To Blend or Not to Blend

I’ve heard passionate wine drinkers extoll the virtues of blending grapes, as if a blend is always a better wine. Likewise, I’ve heard wine fans lament when winemakers won’t just stick to one grape. Let’s explore why some wines are blended and some not, and whether one is better than the other. I learned by experience when visiting Sonoma, California that blending wine well is HARD.

Why blend?

• Taste:  Grape varieties are often blended to balance out the characteristics of a wine. For instance, a grape with low tannin might be blended with a high-tannin grape to create something more well-rounded.
• Vineyard Insurance:  Blending can provide insurance in the vineyard. Different grapes are more or less susceptible to weather or pest problems. If you plant more than one grape and something goes wrong with one of them, you might avoid losing your whole harvest. Your blend may taste different from one year to the next with a different ratio of grapes, but at least you’ll have a product.
• Business/commercial reasons:  Maybe you don’t grow enough of one grape variety to produce it as a varietal wine. You might blend it with a second (or third) grape, to have a larger production of a blended wine instead of a smaller production of two varietal wines.

Bordeaux makes the most famous blended wines in the world, but lots of wines can be blended without having to mention it on the label. The rules in most wine regions allow a producer to list a single grape on the label, even if they've added 10% or 15% of another grape into the blend.

Blended wines are made in two ways. The most common way is to ferment each grape into wine separately, and then blend the wines together. Another way is to create a "field blend," which means that the different varieties of grapes are planted mixed together in the vineyard. In this case, the grapes are all harvested together and made into wine in whatever proportion they were growing in the field.

I tried my hand at blending wine when I visited the Clos du Bois winery in Sonoma, California. Clos du Bois makes a "meritage" wine, a fancy marketing name for a Bordeaux-style blend, called Marlstone. If you visit the tasting room, you can reserve a spot in their "Marlstone Experience," where you can use the same varietal wines that Clos du Bois uses to try to imitate their Marlstone blend or create your own. Just as in Bordeaux, you choose from base wines of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Petit Verdot.

Left to right:  Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, Petit Verdot, Cabernet Franc, "Your blend," and Marlstone

First, I tasted all the wines and blended equal parts of my favorites. It tasted terrible. Then I tried a more typical Bordeaux-style blend: mostly Cabernet Sauvignon with a little Merlot and Cabernet Franc. Better. In the end, the best results came from letting one grape take center stage with small amounts of others playing supporting roles. After at least an hour of trying, I still hadn't created anything I really liked. Blending is hard, but this counts as one of my favorite wine experiences ever.

  

A blended wine is not necessarily good or bad. It's the result of trying to create a better wine, ensure a stable harvest, or navigate a competitive marketplace. If you're still skeptical of blended wines, just remember: 9000 years ago, Neolithic people were making alcoholic beverages out of grains, fruit, and honey mixed together, basically combining beer, wine, and mead. It makes blending together a few different grapes sound like much less of a big deal.

Bordeaux Trip - Free Info Session and Wine Tasting

Regular readers know that I'm acting as the wine educator on a river cruise through Bordeaux in October 2017.

If you're interested in learning more about the trip, join us at a free info session and wine tasting in February in Houston.

Check out the Facebook event here.

For location details or questions, RSVP to:  ClearLakeWineTasting@gmail.com

More information about the trip here.

Moravia in Texas

Last weekend we went to the Houston Slavic Heritage Festival, as we do most years. This year it celebrated the food, music, and crafts of the Ukraine, Czech Republic, Croatia, and Poland. I drink beer at the Slavic Fest (it goes perfectly with sausage and sauerkraut!), but being there reminded me to drink my bottles of wine from the Moravia Winery in central Texas.

The Moravia Vineyard and Winery is named (I assume) after the town in which the vineyard resides, Moravia, Texas (though the winery's address is in nearby Schulenburg). Moravia, Texas was founded in 1881 by Czech and Moravian settlers, who named the town after the Moravian region of the Czech Republic (or do we call it Czechia now?). This region of the Czech Republic produces more than 90% of the wine in that country, so it makes perfect sense to name the winery after the town named after the region.

