On my recent press trip to Australia, not 24 hours after getting off the plane I found myself winding down country roads amidst the pastoral rolling hills of the Yarra Valley. I arrived mid-harvest, to friendly, purple stained hands, and sighs of relief at a vintage that everyone felt was one of the best in several years.

Not long after arriving in the valley, I spent an hour or two above it, getting the lay of the land from the air, and getting a chance to survey the damage from the deadly wildfires of 2009.

The destruction wrought by the blaze was astounding, with countless acres of blackened trees stretching far into the distance, flanked by fresh green undergrowth. Most of the wineries that escaped destruction still lost most of the vintage to smoke taint, though there were some small miracles for a few. One vintner showed me the only patch of vines that were burned at his property, yet they had managed to spring back to life and yielded fruit for the 2010 harvest.

For those unfamiliar with the region, Australia's Yarra Valley is a small winegrowing area about 80 miles to the East of Melbourne in the state of Victoria. The Yarra Valley is the oldest winegrowing region in Victoria, boasting vineyards established in 1838, shortly after the founding of Melbourne and the state of Victoria itself, and a vibrant wine industry that became quite famous by the turn of the 20th Century. Shifting preferences towards fortified wines as well as regional economic trends led to the disappearance of wine production in the valley between 1921 and the early 1960s.

The Yarra Valley is billed as one of Australia's cool-climate growing regions -- with maximum summer temperatures notably cooler than both Bordeaux and Burgundy -- but the region's climate can sometimes include a long slow "indian summer" which is the prime determinant of whether the Bordeaux grape varieties planted there manage to fully ripen.

I was in the valley during this period of warm, breezy fall, and could appreciate the magic of Pinot Noir having been harvested weeks before, while the Cabernet and Cabernet Franc were just about ready to bring in.

My trip above the valley led me to be able to say that there really is no one specific valley when it comes to the Yarra, and no real uniformity even within the Upper Yarra and the Lower Yarra regions. The land is folded and bumpy and pocked and sloping, interrupted by ridges and ravines, and crisscrossed by creeks. The soil types are varied and complex, and there is some debate about what really characterizes the best vineyard sites, but most agree that the vineyards with the more northerly aspects tend to be better, and those with some more elevation and slope tend to be the best.

The region, which represents roughly 2% of Australia's vineyards and 0.5% of the wine production by volume has about 85 wineries. Interestingly, most are on the smaller side, and many do not export. In fact, quite a number of wineries sell only through their "Cellar Doors" which is the Australian name for their tasting rooms.

I had a chance to visit with several wineries in the valley, as well as sit down to a tasting of a number of smaller production wines made in the area. The notes below are some of my favorites.

TASTING NOTES:

2008 Giant Steps "Sexton Vineyard" Chardonnay, Yarra Valley
Palest gold in the glass with a very nice shine, this wine has a nose of cold cream and nice golden apple aromas. In the mouth the wine is smooth and rich, with a gorgeous acid balance and nice apple, pear, and lemon flavors. Really nice yellow grapefruit lingers in the finish. Score: around 9. Cost: $20. Click to buy.

2008 Giant Steps "Arthurs Creek Vineyard" Chardonnay, Yarra Valley
Pale yellow gold in the glass, this wine smells of green apple and lime zest. In the mouth it has a bright mineral and lime zest quality. Wet stones and citrus pith linger in the finish. 300 cases made. 35-year-old vines. Score: somewhere between 8.5 and 9.

2008 Oakridge "864" Chardonnay, Yarra Valley
Pale greenish gold in the glass, this wine has a nose of floral, lemon zest aromas. In the mouth it is rich and bright with really juicy acidity and lemon and grapefruit pith flavors with a very nice lime note on the finish. Score: somewhere between 8.5 and 9.

2008 Punt Road Chardonnay, Yarra Valley
Pale green-gold in the glass, this wine has a nose of lemon zest and wet stones. In the mouth it offers unripe pear, crisp mineral notes, and a hint of woody bitterness on the finish. Score: around 8.5. $20. Click to buy.

2006 Yering Station Reserve Chardonnay, Yarra Valley
Pale green gold in the glass, this wine smells of buttered popcorn, jasmine, and cold cream. In the mouth it is super bright and juicy with gorgeous lemon and buttered sourdough vanilla, and cold cream. Wonderfully juicy and eminently quaffable this is a wine you want to drink all night long. Delicious. Score: somewhere between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $42. Click to buy.

2008 Gembrook Hill Pinot Noir, Yarra Valley
Lightly ruby in the glass with hits of orange at the edge and some cloudy haze, this wine has a nose of bright cranberry and red apple skin. In the mouth it has a wonderful red apple skin, raspberry, and cinnamon quality. Orange peel, cloves, and a tiny bit of heat emerge on the finish that suggests a tiny bit of volatile acidity. Very interesting and distinctive. Score: somewhere between 9 and 9.5.

2008 Giant Steps "Gladysdale Vineyard" Pinot Noir, Yarra Valley
Light ruby in the glass with hints of orange at the edge, this wine smells of cranberry and raspberry. In the mouth it is silky and wonderfully textured with cranberry and raspberry flavors. Super faint tannins creep around the bright orange peel and juicy. lightly woody flavors. Nice finish. Score: around 9.

2008 Mac Forbes "Woori Yallock" Pinot Noir, Yarra Valley
Cloudy light ruby in color, this wine has a nose of bright raspberry and floral notes. In the mouth it is beautiful and crystalline in its aspect, with bright raspberry fruit and faint tannins. Wonderful, airy finish with very delicate qualities. Outstanding. Score: somewhere between 9 and 9.5.

2008 Tarrawarra Estate Pinot Noir, Yarra Valley
Light to medium ruby in the glass, this wine has a wonderful perfumed nose of sweet cherry and cedar. In the mouth the wine is smooth and cedary, with sweet cherry and raspberry quality (though the wine is dry) with a nice long cedar finish. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $22. Click to buy.

2008 Jamsheed "Silvan" Syrah, Yarra Valley
Dark garnet in the glass, this wine has an intense growling nose of Jaegermeister or some other weird herbal woody tincture -- chinese medicine? -- that makes it incredibly distinctive. In the mouth it offers blackberry, woody-stemmy, cocoa powder and lightly grippy leathery tannins. Great acidity, and wonderful oiled leather with cloves on the finish. Score: somewhere between 9 and 9.5.

