THE FRUGAL OENOPHILE
Wine Appreciation through Education
email newsletter: summer 2008

An article that appeared in Decanter (www.decanter.com/news/258025.html) attempts to shed some light on America’s wine buying habits in the wake of that country’s recent economic woes. The article states that Americans are still buying wine despite a low dollar and other miseries. (I’d suggest that events such as the below-prime mortgage fiasco would mostly encourage wine purchases.) But what really confused me was the summary of wine price tiers included in the article.

According to a spokesperson for Constellation Brands, the company that commissioned the study, wines in the $15-20 category are classed as "luxury" wines. More surprising is the categorising of $8 to $11 wines as "super premium". Am I missing something here? Is an $8 wine truly a premium product? And, if I bump my spending to $15 or more, am I crossing over into rarefied territory that I, and no doubt many others, simply cannot routinely aspire to?

Perhaps even more surprising is the report's summary of "bag-in-box" wines: "Of all wine categories, the fastest-growing is the cask, or premium box segment" (emphasis added). Premium box wine ... is that an oxymoron?

The "Luxury" scale apparently looks like this:

Super Premium: $8 to $11
Luxury: $15 to $20
Super Luxury: $20 and up

Now, I have often been taken to task for suggesting that all wine is expensive. I’ve also argued on both sides of this, pointing out that a $10 bottle of wine serves up 5 glasses at a mere $2 each -- far cheaper than your average designer latté. One the other hand, if you have adopted wine into your lifestyle and have a bottle pretty much every night, then your food budget will show the strain. In fact, the wines I open at home with dinner often cost more then the entire meal!

So, seriously, how much are we spending?

Just for fun, I put together a simple spreadsheet to help analyze and quantify the situation. Add a few simple assumptions and voila: we see what it really costs to be a dedicated cork dork.

1. Assume a budget-appropriate price per bottle -- anywhere from $8 to $40 -- and one bottle per night.
2. Assume also eating out once a week, with the wine coming in at 3 times the cost of your every-day wine.
3. Therefore, assume you are spending 9 times the "base price" each week for wine.

Here are the numbers for weekly, monthly and annual outlay. (Figures are after tax. Before tax? Don't ask.)

Now you know why I drink mostly home-made wine.

Vincor Gives Back ... Sort of

Formerly Canada's largest "vintner", and fourth largest in North America (until it was swallowed up by Constellation Brands of New York), Vincor has shown its magnanimous side with a recent endowment to the Viticultural Program at Brock University in St. Catherines.

Get this: The multi-billion-dollar company has created a scholarship and will give a whopping $1500 to a single deserving viticultural student. That amounts to a full $166/month for the school year, or just over $5 per day. That's almost enough to buy a big mac and a small drink.

I admit that something is better than nothing -- after all, the life of a full-time student can be austere -- but I’d like to think that, with the billions of dollars Vincor takes in every year, and with the 6-figure and even 7-figure salaries they pay their executives, they could cough up a bit more than the equivalent of a bottle of Brights House wine.
 

Historic Tasting Foments a Paradigm Shift

Judgment of Paris: California vs. France and the historic 1976 Paris tasting
that revolutionized wine
George M. Taber
Simon & Schuster, 2005
ISBN: 0743247515 / 9780743247511
$29.99 Cdn

We're living in a time of rapid and sometimes intimidating change. Scientists (at least the trustworthy ones) are united on the issue of global climate change, while governments and industrialists are trying hard to ignore the problem. Fuel prices reach record highs almost daily; meanwhile wine producers are looking at how international Free Trade has affected the market.

One trend today seems to be marketing strategies based mainly on "green washing". For example, a certain government liquor regulator forced alternative packaging on producers in order to avoid a bottle take-back program. (A glass plant in Toronto closed recently, citing this switch as a causative factor). Old World wine regions are switching -- first to cute animal labels, then to varietal naming, and now to "lifestyle images" -- to sell their formerly stuffy wines in New World markets. Long-established European vintners are buying previously unplanted land "higher up the hill", and are even buying land in formerly troublesome climates such as Great Britain. And appellation systems are being overhauled, and not necessarily for the better.