The Moravia Winery grows Blanc du Bois (white) and Black Spanish/Lenoir (red) grapes, which it produces in a dry style. It also makes a sweet rosé. These lesser-known grapes flourish in regions near the Texas gulf coast where humidity and Pierce's disease wreak havoc on other grape varieties. (For more information, check out "Introduction to the Grapes of Texas" or "Profile of the Black Spanish Grape." Disclaimer: the link to the Black Spanish profile leads to an article I wrote for Home Brew Talk, and it contains a few errors introduced by their editors, which is why I no longer write for the site.)

Earlier this year I bought a bottle of Moravia's 2014 "Red Wine Cervené Vino Rosso" at the Urban Harvest Eastside Farmers Market and a bottle of 2014 Blanc du Bois at the downtown Houston Spec's. Both were around $20. (Google translate says that cervené means red in Czech.) I stuck the bottles in the wine fridge and nearly forgot about them until I saw the Moravia region of the Czech Republic mentioned at the Slavic Fest.

Experiencing Bordeaux in Books and Movies

When I travel, I like to learn as much as I can about the place I'm visiting before I go. A fun way to do that is through books and movies. Here's a collection of fiction and non-fiction books and movies I'm interested in reading and watching before I visit Bordeaux in 2017. (I'm assembling a group to go on a tour, and we still have spaces available. Email me if you're interested!)

I've marked the ones I've read or seen (*) and added a personal review, and I'll update this post as I make progress on the list.

Visit Granbury, taste great Texas wine.

Recently I wrote about the grapes that are thriving in Texas (Introduction to the Grapes of Texas). Roussanne is one of them. This white grape is native to France and appears in the white wines of France's Rhone Valley. It also appears in the red wines of the region, since it is one of the few white grapes allowed to be blended into Rhone's red wines in small quantities. Roussanne is primarily found in southern France, but its presence is growing in Texas, particularly in the Texas High Plains AVA.

Sorting Out the Names: A Brief History of Bordeaux

The names of the regions in and around Bordeaux can be confusing. For one thing, Bordeaux is the name of a city, a winemaking region, and a wine. In addition, many names get tossed around in relation to this part of France:  Bordeaux, Aquitaine, Gascony, Gironde, Dordogne. Let’s take a brief trip through history that will help us figure out what everyone is talking about.  Here’s the general area in question:

The city of Bordeaux and surrounding areas.

Tour Bordeaux with a French Wine Scholar! (updated with new discounts)

Join our group on a river cruise through Bordeaux in October 2017!

More info...

• AmaWaterways has created a great itinerary with a lot of wine tastings and activities. They plan the itinerary and run the cruise.
• Travel with your own French Wine Scholar - me! I will be on the trip to provide additional educational opportunities, answer your questions, and help you get the most out of your experience. 
• The ship holds ~150 people, but our group-within-a-group of ~15 will allow a more fun and personal experience, and you'll be able to get to know your fellow passengers and wine enthusiasts better.

Itinerary:  8-day/7-night "Taste of Bordeaux" cruise
Sailing Date:  October 26, 2017
Cruise vs. Cruise+Land:  I am doing just the cruise, but you have the option to extend the trip by a                                              few days on land either before or after the cruise.
Air Travel:  You may arrange your own air travel, have our travel agent book it for you, or purchase                       it through AmaWaterways.

I just booked my flights with AmaWaterways, and they are offering spectacular deals!

What are the discounts?

• Discount on Double Occupancy Cabins:  $1000 off per person through the end of March.
• Discount on Single Occupancy Cabins with Windows Only:   The single supplement is waived, so you pay the same price to have your own cabin!  This discount is good until they sell out of that cabin type.

Are you interested?

If you're interested in this trip, contact me! If you may be interested in future trips, please let me know that too.  I'll keep you posted on upcoming plans.


Happy wine travels!

Egyptian Travels and Wine Tasting

I just got back from 12 spectacular days in Egypt, and I cannot say enough good things about the trip. It was a cruse down the Nile, and now I'm totally sold on river cruising. If you need any recommendations for an Egypt visit, post your questions in the comments!

Ahem...back to wine... Of course I researched wine in Egypt before I went. Egypt has thousands of years of winemaking history, going back to the earliest ancient times. Today, Egypt is a primarily Islamic country, which means many Egyptians drink no alcohol. However, Egypt does have a small wine industry, and I tasted and brought back some samples.

The History of Wine in Egypt

Images from the tomb wall of Kha’emwese in Thebes, c. 1450 BC,
showing winemaking in ancient Egypt.