2008 Giant Steps "Harry's Monster" Cabernet Sauvignon, Yarra Valley
Medium to dark ruby in the glass, this wine has a nose of rich black cherry aromas. In the mouth it is rich and broad shouldered with dark cherry and wet earth flavors stretched across a musculature of tannin. Wet dirt and tobacco notes drive the long, aromatically sweet finish. Concentrated but very balanced. Score: around 9. Cost: $40. Click to buy.

2005 Yeringberg "Yeringberg" Cabernet Sauvignon, Yarra Valley
Dark garnet in the glass this wine has a gorgeously perfumed nose of cherry, tobacco, and dark chocolate. In the mouth it is beautifully balanced with cherry and cassis flavors with gorgeous soft tannins and a cedar note on the finish. Score: around 9. Cost: $39. Click to buy.

2006 Yering Station Reserve Shiraz Viognier, Yarra Valley
Dark garnet in the glass, this wine smells of white flowers over blackberry pie. In the mouth it is beautifully silky with velvet tannins that wrap around flavors of blackberry, cassis, and a light briary greenness that all seem to float above the palate with an effortlessness that makes this wine incredibly easy to drink. A light woody coffee note emerges on the finish that is quite appealing. Balanced and delicious. Score: around 9. Cost: $33. Click to buy.

Vineyard-threatening pests have spread from Chile to California wine country

I love broadening my own wine horizons, and I'm always surprised at how narrowly most non-wine-focused media see the world of wine. So I was quite surprised to see a whole segment today on CNN all about Georgian wine. No not the Southern State. The country.

The country of Georgia hosts one of the oldest winemaking cultures in the world, and is regarded by some as the birthplace of winemaking. Georgian wine, of which I've had a scant couple of bottles in my life, comes in many varieties, but they are most famous for their tradition of long macerated wines fermented and stored in huge terra-cotta amphorae called kvevri that are buried in the ground up to their necks. These practices are currently being borrowed (honored?) by a small number of winemakers outside of Georgia, most notably Josko Gravner, whose orange wines are very dear to my heart.

In this nice little segment, reporter Ivan Watson visits a couple of wineries to taste wines out of the kvevri and it looks like a lot of fun. It's great to see CNN off the beaten travel path, and wonderful to see them highlighting a wine region so rich in tradition and history.

Unfortunately, CNN perhaps not being so wine savvy, hasn't done a great job of fact checking their sources, as the number of vinifera grape varieties (the primary source of most fine wine) in the world that is quoted in the story at 3000 is actually much closer to 10,000. While Georgia should be proud of their 500 (of which 38 are officially sanctioned for grape growing, according to Jancis Robinson's Oxford Companion to Wine), they certainly don't represent one sixth of the known varieties on the planet.

No matter. Georgia is still cool, and so are their wines.

Check out the video.

I went to South Africa about 2 years ago on a press junket and fell in love with the place. A stunning landscape, wonderful food, and amazing potential as a wine region left me with the desire to return. In particular, though, I was struck by the value for money that many of its wines offered, and the diversity of styles and grape varieties that seem to be grown successfully in its varied climates.

If you're like me, traveling there without someone else footing the bill is prohibitively expensive, not to mention time consuming. But you needn't trek all the way around the globe to get a taste of South African wine.

In a little more than a week, a group of South African wine importers is putting on two public wine tasting events, one in Los Angeles, one in San Francisco. I'm a bit of a broken record about these public tasting events, but let me say one more time what an opportunity they represent to learn a lot about a wine region, discover new wines to buy, and just generally educate your palate.

This particular event will showcase more than 100 wines from about 50 producers from South Africa, most of whose wines are readily available, or easy enough to find with a little effort on your part. The wines will be accompanied by food from Radio Africa and Kitchen, and apparently the tasting venue will also showcase African art.

Celebrate South Africa Wine Tasting: Los Angeles
Monday May 3rd, 7 PM to 11 PM
Vinoteque on Melrose
7469 Melrose Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90046

Celebrate South Africa Wine Tasting: San Francisco
Thursday, May 6th, 6 PM to 10 PM
The Box SF
1069 Howard Street
San Francisco, CA 94103

Tickets for both events are $30, and should be purchased in advance online. You can find links to the ticketing web site as well as more information on the online press release for the event.

My usual tips for such public tastings apply: get a good night's sleep; go with food in your stomach; wear dark clothes to avoid wine stains; drink lots of water; and if you want to learn something and enjoy yourself, SPIT !

Unfiltered highlights a few of the many wineries making an effort to go a little greener this Earth Day

A recent study confirms that most AOCs have decreased in value over the past two decades

I'm in a pissy mood. At first I thought it was because I ordered a Pinot Noir tonight at a restaurant that wasn't as nuanced as I had hoped. But the more I leveled with myself, the more I realized it was really because I got the following e-mail today that I've been gnashing my teeth over, so to speak, for a number of hours:

Dear Alder,

In accordance with the Federal Trade Commission, below is Rodney Strong's digital influencer agreement. To receive future releases of Rodney Strong Wine Estates wines for possible review, please review and reply YES to this email. To decline, reply NO, but understand I will no longer send you wines.

Please do not alter the subject line. Please know that I am sending this to all my media contacts, whether you blog or not. Everything seemingly gets online one way or another.

RODNEY STRONG WINE ESTATES
DIGITAL INFLUENCER ENGAGEMENT & CODE OF CONDUCT AGREEMENT

Rodney Strong Wine Estates is committed to compliance with laws and regulations that govern the prevention of unfair, deceptive or misleading marketing practices between brands, bloggers and other digital influencers.

Our goal with these guidelines is to continue to work in a transparent manner with influencers like you who share our core values. This 'Digital Influencer Engagement & Code of Conduct Agreement' document merely codifies our current best practices.

Please know that we greatly appreciate your voluntary participation with us and we do not require any influencer to blog or discuss Rodney Strong Wine Estates, its labels, products, initiatives or events related to the company regardless of any material compensation.

Because we believe true advocacy can never be purchased, we do not pay for editorial placement. However, we do provide free product, host regional meetings and sponsor Sonoma County wine education trips for qualifying journalists, bloggers and other digital influencers.

In order to remain compliant with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) blogger guidelines, Rodney Strong Wine Estates respectfully requests that you adhere to the below listed disclosures and best practices.

