The origins of Trader Joe's and why Americans don't drink more wine

NapaNews ^ | February 26, 2004 | PAUL FRANSON

[sandpit]

I think my wine drinking makes up for the other 90%.

I like to experiment, but for day to day, I have a large (14oz) glass of Carlo Rossi Chianti. It's not that great, but you can't beat it for 9.99 a gallon.

[Stentor]

I find this hard to believe only 10% of Americans are wine drinkers.

That's not what was said.

[Old Professer]

Messed up your spelling, too...(execrable)

[FeliciaCat]

"More than 80 percent of the wine consumed in America is drunk by little more than 10 percent of the population."

?

[Tribune7]

ping

[bondjamesbond]

"More than 80 percent of the wine consumed in America is drunk by little more than 10 percent of the population." Happy to say, I'm doing my part.

[Bella_Bru]

I love Two Buch Chuck! It just proves that price is not always an indicator of how good a wine will be.

[CatoRenasci]

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! Or, as we say nowadays, sorry 'bout that. The nimble fingers weren't so nimble and the M-1 calibrated eyeballs had not been properly adjusted for operator headspace.

But, the point remains nonetheless: California Merlot is almost uniformly flat, lacking in structure and tanin, and sweet to the point of being as cloying as wines like Almaden or Paul Masson 'burgundy' or 'claret' were 40-50 years ago before the varietal revolution. Oh, they have a decent enough nose, but they're devoid of character (thank you San Joaquin Valley varietals programs of the '70s and '80s), have a short entry, blandly flat middle palate, and short to nonexistent finish. When not sweet, sharply acidic where they should be tannic. Faugh!

[CatoRenasci]

Well, I do have a bit of an unfair advantage over the average wine drinker: my great uncles were all oenologists and California winemakers from around the turn of the 20th century. My grandfather, (whose education was classical rather than scientific and who was on the business side) was a connoisseur whose cellar was full of first quality Burgundy, Bordeaux, Piedmontese and Tuscan wines as well as California wines, from about 1900 through 1961 (limited buying after the 55's). I was lucky enough to pull a lot of corks as a youth with some very knowledgeable men (and women), including the owners and winemakers at many California wineries of the '50s and '60s, and learn from their discussions.

P.S. My absolute favorite underappreciated wine: Inglenook Charbono. I don't think it's made any longer, but the 1941 was as good as any of the '41 Cabernet Sauvignons, and that's sayign something. The '66 and '68 were legendary, the '70 was magnificent, and the '76 is probably just ready to drink. It's a pity no one I know has a bottle anymore.

I remember going into a Trader Joe's in Los Angeles in 1978 and finding three cases of '70 Inglenook Charbono for $20 a case. Wonderful wine!

[stands2reason]

There will always be good cheap wine. If you pay more than 25$ for a bottle, you're not doing your homework---essentially you're paying for a label.

[stands2reason]

I actually prefer the taste of good beer to wine, though I rarely drink either. (Wine gives me heartburn, beer the burps.) I drink girly mixed drinks with liqueurs. My fave -- 1 1/2 - 2 shots butterscotch schnapps, 1/2 shot light rum, fill with chilled coffee and cream on the rocks.
Yummy!

[wtc911]

Distillation of spirits for whiskey and its Celtic precursor is widely acknowledged to have begun in ancient times, not following some climatic change in the 1400s as the article states. In fact a written record from the middle of that century details the delivery of 1500 bottles of aquavitae (whiskey) to a certain Monk.

Touted for its varied medicinal uses, whisky was even said to cure lisping. One can assume from this that were professional wine tasters around even then. I have tested this anti-lisping theory my self for 35 years and will, after a bit more study, be ready to pronounce it true.

[Moleman]

I just got a bottle of the two buck Chuck and it's very good. I am more of a beer drinker but beer is one of the worst things to drink due to it's glycerin index (sugar) which turns right to fat. Drinking More wine and booze now :-)

[Bob J]

The debate rages...heheh.

[BossLady]

Agreed! I find many Cali wines these days terribly acidic tasting primarily due to the high amount of alkaloids in the soil. Forget varnish remover, use one of these wines! Blech!

Have you given the Coppola wines a whirl? I received the 1998 Diamond Series Claret and Merlot as a gift and the 2000 Director's Series Chardonnay and Merlot as gifts. As a general rule, I find all of them to have a strong oaky flavor which seems to overpower the fruit notes.

[TEXASPROUD]

Cato,
You sound like you got introduced to wine at seminary. In vino veritas.

[CatoRenasci]

The Coppola "diamond series" wines are well-made and usually decent, a cut above what used to be called "sound commercial wine" in the trade. I agree that they seem to be overly oaky, but I'm not sure why since they are usually bought-in wines. Over-oaky can come from new barrels, and, especially from American oak rather than Nevers or Limousine oak. I can't imagine Coppola putting bought-in wines in his expensive French oak barrels, unless he uses the wines to season the barrels before he puts serious wine in them. I'll have to ask my cousin who has a bottling operation and has bottled for Coppola. Back around '96 I actually watched some of that wine being bottled.

I have enjoyed the Claret in a couple of vintages. I wouldn't know about the Merlot. IIRC, I was not thrilled with the Chardonnay, the oak reminded me of cardboard. Often they are not made from grapes on the estate, or even with his own wine (when it says "vinted and bottled by" you know the named producer did not make the wine, he bought it and finished it, perhaps blending it.

[CatoRenasci]

You sound like you got introduced to wine at seminary.

That would have been difficult, as I never attended seminary. Actually, it was just sitting with my great uncles and grandfather and their friends, drinking and discussing wines of various degrees of seriousness. Also going visiting with my grandfather (and sometimes one or more great uncles) to various wineries to have luncheon or dinner with the owners or winemakers. Everyone would bring interesting old wines, and interesting old wines would come out of the winery's vaults.

My grandfather had a fairly large stock of '28 and '29 first and second growth Bordeaux, which were very popular as benchmark wines to have alongside old California wines. The '35s and '37's were good, the '41s probably the best vintage in California in the 20th century (but there were only a handful of ageworthy cabernet sauvignons then: BV reserve, Inglenook cask, Simi reserve, Martin Ray, Louis Martini Special Selection, but the BV and Inglenook cask are -- for me -- the greatest California cabs I have ever drunk. Although having the complexity of age, they still had significant fruit, perfect structure and plenty of tannin left when I drank them in 1960, in 1966, in 1970 and in 1978.) The '47s were excellent, as were some '55s and '57s. In the '60s, '66 and '68 were the oustanding years, and 1970 was a close runner up to 1941.