The knowledge of winemaking came to Egypt from Mesopotamia around 3500 BC – more than 5000 years ago. As early as the Old Kingdom period (2650 - 2152 BC), winemaking scenes were painted and carved on tomb walls. The inscriptions tell us that wine was produced in the northern part of Egypt, the Nile delta, and five different types of wine are mentioned as being desirable to take into the afterlife. A few New Kingdom (1500 - 1000 BC) temples also show grapes and wine as offerings to the gods.

Grapes and wine as offerings to the gods in the Temple of Horus at Edfu.

The average ancient Egyptian drank more beer than wine, which was more of an upper-class beverage. However, wine was important as a drink for pleasure and one of the only medicines available. If used as a medicine, wine was often mixed with herbs, spices, or plant extracts.

Most wine in ancient Egypt was probably red, but newer evidence suggests white wine may have been made as well. Because wine in ancient Egypt was stored in clay jars called amphorae, we can study the wine they drank by analyzing the residue of wine remaining in the jars. This may be a tiny amount which has been absorbed into the porous clay.

When Christianity came to Egypt (around 33 AD or soon afterwards), monasteries were founded and produced wine for communion. Later, the spread of Islam to Egypt (in the 600s AD) greatly reduced the amount of wine produced, since Islam prohibits drinking alcohol. But not all Muslims follow that provision, and some amount of alcohol has always been produced in Egypt and widely available.

Wine in Egypt Today

Egypt's climate is too hot and dry to produce wine in most areas. The Nile delta in northern Egypt receives an average of 1-8 inches of rainfall per year, but the central and southern parts of the country average near zero. Grapes can only be grown in the wetter regions of the delta and near the sea, which moderates the heat.

One of the biggest producers of wine in Egypt is Al Ahram Beverages Company or ABC (owned by Heineken), which produces beer, wine, and spirits. One of their most popular wine brands is Omar Khayyam. For the 12 days I was in Egypt, we drank mainly Omar Khayyam Red. We brought back a bottle of red and a bottle of white (both from the 2013 vintage).

Omar Khayyam Red is made from the grape Bobal, which is a lesser-known variety of Vitis vinifera and originates from Spain. The wine has jammy aromas of raspberry, blackberry, cherry, and cedar. It's dry, with a smoky finish, and moderate levels of acid, tannin, and alcohol (12.5%). This is a fine, everyday sort of wine. It isn't showy and probably wouldn't win awards, but it tastes good, it's well balanced, and it can pair with a wide variety of foods. We drank it and enjoyed it with dinner most nights.

Omar Khayyam White is made from the grape Sultanine Blanche, which is usually a table grape. However, it makes a pretty good wine. It reminded me a bit of a Chenin Blanc or a Chardonnay. It's an old world style, with lots of mineral aromas, lemon, almond, and a bit of oak. It's dry, with high acid, medium body, and a slightly higher perception of alcohol than its actual 12.5%. The Omar Khayyam website describes it as "simple, clean and fresh" and says it "needs to be drunk young." I'd agree with those statements. Like the red, the white was also perfectly fine, but the red was better.

And Beer Too!

Egypt also makes beer, and it's pretty good. The two most popular are Stella (no relation to Stella Artois) and Sakara, both owned by ABC/Heineken. Stella is a light lager, which is extremely refreshing in the heat. Sakara Gold has more flavor and more bitterness. We liked both, but preferred Stella.

  

Sakara is named after the Step Pyramid of Djoser at Sakara (sometimes spelled Sakkara or Saqqara), which is older than the more famous Pyramids of Giza.

New Projects and Travels Afoot...

I've been posting less of late, because 2 new projects have been taking up my time. One is wine related (hopefully more on that soon). The other is travel related. Here's a hint that relates to both:

I hope to be back on a regular posting schedule in several weeks.  Cheers!

A Dessert Wine from the Texas Piney Woods

With the increasing fame of the Texas Hill County, it's easy to overlook some of the other Texas wine regions. But the Piney Woods Trail (east of Dallas) has a few hidden gems, including Enoch's Stomp Vineyard and Winery. I visited in 2012 and enjoyed the wines, but only brought home one bottle. (As I recall, it was one of the last stops on the trip, and by that time I was thinking I'd never be able to drink all the wines I had already bought.)