Standards of Conduct in Working with Rodney Strong Wine Estates:
* We ask that you disclose in each post if you received free product, a trip, or any other material compensation received from Rodney Strong Wine Estates.
* We have always stressed honesty in reviews and ask that you give your true opinion of our wine. We will not tell you what to write, we encourage you to state your personal findings, beliefs and experiences.
* Any blogger who receives any material compensation from Rodney Strong Wine Estates shall comply with the Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising published by the Federal Trade Commission.

Tips on compliance:
* Disclose in each post.
* Create a disclosure policy that is visible and easy to read on your website, blog or Twitter account.
* Include brand affiliation and /or your likelihood that you will receive compensation in the future in your bio.

We want to have a long, mutually beneficial relationship with you and would be happy to answer any questions you may have about the FTC disclosure guidelines.

If you are in agreement with the above guidelines, please reply YES to this email.

Robert Larsen
Public Relations Director
Rodney Strong Wine Estates

This well written letter is, of course, in response to the recent FTC ruling that so many of us in the wine blogosphere wrote about a few months ago. In case you missed it, the FTC stated that it would henceforth be able to fine and prosecute both the bloggers who fail to disclose when they are writing about a product that they received for free, as well as the company that provided the product.

Of course the thing that galled so many about this ruling is that it specifically exempted print journalism, in a truly mind-numbing double standard of gargantuan proportions.

It's no wonder then, that Rodney Strong, perhaps one of the more frequent shippers of wine samples to bloggers, feels the need to offer this bit of (quite well done) ass-covering digital contractualism. If I were them, I'd do it too.

The requests that they make of bloggers are quite reasonable given the FTC ruling, and for most serious wine bloggers, something they've been doing already.

It pisses me off to no end, however, that they aren't forced to do the same with the print journalists of the world, who in turn, have no obligation to meet any such standards of conduct.

Not that it's their fault, but it also pisses me off to be talked to this way by a winery, as if thanks to the FTC we now need to have some sort of contractual relationship, when that is the last thing I want to have with any winery. Despite the very appropriate language about how the winery does not expect anything but honesty, and never requires anyone to write anything even if they do receive a sample, they damn well are requiring what amounts to a verbal contract with various terms and conditions.

I'll be interested to see whether this becomes a common thing, or whether it is merely the overly cautious action of a large company that suffered some unanticipated public controversy in the past for a sample campaign to wine bloggers.

But until I start getting letters like this from everyone that wants to send me a wine sample, I've decided it feels far too... yucky. Which shouldn't be a reflection on the winery, just a reflection of the overall situation caused by our friends in the government. So for now, that's a big NO, from me, Mr. Larsen. I'm sorry you felt compelled to write it, but you did a good job considering the utter inanity that prompted it.

To become great wine countries, Argentina and Chile need distinctive wineries that offer an altogether new vision

Importers, distributors, country trade commissions, and individual wine regions have long put on tastings for the trade and media to showcase wines in the hopes of increased sales and better media coverage. One of the most encouraging trends I see in the wine world continues to be the proliferation of such tastings available for the general public.

Let's face it, even someone who has a bottle of wine with every meal only gets a couple hundred tastes of different wines every year. And most people tend to stick with the wines or grape varieties that they know. No matter how adventurous the palate, there aren't that many opportunities to learn what you like and what you don't like during the course of normal consumption of wine for pleasure at mealtimes.

Instead of consumption for pleasure, those interested in wine need to consumer for education, which is where large public wine tastings come in. The chance to sip and spit sixty, eighty, even one hundred wines for the price of a couple of bottles represents an unmatched opportunity to educate your palate.

The latest opportunity for such an education is around the corner in San Francisco. On May 3rd, the Austrian Wine Marketing Board is bringing a whole lot of Riesling and Gruner Veltliner to town for you to taste, along with cheese and various Austrian finger foods.

Austrian Riesling, in particular, is one of the world's greatest food wines and anyone who isn't that familiar with it should take this opportunity to find out why. Likewise, you might decide to discover why Gruner Veltliner is so popular with sommeliers in this country.

Austria Uncorked 2010 San Francisco
Monday, May 3rd - 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
The Officer's Club
1 Fort Mason, San Francisco, CA 94123 (PDF map)

Austria Uncorked 2010 New York City
Wednesday, May 5th - 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Tribeca Rooftop
2 Desbrosses Street
New York, NY 10013 (map)

Tickets for San Francisco $60 and New York tickets are $70. Both should be purchased in advance online. Use the code: AUSTRIAEB at checkout to get a $15 discount !!!

For those who may not have tasted a lot of Riesling in one sitting before, the wine is quite acidic and can make your teeth hurt after a while. Drink lots of water and eat as you go to minimize this effect. My other public tasting tips also apply -- get a good night's sleep, make sure you have some food in your stomach before you taste, and be sure to spit so you can learn something as you go, instead of getting schnockered after 10 tastes.

You know how some entrepreneurs seem to start businesses in their sleep? They create a company, make it profitable or sell it to someone, and then it seems like a week into their "vacation" they're starting another one, and another. The most successful of these seem to have the Midas touch, with each business more successful than the last, as if they can't help but make tons of money.

There's an analogue to this type of personality in the wine world, and it is readily demonstrated by one Steve Clifton. Clifton is best known for his partnership in Brewer-Clifton wines with friend Greg Brewer, but in the last ten years he has started no less than three different successful wine labels, as if he just wanders around and they seemingly fall out of his pockets.

It would seem like incredible luck if Steve Clifton wasn't so clearly a guy who knows what he's doing.

After falling in love with wine in college as a waiter in Italian restaurants, his love continued to grow through the 1980's as a young musician and aspiring nightclub owner. In the early 1990's Clifton started making wine in his basement and took a series of jobs in wine sales and marketing where he met Greg Brewer, who was following much the same path. Together they decided to start a winery focused exclusively on combining their love of Burgundian varietals and the appellation in their back yards: the Santa Rita Hills.

Getting fruit from what they called "extreme vineyards" in the appellation, Brewer-Clifton rapidly shot to recognition as on of the best producers of small-lot Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in the region.

You would think that Clifton would have his hands full managing one of the hottest new labels in Santa Barbara County, but a few years later he started playing with Rhone varietals, and then suddenly the world was chasing after another new label: Alder Wines (no, they did not ask me before they started it).

Sandwiched in between these two projects, Clifton apparently couldn't restrain his affections for Italian wines or for an Italian educated woman named Chrystal, so he married her and started Palmina Wines, though not necessarily in that order.

