After recently blind tasting 12 virtually 15+% 2005 CA Cabs., I was left to seriously wonder....

At what point, if ever, will this fad of ever increasing ripeness and manipulation of wine (both in the vineyard and in the cellar) die out? How many people out there TRULY enjoy these kind of wines on a regular basis?

I'm perfectly aware and comfortable with my moniker, but, IMHO, lately its gotten out of hand. Many of today's new age red wines taste hot, manipulated, and simply DO NOT go well with food...at all! They are dry red ports picked at 28 brix, laden with VA and alcohol, fermented and aged in heavily toasted new wood, and recalibrated with tartaric acid to attempt some sense of freshness.

So...what gives? How long will this be the "in" thing? As long as Parker and Laube like it? As long as people care more about "tying one on" than they do about the wine itself, or food they're serving it with?

Isn’t the root cause of the “new world” approach to make wines that are more approachable earlier and to therefore show better in tastings? I don’t think that is going away anytime soon.

For me, I tend to only drink wine with food so I appreciate a wine that is balanced and compliments a meal rather than overpowers it.

Where do I stand? Everywhere! I love a great, stand-alone, high-magnitude fruit bomb, but I also love the modern but more moderate style that goes better with food, as well as earthier, leaner, more old-world food wines. I understand what you're saying about the prevalence of the over-extracted style, and I think it can be discouraging to see how many wines are being made in this style, but I'm glad somebody's doing it. To my mind, there are still plenty of alternatives (maybe not so many of them are CA Cabs, however) in contrary styles.

I stand right of center.

Old World!

Modern style old world.

In the past was much more new world but in last few months I have started to shift mroe to old world. This is primarily a result of drinking more wine with food. Case in point, I am having a birthday dinner at a great restaurant this weekend (Kitchen Restaurant in Sacramento)and am trying to decide what to bring. As I look through my mostly new world cellar, it is hard to find many wines that will not overpower the food. I love my stash of Switchback, Foley, Saxum, etc but I prefer them on their own.

I will defend the idea that winemakers should work to express the somewhereness or sense of place or terrior in all wines they produce.

They will be around as long as people buy them.

quote:

Originally posted by dr.darkrichandbold:
They are dry red ports picked at 28 brix, laden with VA and alcohol, fermented and aged in heavily toasted new wood, and recalibrated with tartaric acid to attempt some sense of freshness.

I wouldn't give ports such a bad rap. For one, the port houses have had many many many more years of experience on balancing sweetness/body/fruit and alcohol =) I'd happily take a Fonseca over many of the "newer" wines you've described (tho some of the wines you've mentioned in the napa tasting I would love to have).

As in wine itself, it is all about balance - old world, new world, they both have their place, and I'd miss either equally if I had to do without.

I have had some great new world wine, but lately they just taste too hard to me. Bitter acid also rears its ugly head often. For the money old world is a safer bet. Plenty of crap from there also. But I can't say this enough, I like both and the in betweens as well.

Variety is the spice of life.

I'm firmly in the Old Word camp. Not that I resent a more flamboyant style, but I am dismayed that Old World style wines are getting harder to find - even in the Old World!

I too am a fan of old world, new world, and anything in between. And, I'm not a proponent of discouraging or eliminating any style.

But...when I sit down to a tasting of 12 of CA's premier wineries growing grapes in some of the best sites I want to be blown away by what they have to offer. I want to see, as Eric White said, well balanced wines. They can be ripe and or well structured, but I don't want over-ripe, VA, syrupy, porty, brutal alcohol, etc. These are signs of going too far. Being too heavy handed. I've felt as though this style isn't being crafted within it's parameters anymore. It's being taken too far.

Craft or climate ?
I think the climate plays a big role in the evolution of the current wine style, both in the old and the new world. You'll find many 13.5 - 14.5 % vol wines in French regions that had 1 - 1.5 lower levels some 10 years ago.

As much as i like the old world style, i like diversity. As already pointed out, there are limits.

quote:

Craft or climate ?

While I do believe in global warming and the effects it may be, and surely will be having on winemaking, I think this is relatively a non-issue at this point in time. Craft is where it's at. Hanging grapes to the point of raisins and achieving ultra high sugar levels is a choice, not a product of climate change.

I just wonder in 20-30 years when we look back and taste these millenium wines, which ones will evoke memories of the '74 Heitz Martha's Vineyard, the '69 Chappellet, the '78 Shafer Cab., the '74 or '76 Mayacamas, the '76 Insignia, the '76, '77, '78 Montelena, etc.. Many of these wines are still drinking monumentally well today. Most of them were not conservative alcohol levels either....they just weren't 15+%...

Absolutely Old World. I have new world wines for four reasons:
1. Because other people like them
2. There are a very few very good new world wines which any old worlder can enjoy
3. Offlines
4. I keep hoping that more of the new world producers will learn to make great wines

quote:

Originally posted by dr.darkrichandbold:

quote:

Craft or climate ?

While I do believe in global warming and the effects it may be, and surely will be having on winemaking, I think this is relatively a non-issue at this point in time. Craft is where it's at. Hanging grapes to the point of raisins and achieving ultra high sugar levels is a choice, not a product of climate change.

I just wonder in 20-30 years when we look back and taste these millenium wines, which ones will evoke memories of the '74 Heitz Martha's Vineyard, the '69 Chappellet, the '78 Shafer Cab., the '74 or '76 Mayacamas, the '76 Insignia, the '76, '77, '78 Montelena, etc.. Many of these wines are still drinking monumentally well today. Most of them were not conservative alcohol levels either....they just weren't 15+%...

The problem is: In hot climate, the wines reach sugar ripeness before phenol ripeness. So what can you do if your wine already has potentially 15% vol but the physiological ripeness is not there ?

I used to like Aussie fruit bombs(I guess everyone gets serious into wine from the modern, overripe fruit versions) and later as my palate became more sophisticated, I tended to like more traditional wines as I enjoyed these latter wines better with food.

There is a place for both styles, modern wines but with old world elegance and some traditional wines with a bit more modern styled wine-making techniques incorporated. Example? Australia is moving more and more away from American oak and into French oak to give it a less overtly oaky taste.

quote:

Originally posted by Eric White:
As in wine itself, it is all about balance - old world, new world, they both have their place, and I'd miss either equally if I had to do without.

Not surprised, Eric put it better than I would. I completely agree

quote:

Originally posted by MoselleLuxemburg:

The problem is: In hot climate, the wines reach sugar ripeness before phenol ripeness. So what can you do if your wine already has potentially 15% vol but the physiological ripeness is not there ?

Add water

quote:

The problem is: In hot climate, the wines reach sugar ripeness before phenol ripeness. So what can you do if your wine already has potentially 15% vol but the physiological ripeness is not there ?

I'm not sure I understand? I've seen great well balanced wines come out of nearly every region. I can't think of a well respected region that is unable to make wine that is balanced and capable of achieving "physiologic ripeness" (an ambiguous term that is undefinable and a popular buzz word in the wine world BTW...).

quote:

Originally posted by Eric White:
As in wine itself, it is all about balance - old world, new world, they both have their place, and I'd miss either equally if I had to do without.

What Eric said!!!!