This week I finally opened that lone bottle from Enoch's Stomp: Ellen's Sweet Song, a red Port-style dessert wine. Many Texas wineries make a Port-style wine, but this may be one of the best. Many of the Texas Port-style wines are not fortified, meaning that unlike true Port, brandy is not added to the wine. They achieve a higher alcohol content (usually 18 - 20%) through fermentation alone, which makes them very smooth and perfect for those who like the taste of Port but find it a bit harsh.

Ellen's Sweet Song is made from Lenoir, which grows well in east Texas. Lenoir is an up-and-coming variety to watch. Many Texas winemakers are growing and experimenting with it. I've tasted great and not-so-great examples, but I predict a big future for the grape.

2010 Ellen's Sweet Song

Appearance:  Opaque, deep brick red. The brownish tinge is a result of age, since it's 5 years old now.

Nose:  Very aromatic. Notes of blackberry preserves, raisin, dried plum, vanilla, and almond (almost like in Amaretto).

Palate:  Fully sweet (14% residual sugar), high acid, medium tannin, full body. 17.3% abv.

I don't believe you can purchase any of Enoch's wines in the Houston area yet, but since the Piney Woods is an easy weekend getaway from Houston, I hope you'll visit them sometime! They have a restaurant along with beautiful, relaxing views, as you can see.

P.S.  Yes, that is a Messina Hof tasting glass in the picture! I often use mine for tasting at home, since they're the right size and shape.


You may also be interested in:
Texas Wine Cheat Sheet
Visiting Tara in East Texas and Tasting Stagecoach Red
Lenoir and the Georgetown Winery
Visiting Los Pinos in the Piney Woods
Returning to Messina Hof for my 1st harvest and grape stomp!

Visiting Tara in East Texas and Tasting Stagecoach Red

Tara Winery is part of the Piney Woods Wine Trail in northeast Texas.  I visited the winery a few years ago and really enjoyed the wines, but only recently drank the bottle I purchased when I was there.  As you may have guessed from the picture, Tara is named after and built to resemble Scarlett O'Hara's house from Gone with the Wind.

Tara grows the Lenoir grape (aka Black Spanish) onsite and buys other grape varieties from other places. This estate-grown Lenoir figures prominently in my favorite of their wines, Stagecoach Red.  It's made from 50% Lenoir, 30% Merlot, and 20% Syrah (from California). This bottle was not vintage dated, but I purchased it in 2012.

• Color:  Medium ruby-garnet
• Aroma:  Red and black fruits, toffee, sweet baking spice, cedar, plum, plus a hint of tobacco and vegetal aromas. 
• Palate:  The flavors on the palate generally matched the aromas, with a hint of smokiness on the finish. Medium acid and strong tannin.  12.5% abv
• Price:  $18 at the winery (in 2012)

I love this stuff.  My notes from tasting it at the winery were positive, but the wine improved as it aged. (I stored it in a wine fridge for most of the 2 1/2 years before I drank it.)  It might have improved for another year or so, perhaps, but I think I got lucky and ended up drinking this bottle at or near its peak.  It really did taste great.

  

I drank Stagecoach Red with what we happened to have for dinner that night:  spaghetti squash topped with a rich, meaty tomato sauce, which I made in the slow-cooker with herbs, capers, and chicken thighs.  It was a big wine for this food, but still paired reasonably well.  The earthy sweetness of the squash paired with the fruity/earthy/sweet-spice qualities in the wine, and the wine was acidic enough to stand up to the tomato sauce.  This pairing worked because of the rich sauce, but Stagecoach Red would really shine with grilled meat or a steak.

I believe Tara's wines are currently available only in east Texas and the DFW area, or directly from the winery when you order online or join the wine club.  I'm hoping they'll appear in the Houston area soon.

Can you get decent wine on an airplane (in economy)?

Ordering a glass of wine in an economy seat on an airplane can be risky if you care about what you drink.  While First Class and Business Class passengers often have a good list to choose from, the main cabin is usually offered “red or white” and you have to take your chances.