Palmina is a small family run operation -- Steve makes the wine and Chrystal manages the books -- focused exclusively on Italian varietals grown in Santa Barbara County. Chrystal's fluent Italian has helped the couple build relationships with a number of Italian producers who have helped the couple keep their wines true to the old world styles and techniques appropriate for each varietal, whether that be fermentation in steel or old oak vats, avoiding malolactic fermentation for whites, and aging (often) with a minimum or complete lack of new French oak. This is important, because Palmina is both literally and figuratively breaking new ground in California in its attempts to grow some lesser known Italian varietals.

The winery produces Malvasia Bianca, Traminer, Tocai Friulano, Pinot Grigio, Moscato and Arneis, along with several Nebbiolo-based and Barbera-based wines; a Sangiovese and Merlot blend that utilizes the passito method of drying grapes before pressing; a couple of Dolcettos, and a blend of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Refosco among others.

In addition to being quite delicious and true to the characters of their grape varieties (something which I find lacking in many California renditions of traditional Italian grapes), Palmina wines are especially noteworthy for what I consider quite fair, even value-based, pricing. While they are not made in huge quantities, they deliver quite a bit of pleasure for their price tags.

I had the chance recently to taste four of the newest releases from the winery, and though they don't represent even 30% of the portfolio, I liked them well enough to justify this writeup.

TASTING NOTES:

2009 Palmina Wines "Honea Vineyard" Tocai Friulano, Santa Ynez Valley
Pale green-gold in the glass, this wine smells of green apples and wet stones. In the mouth it is crisp and bright and stony with unripe pear, lemon juice, and nice rainwater notes on the finish. Bright and true to the character of the grape variety. Would be difficult to peg as a California wine if tasted blind. Score: around 9. Cost: $20. Click to buy.

2007 Palmina Wines "Alisos" Sangiovese, Santa Barbara County
Medium to dark garnet in the glass, this wine has a nose of sweet cherry and red licorice aromas. In the mouth it is soft and velvety with the tart sour cherry and sandalwood of the Sangiovese and a distinct rich cherry and plummy note of Merlot (of which there is a bit blended in). The sour cherry lingers in the finish with nice acidity puckering the mouth and the lightly grippy tannins lingering in the corners. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $28. Click to buy.

2005 Palmina Wines "Mattia" Red Blend, Santa Barbara County
Medium garnet in the glass, this wine has a nose of very pretty cassis and blueberry aromas. In the mouth it offers blueberry and cassis flavors with a nice leathery undertone and a woody note that lingers in the finish. Light tannins. 55% Refosco, 30% Cabernet Franc, and 15% Merlot. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $30. Click to buy.

2005 Palmina Wines "Stolpman Vineyard" Nebbiolo, Santa Barbara County
Light to medium garnet in color, this wine has a gorgeously perfumed nose of violets and sour cherry aromas touched with a beautiful sweetness. In the mouth the wine has a beautiful lightness on the palate and incredible... drinkability. Nice acidity, beautiful, restrained raspberry and cherry flavors with cedar and violet notes linger on an airy finish. Fermented and aged primarily in big old oak barrels. Score: around 9. Cost: $40. Click to buy.

I've been known to spout an opinion now and again about the Three Tier alcohol distribution system in this country, and the maddening array of ridiculous regulations that govern our ability to purchase alcohol. Mostly, however, I stay out of the fray because I'd rather write about, and I'm sure you'd rather read about, fantastic wines.

But something happened yesterday that sent chills down my spine, and made it imperative that I broadcast to as many of you as possible the urgent need to call your Congressional Representative immediately. When you get one of their aides on the phone here's what you need to say:

Under no circumstances should they vote for a house bill HR 5034: The Comprehensive Alcohol Regulatory Effectiveness Act of 2010.

This bill, introduced by representatives Bill Delahunt (D Mass) Mike Quigley (D Ill.), Howard Coble (RN. C.) and Jason Chaffetz (R Utah), was purportedly authored by the National Beer Wholesalers Association.

This bill, which you can read in its entire three short pages, is available here (PDF).

The bill is insidious in its simplicity. It would make it effectively impossible to challenge any state's laws about alcohol distribution or direct shipping by forcing the challenger to prove that any particular law "has no effect on the promotion of temperance, the establishment or maintenance of orderly alcoholic beverage markets, the collection of alcoholic beverage taxes, the structure of the state alcoholic beverage distribution system, or the restriction of access to alcoholic beverages by those under the legal drinking age.''

In other words, as long as any state can prove that its laws produce tax revenues or prevent children from buying alcohol, those laws, no matter how discriminatory, anti-competitive, or anti-consumer cannot be overturned by a legal challenge by any party or any act of Congress.

Under their usual guise of trying to "protect the children" from an "epidemic of alcoholism" the liquor wholesalers lobby has introduced a bill that effectively keeps the alcohol laws of this country an affair to be settled by state legislators and their wholesaler lobbyist friends.

This bill must be stopped. It effectively prevents any progress towards fixing the antiquated and consumer unfriendly alcohol shipping laws in this country.

Please call, write, e-mail, and otherwise hound your Congressional Representative and tell them to vote against this bill. Here's the easiest way to find, and contact your congressperson.

This is serious business. If this bill passes, consumers will have lost the ability to fight in the courts for laws that allow them to buy the wine they want, where they want.

Read what the Wine Spectator has to say about the bill.

"The shitstorm is just beginning," he says, with a gravitas that makes it sound like the end of the world for the California wine industry. And while it may be the end of an era, rather than the end of the industry as we know it, my conversations with the man that I will refer to as Deep Tank leave me with a hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I wanted to get to the heart of what is really going on in the California wine industry as a result of our great recession, so I found the most connected person I could. A guy who's walked through more wineries and talked with more winemakers than anyone else I could think of. Deep Tank has his finger on the pulse of what's going on in nearly every major wine region of California, and that pulse, he says, is faltering.

"It's a huge game of chicken out there -- between the wineries, the distributors, the retailers, and the lot of other people who have a vested interest -- and it's really ugly," he says. "Right now, no one wants to be the first person to buy a wine, only to find that two months later, it's selling for 30% less. But wineries desperately need to sell, and if they don't they're screwed."

I spent several hours talking with Deep Tank, trying to unpack just exactly why so many people were, as he put it "so fundamentally screwed" and was surprised at how quickly the conversation ceased to be about wine, and how quickly it became about fundamental business finance and economics.

We all tend to forget (those of us who knew in the first place) that wine is a business, and like any business it has to operate within key principles of accounting and economics. The idea of a winery being run by balance sheet rather than by passion and philosophy doesn't make for very good marketing, but at the end of the day, if a winery isn't run like a business, and a good one, it will fail.