I'm a big fan of interesting wine offered at a fair price, and I value what the local terroir brings to a wine. I'm also a fan of the 100-mile diet and other "buy local" messages. And I’m Canadian, so I look for opportunities to support my own, regional economy.

VQA stands for vintners’ quality alliance. It also stands for wine that was grown in Ontario (BC as well) to very high standards. Vinification is also held to high standards. These wines pass both the "buy local" test and the terroir test. When I buy a VQA wine, I know what I’m getting. It won’t be "Cellared in" or "Cellared by" or "Blended and bottled by". Were it allowed on the label, VQA wines might say "Made from grapes we planted ourselves; grew, tended and harvested ourselves; vinified, aged and bottled ourselves at our own winery." The back label might say "This wine expresses the unique qualities found only when these grapes are allowed to grow right here, in this soil."

If you’re looking for true "Wine of Origin" (a very easy to understand term that, unfortunately, our decision-makers don’t want to use), then an appellation designation is your guarantee. I'll choose VQA, just as I would choose AOC or DO or IGT. I want to taste the land, and these days I prefer to do that while minimizing further damage to the land. So why not buy local, buy honest, and enjoy.

I was approached a few months ago to do a wine tasting seminar in the first of what organizers hope will be an annual event in the tiny vacation hamlet of Haliburton Ontario. Located about an hour north of Peterborough (2 1/2 hours north-east of Toronto), Haliburton is a jewel of a town that wraps around Head Lake. The Summer Nights Wine and Music Festival, organized by Toronto-based marketing entrepreneur Adam Brind and Torq Media Group Ltd., took place in High Lake Park, located in the centre of town. (Normally I'm a very good navigator, with very good instincts. But on this trip, after a couple of wrong turns, I resorted to calling the organizers on my cell phone. The embarrassing conversation went like this: "Where are you?" "I'm on Main Street." "Look to your right. Can you see a tent?" "Oh, I guess we've arrived.")

The festival was very well organised, running from 11:00 am on Saturday with live music, and wine, beer, scotch and food vendors in the park. I did my usual Wine Style Trios shtick in mid-afternoon, right after the scotch tasting, and followed by Shari Darling's "Harmony on the Palate". Saturday closed with live concerts.

Sunday was a continuation of the same booze, food, music and seminars theme. In all it was a wonderful event with a superb combination of entertainment, education and atmosphere. I will definitely be putting this one on my list of must-attend events.

Colio CEV Series Raises the Bar while Lowering the Price

It's always interesting to find out that a winery has a new winemaker. It's especially interesting when the outgoing winemaker is someone who has been there from the beginning, and who has a stellar reputation. Carlo Negri helped cofound Colio Estate Wines on Lake Erie's North Shore in 1980, borrowing the winery's name from his previous homeland, the Collio district in Northern Italy. Today, Carlo and Colio are leaders in quantity -- some 240,000 cases annually -- as well as quality. (If you have a chance to try any of their 25th anniversary wines; you will be impressed.)

Carlo Negri has not disappeared, by the way. He will continue to help guide the winemaking as consulting winemaker. Otherwise, the reins have been handed over to Tim Reilly, who has been with Colio since 2002.

Colio wines cover the entire quality spectrum (some are Cellared in Canada offerings). Their CEV series is the first tier of their premium wines. I had a chance to try the first wines to be released under Tim Reilly's tenure and here are the results.

Colio CEV Sauvignon Blanc VQA 2006 - $15.75
The aromas here are textbook sauvignon, with rich lemon and grapefruit, and nuances of melon and grass. The palate is suitably racy, with ample white grapefruit and spicy flavours and a pleasantly tart close. Very good body and length, and enough stuffing to compliment pork roast or grilled veggies, or try with flavourful fish. You might even want to lay down a couple of bottles for six months to a year. An exceptional bargain and winner of the Trophée Excellence at Vinexpo '08.

Colio CEV Cabernet Sauvignon VQA 2005 - $19.75
You don't often find cab this ripe in Ontario. The nose shows rich dark berry flavours, a slightly gamey note, a riot of spices, and a smoky close. The palate is deliciously smooth, with red and black currant flavour, soft tannins, and a strong acid core. Not overly full and with very good length, it would be a good cellar candidate. Calls out for roast beef.