On a recent United Airlines flight from Houston to San Diego, I took my chances and was pleasantly surprised.  When I chose “white” I expected an over-oaked, overly-alcoholic Chardonnay fruit bomb.  But actually got a French IGT-level Sauvignon Blanc.  Les Deux Pins Sauvignon Blanc (2012) from the Pays d'Oc region was crisp with a good balance between fruity flavors and minerality.  It had floral and citrus notes (lemon with a bit of orange peel), and a hint of the usual vegetal aromas, but less herbal/grassy impression than the typical New Zealand style.  I'm sure it was chosen for this middle-of-the-road character to please the widest possible audience, which makes sense, and I think the wine achieves this goal.  It's expensive at $8 per glass, but we are talking airplane prices, so maybe not terribly outrageous.

On the flight home I picked “red” with reasonable success.  This time there were 2 different French Cabernet Sauvignons available, both from Pays d'Oc (the same region as the Sauvignon Blanc), and both from 2012. I wasn’t familiar with either of the producers, so I picked at random and got Jean Belmont Cabernet Sauvignon.  It was fairly light and tart for a Cab, though it had typically dark fruit aromas, and moderate acid and tannin.  Again, I assume it was intended to strike a compromise among different red wine tastes, and I think it succeeded.  I poured half the little bottle at a time into my glass plastic cup, and the wine improved as it breathed.  The Cab was also $8.

Though neither of these wines was spectacular, they were perfectly fine and much better than I anticipated. United’s website tells me that Doug Frost, Master Sommelier and Master of Wine, selects United's wines. The list of wines available for First and BusinessFirst passengers is available here, but for Economy I believe the “red or white” selections are unspecified and may change periodically.  I can’t guarantee you’ll have these same choices on your flight, but this has given me hope that an economy class “house” wine can be a pleasant experience!

P.S.  Master Sommelier Andrea Robinson selects wines for Delta’s Business Elite class, but I’m not sure whether she selects the wines for the cheap seats.

P.P.S.  It annoys me that United no longer offers ANY free snacks.  Not even a small bag of pretzels on a 3+ hour flight leaving at lunchtime.  I’m happy to report that Delta has not yet sunk to this level of savagery, and still gives out cookies or pretzels.

Win a Trip to the Texas Hill Country

Wine Enthusiast Magazine is partnering with Texas Tourism to offer the chance to win a trip to the Texas Hill Country.

The prize is:

• Round-trip flights and transportation for 2 to Texas
• Up to 8-night accommodations at local B&Bs and winery accommodations in the Texas Hill Country
• Guaranteed visits at up to 12 wineries
• Multi-course wine-and-food dinners

Enter the contest here: buyingguide.winemag.com/features/destinations/2014/texas/contest

Good luck!

Lenoir and the Georgetown Winery

I recently visited the Georgetown Winery, which is north of Austin on the San Gabriel Wine Trail.  It has a quaint storefront on the beautiful downtown square in Georgetown, Texas, and it's a comfortable place to stop and taste.  

The most interesting wine I tasted there was Lenoir.  Lenoir is a grape, also known as Black Spanish or Jaquez, which is native to the U.S. and grows well in Texas due to its natural resistance to phylloxera and Pierce's disease.  It is a hybrid of two other grapes - one from the species Vitis aestivalis and one from Vitis vinifera (the species of most international wine grapes).  Many Texas wineries produce wine from Lenoir, to varying degrees of success.

I enjoyed Georgetown Winery's take on Lenoir.  The wine has a medium ruby color, with aromas of blackberry, cranberry, spice, herbs, earth, and vanilla.  It's initially fruity on the palate, but then develops a slightly tart, bitter edge, which balances the fruit.  It reminded me of the vegetal/green pepper notes that Cabernet Sauvignon sometimes has.  This Lenoir has moderate tannin and moderate-to-high acid.

Georgetown sources over 65% of its grapes from Texas and about 35% from other places, primarily California.  Here are my notes on the other wines I tasted.  (When I make tasting notes, I use a 4-star scale for how much I liked the wine.)  