And that's just what Deep Tank says is going to happen to literally hundreds of wine labels in California in the next 18 months. "There are a ton of these little custom crush wine labels that are literally going to vaporize."

The explanation for this grim fact lies in understanding the fundamental economics of owning and running a wine label, even one that includes no vineyards, no winery buildings, and no full time employees.

You may have heard that wine is a capital intensive business? This means that you have to put a ton of money in before you get much of anything out. Leaving aside for the moment all the suitcases of money required to buy land, build a winery, plant vineyards and everything associated with being a real physical winery, the costs of making wine without any of that stuff is still pretty steep. You need to buy barrels (new French oak runs somewhere between $800 and $1100 per barrel depending on the exchange rate and type of barrel). You need to buy grapes (if you want to make really good wine, that's somewhere between $4000 and $8000 per ton). You need to rent space in a custom crush winery. You need to buy bottles, and labels, and boxes, and that's all before you sell a single bottle of wine. To make matters worse, you have to age wine for some time before you sell it, so not only do you have to buy all those things, you have to buy them all for probably two to three years in a row before you sell a single bottle of red wine. Ever wonder why so many wineries in California sell Sauvignon Blanc? Because it goes from grape to $$ in about 6 months, instead of 28 months for a fine Cabernet.

But back to the point. You need boatloads of cash to start and operate a winery, and even if you've got a lot of money to start, most people finance the operation. Which is to say, they go to a bank and take out a loan.

When the bank lends a winery money, it's a relatively risky bet, especially for a small operation. As anyone knows who has taken out a loan or a line of credit before, the bank wants to protect itself in the event of the borrower not being able to pay back the loan. So they ask for security in the form of collateral. This means they need something that they can seize if for some reason you don't pay back the loan. When you get a mortgage or a home equity line, that thing the bank will take is your house. When you get a loan to start or run a winery, the collateral you put up to securitize your loan is your wine.

And that is why, says Deep Tank, "you're about to see a shitstorm of epic proportions."

"Let me play it out for you," he says.

"You've got maybe hundreds of these little virtual wine labels running out of custom crush outfits. They've got two or three vintages in really expensive oak (and another vintage sitting around in case boxes) where they've paid $6000 a ton for some fancy big name Pinot fruit, a bunch of really expensive corks and heavy glass bottles, and a couple of years ago they would have been looking forward to selling 4000 cases of their tricked up wines for $60 a bottle, no problem. That's the financial picture they took to the bank in 2008 to get another loan to buy barrels and more fruit. But now, their wine isn't worth shit. They'll be lucky to sell it at all, let alone for a discount. From a balance sheet perspective, there's a single word that describes this situation: fucked."

What used to be hundreds of thousands of dollars of inventory assets that the bank could sleep easy over, knowing they could swoop in at any time, scoop up the wine and sell it on the market, is now a near worthless pile of wood, wine, cardboard, and glass bottles.

Of course, banks don't value these assets at anywhere near their full retail value (they use a set of bulk wine pricing guides that are closely held secrets by big wine brokerage houses like Ciatti), but that doesn't matter. The value of these assets is solely dependent upon being able to sell them, and these days, almost no one is buying.

"What you're looking at," says Deep Tank, "is a foreclosure mess just like this housing debacle we just went through. Banks will not be renewing lines of credit, they'll be pulling them, and all these little wineries won't be able to buy fruit, they won't be able to buy barrels, they can't honor the contracts they've made to buy grapes at outrageous prices, and even worse, they'll be lucky to sell the wine they've already made for half price. They won't be able to finance their debt and they'll default on their loans. They're just going to vaporize."

According to Deep Tank, the handful of impending winery foreclosures already announced in a recent San Francisco Chronicle article are just the beginning.

The scary thing about that Chronicle article is that the wineries referenced there have way more going for them than the average little virtual label. They have land and buildings, assets that have much more inherent value than wine in barrel. But even those assets have taken a huge beating in terms of value, and they are not enough to satisfy banks that have suddenly gotten extremely risk averse.

It's at this point that Deep Tank introduces me to another character in the calamity. His name is Workout Winemaker.

"These guys' phones are ringing off the hook," says Deep Tank. "Any winery in financial distress is a ticking time bomb for the bank. These workout winemakers work for the bank. Their job is to come in and look at all the assets and contracts going forward and figure out whether the entity is viable, or whether it's toast. They reassess the bank's valuation of the asset, and they either find some way to better collateralize the loan, or they take over the inventory."

"Yep," says Workout Winemaker, "I'm kind of like that guy The Wolf in Pulp Fiction, except instead of dead bodies, it's dying wineries."

I knew Workout Winemaker long before I was introduced to him again by Deep Tank. He's a well known winemaker for a solid, very profitable mid-range winery in Napa who also happens to have gone to business school.

"What I'm most surprised at," he says, "is just how many banks aren't freaking out as bad as they should be. A number of them don't seem to want to admit just how bad the situation is. These banks have been giving away money according to a stupid mathematical formula about how much your wine should theoretically be worth but those numbers have no basis in today's reality. Eventually the banks are going to realize, 'Holy Christ, what have we done. We've been putting money into the shittiest industry possible for the last 10 years.'"

But for those banks that do understand the mess already, Workout Winemaker is out trying to make bad situations a little less painful. He walks into a winery and ignores the beautiful barrels. He doesn't stop to taste the wine. He walks into the back office and looks at the balance sheet, the contracts, the inventory of goods, and the current (dismal) pricing for wine on the bulk market, and then pronounces his verdict.

I ask him what his most recent verdict was, and he pauses before saying, "I'm not sure you should quote me on this, but I told them they were fucked."

"So how bad is it out there?" I ask.

"Nobody really wants to know," says Workout Winemaker. "Let me tell you the scariest thing I have seen in a long time. A few weeks ago I was walking through one of California's largest wine warehouses, and it was unbelievable what a shitpile of wine is sitting in there. I'm talking big name wineries with unbelievably huge levels of stock. I looked closer and it's 06's, 05's, and rows and rows, pallets and pallets of this stuff. Wines priced anywhere from thirty to a hundred dollars, mostly Napa but a lot of Sonoma too. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of cases. And I'm thinking to myself, 'God, this is not good.' People are waiting for some big day to come when they'll be able to sell this wine, and it's just not going to come. It's never going to come. And I'll tell you another thing. There's no way Wine 'Til Sold Out or any of those other places could possibly sell all this stuff. It was that much wine."

