Doug Tunnell and I were out on The Deschutes River last summer. One of the things we talked about was the words and phrases the French often use to describe their new wines that stir consumers to buy. Below is a tongue-in-cheek description of a few. Add your own if this sounds familiar.

We periodically hear that a particular offering is a “vin de garde.” The term connoted a bottle aging gracefully to reach perfection in years to come. It is also true that this can mean hard, unyielding wine with high acidity or tannin — or both — and shallow fruit. As I look back, this term seems to have been designed to sell wine now with no recriminations for 20 years, while the wine is sleeping. Buyer beware. 1988 red burgundies were widely touted as “vin de garde”. I have been “garde”ing some of these for nearing 20 years. Many are still hard, sour, and shallow. (more…)

The 2005 Burgundies were touted as wines from a vintage that comes along maybe once in a decade, possibly two or three times in a century. Prices rose to unbelievable levels. Retailers were given smaller allocations than earlier years. Now, most of the 2005s have sold through to distribution, and we hear little of it. But oh, the glorious 2006s!

Which gets me to the point of this rant. I have now followed Burgundy introductions for over 30 years. In that time, I recall 12 “vintages of the century” (1969, 1978, 1983, 1985, 1990, 1993, 1995, 1996, 1999, 2002 and 2005). Each in its turn was touted as better than anything before it. I, for one, bought the hype almost every time. Each vintage was, in fact, very good, but I noticed that once a vintage was safely in my cellar, the newest vintage (the one currently for sale) was described as even better.

I am not against selling. It makes the world go round. But, after watching it for 30 years, I am very wary of hysterical type. You should be too.

Paul Fortino

While I am as much as a palate geek as the rest of those who purchase a bottle of juice - for me, wine is about relationships - forming them with the folks who make the wine and ultimately with the folks with whom you will share this wine. Buying wine is not about collecting and obtaining a trophy. Nor is it about hoarding away a secret cache of bottles so that they can gather dust and ultimately be forgotten. Reading through my wine notes, I do not find some perfectly written scored analysis of wines consumed, but instead, a journal of where I was and with whom I shared the wine. In short - for me, wine is about memories. (more…)

So if you can’t possibly “win” this wine game, why play? I tell my wife it’s a good investment, but she’s too sweet to point out I’ve never sold a bottle in twenty years. Drank, traded, donated to charitable causes, given away— yes— but sell? I don’t think so. I know people who collect and play the “ratings game” and take exclusive comfort in the ratings of the critics, sometimes without even trying the wine for themselves. While there are certainly wine critics I respect and heed, that approach is too passive for me. I like to at least try to figure it out for myself. And of course we all know “label lovers” who continue to revere a brand even after the winemaker who made the wine famous has retired and sold the vineyard to a multinational corporation. So while you may find certain labels in my cellar, there is no lifetime pass if the style, quality or value diminishes.

The fact is, my wine collection-and I suspect many others– started as an accident. A classmate of mine ended up at a wine distributor and she gave me a few bottles of truly different and interesting wines to try way back in 1985. I had no idea there was more to wine than what I had been used to drinking. This started a long and serendipitous path of trial and error (lots of errors), study, discussions, and travel. My cellar is more of an ongoing process than a collection. Like most people who consistently buy wine, I have developed my prejudices on regions, grapes and winemakers, but every region has it’s expressions of balance, quality and value. And even though I can afford more expensive wines than I could in 1985, those are the bottles I’ve tried to add over the years. Besides, it’s a good investment.

John von Schlegell

I’m not even sure where to begin with this wine. It’s one of Oregon’s rarest (only 37 cases were made) and most difficult-to-find wines (who would be crazy enough to try and sell it?) to locate. So I guess I’ll start at the beginning. Several years ago I was at a trade tasting in Chicago. There were hundreds of wines and dozens of winemakers, all jammed into a trendy Chicago restaurant designed to look like the inside of a circus tent. Which was the perfect setting for this wine. At about the time I thought my palate was about to give up the ghost, one of my employees came running over and said, “I may have just died and gone to heaven. You have to go find Sam Tannahill and ask for the Jackass. It’s hidden under the table.” I didn’t know quite how to interpret that statement so I went to see for myself. After all, I’ve seen stranger things than a jackass under a table at a trade tasting, but you never know.

Sam Tannahill is usually a cool, calm and collected fellow (think young Elvis Costello, but without the contemptuousness) but he was clearly nervous about this wine he had hidden under the table. It didn’t have a label and it had the oddest light orange color with flecks of pink. Was it a rose? Was it an Oregon attempt at sherry? Was it a white wine? Sam wasn’t sure himself, but he did say “I’m pretty sure my wife (co-winemaker Cheryl Francis) isn’t happy about this wine. In fact, she calls it the ‘jackass wine’ because that’s what she thinks of me for making it.” (more…)

Gregg Popovich

One small but important note is to construct or buy racks that have the flexibility to handle bottles of different sizes and shapes. Whereas thirty years ago bottles came in a handful of shapes, sometimes it seems as if everyone today is trying to distinguish themselves with a bottle no one else has which can make for a storage nightmare or worse, an expensive red puddle on the floor.

Gregg Popovich