in particular, rpm recommends that we at least look carefully at the Wine Aroma Wheel and User Guide and the Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel (we couldn't find an image online) and consider trying to use them as our common tasting vocabulary. Also posted is the Vinography (Alder's blog) Aroma Card which some people may find makes a convenient pocket reference.

American Wine Society Wine Evaluation Chart

RPM’s Highly Idiosyncratic Annotated Wine Bibliography

Interviews with the Masters

Interview with Antonio Perelli-Minetti (this has been reformatted for speed of download - original is prettier but Huge)

The Old Timers of Wine Country

Interview with Andre Tchelistcheff  (Large PDF - 9 MB)

Interview with Warren Winiarski (3 MB PDF)

Interview with Louis M. and Louis P. Martini (5 MB PDF)

Interview with Peter Mondavi (3 MB PDF)

Interview with Robert Mondavi (6 MB PDF)