It sounds like a very bad time to be the accountant at a winery, or worse, a winery without an accountant.

"Tell me about it," says Workout Winemaker. "There's not nearly a high enough level of skill in this industry when it comes to the basic finances of the business for people to survive. Mix a lifestyle business with a downturn and all you get is a big fucked up soup. The sharks are circling and just waiting as the deals get better and better. It's gonna be a bloodbath and we're all just waiting for it. All of these small wineries are going to be destroyed, and the mid-tier wineries that are highly leveraged too. And roughly 80% of them are highly leveraged."

Both Deep Tank and Workout Winemaker are in the guts of the turmoil caused by the downturn. They may even stand to profit from it, especially Workout Winemaker, so their predictions of the sky is falling have to be understood in that context. Having said that, I trust both of their judgements, as do many in the wine industry. I've been trying to figure out what they might have to gain by selling the situation to me as worse than it actually is, and I can't really come up with anything.

But as I reflect on our conversations, the most sobering thought I am left with remains that even if these guys are half right, the California wine industry is in for some seriously troubled times in the next couple of years.

If there is a silver lining to any of this, it might be that there will be a lot of very good wine available for incredible prices. So if by chance you haven't been hurt as badly by the recession, or if your personal recovery leads the wine industry's recovery, you'll have an opportunity to stock your cellar at rock bottom prices, as dozens of sites like Cinderella Wine and Wines 'Til Sold Out that Deep Tank calls "dumping grounds" pop up like Spring crocuses.

Bad time to be a winery, good time to be a bargain hunter.

Wholesalers and states convince Congress to consider new legislation to prevent direct-shipping lawsuits in a campaign to protect the three-tier system

Plus, part man, part machine, all harvester, and the tools of biodynamics don't fly

Fellow wine writer Eric Asimov thinks that we have a big problem in this country. His argument is somewhat more subtle, but hopefully he'll forgive me for boiling it down to the fact that it's a damn shame that people think they need to know something about wine in order to enjoy it. He posits that we have a culture that has turned wine into an intellectual object, imbued with status and special qualities that can only be perceived and appreciated by the knowledgeable.

While Eric and I might disagree about the causes of and contributors to this malaise, I completely agree that it's a problem. I wrote my thoughts about it in a post a couple of years ago entitled The Travesty of Wine and Social Class in America.

One of the byproducts of this class driven, intellectualization of wine is something that I like to call the Wine Asshole. In 2007 a study showed that 22% of men in the UK embellished their wine knowledge to impress their dates. And worse, 35% refused to let their dates choose a wine at dinner.

Well a new study has recently come out showing that 62% of self described "wine lovers" in the UK think they know "a lot about wine" but when tested got many basic facts wrong. Much more egregiously, however, 66% said they "bluffed their way through" interactions with sommeliers at restaurants, and 30% said they do not trust a sommelier's opinion while at the same time 84% feel "they are being ripped off" in restaurants.

So let's just get this straight once and for all, guys (yes, it is mostly men that have issues here). Knowing something about wine doesn't mean shit. It doesn't make you special, sophisticated, cultured, or classy. Like any knowledge it's all in how you use it. And when you're over your head, its much sexier to ask for help than it is to bluff your way through. There's nothing shameful in seeking the help of a professional. Spend your time paying attention to your date instead of in a pissing contest with a sommelier.

Read the full story.

Industry figures call for more dining and hotel options in wine areas

Manhattan sommelier works in a Twitter-paced world, but advises wine travelers to stop and smell the vineyards

Most wine tasting events focused on a specific style or type of wine that take place in California suffer from a single, but important deficit: they feature almost exclusively California wines. Go to a Pinot Noir event, and you get 95% California Pinots, etc.

There are a few notable exceptions to this, however, and one of my favorites is the annual fete for Rhone style wines called Hospice du Rhone.

For those who have not had the pleasure of attending Hospice du Rhone, it is a unique treat for anyone who enjoys this kind of wine. Attendees spend a laid-back two and a half days of seminars, dinners, and parties which offer a unique blend of California and international wines and wine talent. The event takes its title every year from some sort of bad pun -- this year's Rhonely Hearts Club theme being a particular groaner -- but that's really the only thing bad about this event. The rest is pure, unadulterated wine fest.

The event begins with a night of bowling and debauchery, which is followed by a full day of seminars on everything Rhone that ends with various dinner parties at wineries in the area. Day two for some people begins with a big dose of antacid and more than a liberal dose of coffee to compensate for the previous evenings festivities. The second day includes more seminars and the grand tasting, which offers the remarkable and instructive opportunity to taste California, French, and Australian Syrah, Grenache, Mourvedre, and the other 19 Rhone varieties side-by-side.

The overall event is a very down-to-earth, and often humorous, celebration of the twenty-two Rhone varietals and the people who love them. The wine seminars are top notch, and the grand tasting is a fantastic opportunity to taste a lot of excellent wines, many of which are sold only through mailing lists, or not sold in the United States at all.

If you're a wine lover looking for something great to do the first weekend of May, you'd be hard pressed to find a better way to spend a couple of days.

Hospice du Rhone 2010: Rhonely Hearts Club
April 29 - May 1, 2010
Paso Robles Event Center
2198 Riverside Ave
Paso Robles, CA 93446 (map)
805.784.9543

Tickets are $795 for the entire weekend (with a la carte pricing for various elements), and $100 for the Grand Tasting available for purchase online, and should be purchased in advance as the event will likely sell out. Also, book your accommodations quickly as they tend to be scarce in this little town the closer you get to the event.

I can't remember when, exactly, I had my first Australian wine, but there's a good chance that it was made by D'Arenberg. Most certainly I first learned to recognize the distinct area of McLaren Vale courtesy of a bottle with a characteristic red slash through the label.

I've drunk D'Arenberg wines for years, always appreciating their value for the money, and often recommending them to friends who are looking for crowd-pleasing wines that are relatively easy to find.

So when I found myself in McLaren Vale a few weeks ago, I made sure to stop by the winery, have a look around, and taste through their current releases.

D'Arenberg was founded in 1912, when Joseph Osborn purchased about 60 acres in the hills of a region that was not even yet known as McLaren Vale. For the next 40 years, the winery made mostly the fortified wines that were in fashion at the time, as well as some dry red table wine, all of which was shipped in bulk to Europe. Three generations later, a precocious Francis d'Arenberg Osborn, known to all as d'Arry (pronounced like "dairy"), returned home from school to help his ailing father run the family winery. After 14 years, at the age of 30, d'Arry took over the business and two years later, launched the first vintage of wine that still bears his middle name today.