• Tempranillo – Dry red with full body, aromas of red and black fruits, spice, potting soil, and vanilla. (***1/2)
• Cowboy Red – Dry red with full body, aromas of red and black fruits, blended from 75% Malbec (from California) and 25% Tempranillo. (***1/2)
• Super Big Texan – Dry red with aromas of blackberry, cranberry, and vanilla.  Tart on the palate, with moderate-to-high acid, moderate tannin, and high alcohol.  Blended from 70% Sangiovese, 20% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot. (***)
• Cabernet Sauvignon – Dry red with full body, aromas of black currant, black pepper, tobacco, and cloves.  Blended from 75% Cabernet Sauvignon and 25% Shiraz. (***)
• Portejas – A sweet red Port-style wine, fortified with brandy, and made from Red Zinfandel grapes.  It's very strong at 21% alcohol, but fruity and smooth. (***)
• Chocolate Cherry Port – In the style of a ruby Port with chocolate flavoring added. (***)
• Texas Twister – A dry white that tasted mostly like apple juice with some vegetal characteristics and moderate-to-high acid. (**)

Georgetown Winery makes more wines than I tasted.  Here's the full list with prices.  Locally, I believe we can only buy the blueberry and peach wines.  But Georgetown makes an easy day trip from Houston, so I encourage you to visit and taste for yourself.  Also keep your eyes peeled for Lenoir/Black Spanish from other Texas wineries.  It's an interesting grape with a lot of potential.

Texas Wineries: Fairhaven Vineyards

Fairhaven Vineyards is part of the Piney Woods Trail in north-east Texas.  The vineyard and tasting room are not far off I-20, near Tyler, which is an easy drive from Dallas.  Fairhaven grows its own grapes and uses a combination of traditional, yeast fermentation and carbonic maceration.  (Carbonic maceration is a whole-berry fermentation method that yields sweet aromas and fresh flavors.)

When I visited Fairhaven's tasting room a couple of years ago, I liked many of the wines, but my favorite was the Chambourcin, which is a French grape.  The 2010 Chambourcin has tart red and black fruit aromas/flavors, heavy on the cherry, a little blueberry, lots of spice, vanilla, and a hint of smoke at the end.  The acid level is on the upper end of moderate, with moderate tannin, body, and alcohol (13.5%).  I was impressed with the combination of flavors - fresh and bright balanced against dark and rich.  It's a good deal at $15.

I appreciate that the tasting room offers a meat and cheese plate.  I find that when I'm tasting on a wine trail, driving between wineries and maybe visiting several in a day, the oyster crackers just don't cut it!

Fairhaven will ship its wines to the Houston area, but unfortunately none of our local retailers carry it.  I definitely recommend visiting if you are in the area.

Mead 101 and the Dancing Bee Winery

Mead:  more than just what you drink at the Renaissance Festival!

You’ve probably heard of mead (honey wine) before, or maybe tried it at the Ren Fest, but did you know there are different kinds?  I didn’t until I visited the Walker Honey Farm and Dancing Bee Winery, roughly 80 miles north-east of Austin.  The honey farm produces the honey, and Dancing Bee produces a selection of meads and wines.  (It is officially called a “meadery,” and if you say this word out loud everyone will think you’re saying “meatery” and imagine a butcher shop.)

Mead is an ancient alcoholic beverage, dating to around 7000 BC, made with honey, water, and yeast.  In the same way that the type of grape impacts the flavor of wine, the variety of honey impacts the flavor of mead.  Bees produce different flavors of honey based on the types of flowers where they gather pollen.  So mead made from clover honey will taste different from wildflower honey, or buckwheat honey, etc.  If you’ve tried mead before, you probably remember it being very sweet.  Just like wine, mead can range from sweet to dry, though it is usually at least a little sweet. 

If the honey is fermented along with any other fruits, herbs, or spices, it becomes a different type of mead.

Here’s a summary of the types:

I made some tasting notes on the meads we sampled at Dancing Bee.  We didn’t taste any wines, other than the one mixed with mead.  We were totally mead-focused!

I took home a bottle of the Texas Two Step and The Beerded One.  Both were completely unlike anything I had ever tasted – in a good way!  Spec’s carries a few of the Dancing Bee meads, which range from $14 to $18 dollars.  If you’re hosting (or attending) a holiday party in the next few months, mead is a festive thing to serve.  It’s something a little out of the ordinary, and it will satisfy the sweet wine drinkers.  Better yet, pour the bottle of mead into a sauce pan on the stove, throw in a package of mulling spices, and let it warm for a while.  It will taste delicious, and your house will smell like Christmas.

Visiting Los Pinos in the Piney Woods

Los Pinos Ranch Vineyards is part of the Texas Piney Woods Wine Trail, which covers a large area east of Dallas, roughly centered around Tyler.  Los Pinos is out in the middle of nowhere (as are many of the Piney Woods wineries), but is worth searching out.  The wines are good, the food is good, and the view is great.

