WineCountry Staff: December 2007 Archives

Wine Country's Next Generation of Wine Makers Takes Off

By Courtney Cochran

Ever since Yellow Tail landed stateside I've seen a lot more young wine drinkers stepping up to the tasting plate. Now, before you stick up your nose and bad mouth the Aussie juice as some sort of unsophisticated entry-level slop, think twice.

It's having a profound effect on consumption patterns amongst new drinkers, functioning as a starter wine for lots of folks who were previously swilling just beer and booze. And, as is true for all things entry-level, there's only one way to go from here: up.

Once they're in the door, newbie wine lovers are moving quickly beyond the black and yellow to more complex wines. And what better way to introduce them to a bunch of awesome examples than through a live tasting featuring some of most dynamic movers and shakers on the wine scene under the age of 35?

It's no accident that most great wine-producing regions of the world have a signature dessert wine. Bordeaux, Tuscany and the Rheingau are the most famous homes of "stickies," as dessert wines are sometimes called, but the list is far longer. The reasons are simple: sweet wine makes a great finish to good meals, and it takes good grapes to make good dessert wine. So superior stickies tend to be made in places where good wine and good food go hand in hand.

Ancient Vines Still Growing Strong in Lodi

Though they're gnarled and twisted with age, a little hunched over and not at all interested in new-fangled ideas like, say, trellises and grafting, there's still plenty of life left in the wise, old vines of Jessie's Grove. They've made it 115 years, after all.

Given names like Yoda and Royal-tee, these relatively ancient vines are the oldest in Lodi--and among the oldest in the state. Planted in the late 1800's, not long after the madness of the Gold Rush and some of the earliest plantings by the viticultural Johnny Appleseed of the California's Central Valley--Captain Charles Weber--the vines continue to produce intensely flavored, highly prized Zinfandel and Carignane wines.