D'Arry just celebrated his 67th consecutive harvest in McLaren Vale and the 51st vintage with his name on the bottle. But d'Arry hasn't been making the wine for some time, thanks to his talented son Chester Osborn, who took over the responsibilities of Chief Winemaker in 1984, after completing his enology studies and spending time working at wineries around the world. D'Arry's name is on the bottle, but it is Chester, whose wild-child-surf-bum-meets-absent-minded-professor persona has turned d'Arenberg into the massively successful global brand it is today.

Chester Osborn is the kind of bloke that my British friends would describe as "completely mad" with a twinkle in their eye. It's a term of equal parts endearment and exasperation for the kind of person that always has and always will step to the beat of their own private drummer. Chester's rhythm section seems to be one part jazz and one part heavy metal. Take a look at his working uniform of bermuda shorts and Hawaiian shirts; or a glance at his office desk, piled literally three to four feet high with stacks of paper and back issues of wine magazines; or listen to him talk about the new glass cube of an office building he's designed with "cones of silence" that can be lowered over each desk in the open seating plan, and you might think he's just riding high on his family's legacy.

But when it comes to both making and selling wine, Osborn has proved beyond a doubt that he's anything but a freewheeling dilettante. For more than 25 years he has maintained a fierce regimen of quality-focused traditions in the cellar that many wineries his size gave up long ago. The grapes for every single wine, from the cheapest bottles to the most expensive, are all basket pressed, and every red wine is fermented in traditional cement vats lined with wax, using the fussy, labor intensive method of submerged-cap fermentation and foot treading. This technique, involving a mesh screen that holds the skins and stems of the grapes in the middle of the tank while the juice flows above and below, is one of the more gentle ways of extracting color and flavor from the grapes, and tends to be used by much higher-end wineries.

Osborn has made a few concessions to modernity, such as the huge new crusher I saw under construction on my visit, as well as mechanically harvesting most of the newly planted vineyards, but all of the heritage Shiraz, Mourvedre, and Grenache, some of which are more than 100 years old, are still picked painstakingly by hand.

Over the past 25 years the d'Arenberg portfolio has grown in breadth, adding many more wines, each as distinctly, if not cleverly, named as the last. Many of the wines are small projects that strike Osborn's fancy, or that have sprouted opportunistically from the chance to get his hands on a particularly nice source of fruit. I spent nearly an hour and a half tasting through the portfolio, and still didn't taste all the wines, a good portion of which never find their way outside of Australia.

Here's what I got to, and what I thought about them.

TASTING NOTES:
2008 D'Arenberg "Dry Dam" Riesling, McLaren Vale
Near colorless in the glass with a hint of greenness, this wine has a nose of lychee and ripe pear aromas. In the mouth it is bright, with lime juice and green apple flavors. A wonderful lemonade character lingers on the finish. Score: around 8.5.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Money Spider" Roussanne, McLaren Vale
Pale gold in the glass, this wine smells of honeysuckle and beeswax. In the mouth the wine has a juicy lychee and apple flavors, and a hint of nuttiness as the wine heads for a clean finish. Nice acidity. Score: between 8.5 and 9.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Hermit Crab" Viognier Marsanne, McLaren Vale
Pale greenish gold in the glass, this wine smells of peaches in syrup with a hint of bergamot citrus. In the mouth it is zesty and juicy with apple, pear, and faint apricot flavors that linger in a nice finish. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $17. Click to buy.

2007 D'Arenberg "The Olive Grove" Chardonnay, McLaren Vale / Adelaide Hills
Light gold in the glass, this wine smells of freshly popped and buttered popcorn. In the mouth the wine offers a lemon curd and lemon zest flavor with a juicy pink grapefruit quality on the finish. Clean, bright with acidity, and refreshing. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $17. Click to buy.

2007 D'Arenberg "The Lucky Lizard" Chardonnay, Adelaide Hills
Pale gold, nearly colorless in the glass, this wine smells of cold cream and buttered baguette. In the mouth it offers lemon juice and lemon zest, with a wonderful underlying minerality. Only 30% new oak, the rest well used barrels, and about 5% fermented with natural yeasts in barrel. Nice finish. Score: around 9.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Last Ditch" Viognier, McLaren Vale / Adelaide Hills
Pale gold in the glass, this wine smells of citrus and just the barest hint of apricots and peaches. On the palate the wine is wonderfully floral and citrus oriented, with a nice light texture (as opposed to the thick quality the grape variety can often have). Hints of unripe peach sneak into the finish which is clean and long. Fantastic acidity. Refreshing but missing some of the deeper complexity that would make this a profound instead of just pleasurable wine. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $23. Click to buy.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Feral Fox" Pinot Noir, Adelaide Hills
Light to medium ruby in the glass, this wine has a nose of nose of dried raspberries and well oiled leather with a very distinctive orange peel quality. In the mouth the wine offers juicy sour cherry and dried raspberry flavors with an orange peel and cinnamon note on the finish. Good acidity, but this wine is a little less successful than it could be. Score: between 8 and 8.5.

2007 D'Arenberg "The Custodian" Grenache, McLaren Vale
Medium garnet in the glass, this wine smells of raspberry and green herbs. In the mouth the wine offers woody tannins that wrap around a core of raspberry and cherry fruit, with savory, even salty, dried herbs on the finish. Nice acidity. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $19. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Derelict" Grenache, McLaren Vale
Medium to dark ruby in the glass this wine smells of dried cherries and raspberries. In the mouth the wine is quite velvety, with light supportive tannins that run through a core of cherry and raspberry fruit that has a wonderfully savory, umami quality, making the wine quite delicious. Nice acidity keeps the flavors fresh as the raspberries and texture of the tannins linger into the finish. Excellent. Score: around 9. $26. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Ironstone Pressings" Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre, McLaren Vale
5% Mourvedre, 20% Shiraz and 75% Grenache, this wine has a medium ruby color, and a nose of cassis and cherry with a nice briary and leathery aspect. In the mouth the wine is velvety with muscular, lightly grippy tannins and flavors of sour cherry, raspberry, and new leather. Dried herb aromas emerge on the finish with some citrus oils. Nicely integrated and balanced, this is a very drinkable wine. Score: around 9. Cost: $45. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Cadenzia" Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre, McLaren Vale
Medium garnet in color, this wine smells of sweet cherry fruit with a hint of orange peel. In the mouth it is explosively juicy with cherry and sour cherry flavors with hints of citrus zest. Incredible acidity and faint tannins add to the well-integrated package. This is a wine that compels multiple gulps. Delicious. 48% Grenache, 45% Shiraz, 7% Mourvedre. Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $28. Click to buy.

