PATRICIA GREEN | Willamette Valley Sauvignon Blanc 2017
(Willamette Valley, Oregon) $24
Patricia Green was a free spirit in a wine region renowned for them. Nearly 20 years ago—when women rarely did this sort of thing—she left her job, gathered up her savings, bought a broken-down winery, and put her name on the door. Patty Green died in an accident this past spring. She and her partner Jim Anderson had just finished making this extraordinary wine, and I can’t help but think of it as her final gift to the wine world she loved. If sauvignon blanc is usually something of a wild girl, this sauvignon is the exact opposite—a wine of uncommon beauty and grace. A wine that’s utterly refined and exquisitely fresh. A tribute and a testament. And a wine you must taste. (13.7% abv)
92 points KM
Available at Patricia Green Cellars
It’s rosé season, so here’s a timely question: what is the difference between rosé de Loire and rosé d’Anjou?
A. Nothing. Anjou is a town in the Loire, so the two terms are synonymous.
B. Rosé d’Anjou is made from pinot noir but rosé du Loire is not necessarily made from that grape.
C. Rosé de Loire is still and rosé d’Anjou is sparkling.
D. Rosé de Loire is dry and rosé d’Anjou is a little sweet.
The country with the highest per capita wine consumption in the world is Italy.
Answer: False. However, nestled within Italy’s capital city of Rome is the true answer: the Vatican City State. Each of the approximately 800 people who live inside the Vatican City consume about 16 gallons of wine a year. The country’s wine usage is partly the result of the Catholic celebration in which bread and wine are consecrated during the Mass. By comparison, U.S. per capita wine consumption is about 3 gallons.
“Dear Karen, I’ve read about wine being made and aged in a Burgundy barrel and also in a Bordeaux barrel. What’s the difference?” – Derrick M., Louisville, KY
Derrick, the two most famous types of barrels are, as you’ve said, Burgundy barrels and Bordeaux barrels. A Burgundy barrel (piece in French) is 228 liters in capacity, low and squat, with a deeper, rounder bilge for the spent yeasts (known as lees) to settle in. With more lees contact, a wine becomes creamier and softer—just what the high acidity wines of Burgundy need. A Bordeaux barrel (or barrique) is 225 liters in capacity and is taller and longer than a Burgundy barrel. It also has thinner staves. This reflects the fact that cabernet and merlot evolve and age more gracefully when helped by minute amounts of oxygen.
Send your questions/comments to [email protected].
Chaptalization
The addition of cane or beet sugar to wine must before or during fermentation to increase the total amount of sugar and therefore raise the final alcohol content. Chaptalization is legal and widely practiced in Continue Reading…
“He planned dinners, of enchanting aromatic foods that should be carried under the nose, snuffed and then thrown to the dogs … endless dinners, in which one could alternate flavour with flavour from sunset to dawn without satiety, while one breathed great draughts of the bouquet of old brandy.”
— Vile Bodies (1930) by Evelyn Waugh, as quoted by Charles Spence in Gastrophysics: The New Science of Eating