2007 D'Arenberg "The Twentyeight Road" Mourvedre, McLaren Vale
Medium cloudy ruby in color, this wine smells of stewed cherries and mulling spices. In the mouth the wine is nice and juicy with cherry and sour cherry fruit, and tight grained tannins that linger with some cinnamon notes in the finish. Nice acidity and a medium body, this is a deft rendition of the Mourvedre grape. Score: between 8.5 and 9.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Galvo Garage" Bordeaux Blend, McLaren Vale / Adelaide Hills
Dark garnet in the glass, this wine smells of rich stewed cherries and black olives. In the mouth it has a distinct cherry and black olive character with tannins that taste as well as feel like well oiled leather. The black olive character lingers with an anise component in the finish. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $29. Click to buy.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Wild Pixie" Shiraz Roussanne, McLaren Vale
Dark garnet in color, this wine has a nose of cassis and blackberry aromas with a hint of golden delicious apples. In the mouth the wine has a blackberry and tart/sour cassis backbone, supported by burly tannins. Light orange peel notes emerge on the finish. The wine contains 5% Roussanne that is cofermented with Shiraz. Score: between 8.5 and 9.

2006 D'Arenberg "d'Arry's Original" Shiraz Grenache, McLaren Vale
Medium ruby in color, this wine has a nose of rich ripe and dried cherry and chocolate. In the mouth black cherry and chocolate flavors dominate, with lightly herbal and cassis notes in the finish. Nice acidity and supple tannins give the wine life and complexity. Tasty. Score: around 9. Cost: $19. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Footbolt" Shiraz, McLaren Vale
Medium garnet in color, this wine smells of cassis and blackberries with a sour cherry overtone. In the mouth the wine offers blackberry and sour cherry flavors with woody tannins and nice acidity. Less complexity or depth to the fruit than there could be. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $15. Click to buy.

2007 D'Arenberg "The Laughing Magpie" Shiraz Viognier, McLaren Vale
Medium to dark garnet in the glass, this wine has a nose of cassis, white flowers, and honey. In the mouth the wine offers a juicy blackberry and honeysuckle aspect, with a nice cedar and cocoa powder aspect that lingers in the finish. Muscular persistent tannins and nice acidity. This wine is 10% Viognier, more than usual to compensate for an aggressively tannic Shiraz year. Score: around 8.5.Cost: $19. Click to buy.

2005 D'Arenberg "The Sticks and Stones" Red Blend, McLaren Vale
48% Tempranillo, 42% Grenache, 10% Shiraz, this wine is a medium garnet color in the glass. It smells of dried cherries and fresh raspberries with a hint of floral notes. In the mouth it is velvety and lush with cherry and raspberry flavors and aggressive but smooth tannins that linger, along with a note of citrus into the finish. With some time to mellow the tannins this will be a really drinkable wine. Score: around 9. Cost: $22. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Coppermine Road" Cabernet Sauvignon, McLaren Vale
Dark garnet in color, this wine smells of rick black cherry and just the barest hint of green bell pepper and green herbs. In the mouth the wine is a nice balance between rich black cherry fruit and a greenish aromatic herbal component that seems welded to leathery tannins that will need a couple of years to settle down. Wonderfully balanced, with excellent acidity this is a wine to age and enjoy in a few years. Score: around 9. Cost: $62. Click to buy.

2003 D'Arenberg "The Coppermine Road" Cabernet Sauvignon, McLaren Vale
Medium to dark ruby in color, this wine smells of dried cherries and a hint of black olive. In the mouth the wine has a wonderful dried cherry and red miso quality. Well integrated tannins and nice acidity give the wine a nice poise, that combined with its velvety texture demonstrate the benefit of laying this wine down for some time. Score: around 9. Cost: $62. Click to buy.

2006 D'Arenberg "The Dead Arm" Shiraz, McLaren Vale
Medium to dark garnet in color, this wine smells of cassis and blackberry with a nice violet note. In the mouth the wine has a rich cassis and blackberry-with-briar flavor, and rich velvety tannins that coat the mouth and grip the edges of the tongue tightly as the wine finishes for a long time with a hint of brown sugar and cedar. Much better than a bottle of the same vintage I had nearly a week prior. Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $49. Click to buy.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Noble Prankster" Chardonnay Semillon, McLaren Vale
Light yellow-gold in the glass, this wine smells of honey, candied orange peel and vanilla. In the mouth the wine has a nice silky texture and flavors of candied orange peel, orange blossom water, and honey. Somewhat simple. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $20 for 375ml. Click to buy.

2008 D'Arenberg "The Noble Mud Pie" White Blend, McLaren Vale
An unusual blend of botrytized Viognier, Pinot Gris, and Marsanne, this wine has a medium gold color in the glass. It smells of dried mango, papaya, pineapple and candied orange peel. In the mouth it is exceedingly thick and silky on the tongue with flavors of dried pineapple, dried mango, and rich orange blossom honey. Comes across as somewhat syrupy and needs more acidity for me to want to drink more than a mouthful. However, poured over ice cream I'd expect it to be fantastic. Score: around 8.5.

I'm quite behind on my blog reading. I try to read a lot of wine blogs but it's been some time since I checked in with many of them. Which is why I'm only now getting to suggest that you go over and read a post entitled A Manifesto for Change in the Wine Industry on Tom Wark's blog Fermentation.

That, and the fact that it took me two days to read the thing.

It's a very, very long post. Many of you will likely burn out before the end. But if you can, I encourage you to persevere to get the full story.

And what is that story? A very cogent and concise explanation of the really screwed up alcohol shipping and sales laws in this country, and how they got to be the way they are. If you are a wine lover, and especially if you've ever bought wine on the Internet (or wanted to) it's important to understand just what makes it possible (or impossible, as the case may be) for you to buy the wines you want -- online, in stores, and from wineries.

Wark also makes a sensible set of proposals for reforming the system. A set of proposals that are decades away from being commonplace, but nonetheless, a vision to aspire to.

This manifesto is truly an excellent piece of writing and a compelling argument for change of a totally irrationally restricted system. Check it out.