I wish I had taken a picture of the main building.  I’m going to borrow one from their website, and hopefully they won’t mind.

There is a restaurant with a large patio, where you can order food and any wines you’d like to taste.  The food was great (we had a pizza), and the flights were brought to the table with a tasting sheet for making notes.  I have grown to appreciate a good tasting sheet – one with a complete list of the wines, a description of each, and sufficient space to write notes.  

They bring out the flights in a nifty, test-tube-like contraption.  (Picture from their website.)

Los Pinos grows Cynthiana (also called Norton), Blanc du Bois, and Black Spanish (also called Lenoir) grapes.  They also use grapes that are purchased from other parts of Texas, and other states.

Here are the tasting notes I made when we visited:

Texas Wineries: Miranda Lambert's Red 55

Last year the husband and I spent a few days visiting the wineries of the Texas Piney Woods Wine Trail, which covers the area roughly between Dallas and Tyler.  One of them is the Miranda Lambert/Red 55 Winery in Lindale, Texas.  (I had to be informed that Miranda Lambert is a country singer who grew up in the area, since I’m not familiar with any recent country music.)  

This location is only a tasting room, not a functioning winery.  Most of the grapes are grown in west Texas, and Red 55 has a partnership with Crump Valley Vineyards, which makes most of the wine.  The winery is a family project, with Miranda’s brother designing the labels and her family choosing the names of the wines. The store front in Lindale is a combination tasting room and souvenir shop for all things Miranda-related.  

We tasted all 7 of the Red 55 wines at the winery, and honestly I wasn’t impressed.  I bought 1 bottle of my favorite (Kerosene) to take home and taste again later.  Here are my notes on all 7 wines, in descending order of yumminess:

Kerosene

This full-bodied dry white – made from Blanc du Bois, Chardonnay, and Muscat Canelli* grapes – is the best smelling of the lot.  It has flavors and aromas of tart citrus, apple, apricot, and herbs, along with some floral and earthy notes.  High acidity. 

Red 55

Made from Cabernet Sauvignon grapes, this smells and tastes of black currant, herbs, and smoke.  It has moderate acid and tannin, but needs to be decanted or aerated.  (12% abv)

County Road 233

Made from Merlot grapes, this has the usual Merlot markers of red and black fruits and spice, with some herbal undertones.  Moderate acid and tannin.  (13.1% abv)

Belle

This is a sweet red cabernet with aromas of black currant, red berries, and an earthy quality.  Moderate acid and tannin.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

This sweet Muscat Canelli* has a good sugar/acid balance going for it, but a funky aroma that I wasn’t crazy about.  

White Liar

This crisp, dry, unoaked Chardonnay smelled good, but had a very simple flavor and wasn’t as fruity as I had expected.  

Electric Pink Blush

This semi-sweet rosé (think White Zinfandel) is made from a blend of several grapes, but I found it to have a funky aroma and very little flavor.

*Muscat Canelli is the same grape as Moscato, though Texas wineries often use the Muscat Canelli name instead.

All of these wines are sold at the downtown Houston Spec’s.  Unfortunately, I can’t suggest that you buy any of them, except possibly the Kerosene.  They’re priced between $15 and $18, and while they’re not terrible, you can get much better wines for that price.  I would only recommend you try them if you are a) really into Miranda Lambert, or b) so interested in Texas wines that you want to try all of them, even the not-so-good ones.  Obviously, I fall into category b.

Drinking Desert Rose from Homestead Winery

I drank a very interesting (and tasty) Texas wine last night from Homestead Winery.  Homestead’s main production facility is in Ivanhoe, TX, but it has tasting rooms in Denison and Grapevine.  I visited the one in Grapevine last year and purchased a bottle of their “Desert Rose.”

Desert Rose is made from the Muscat Canelli grape, which grows well in east Texas.  (This grape is grown in southern France where it is known as Muscat Blanc à Petits Grains.  It is also the grape of the famous Italian Moscato d’Asti.)  Don’t be confused by “rose” in the name – this is a white wine.  It is mostly dry, with perhaps a hint of residual sugar.  The aromas include the “grapey” and floral qualities typical of Muscat, along with some grapefruit, apricot, and a slightly herbal undertone.  It has a medium body and medium-to-high acid, so it is food friendly!  I drank it with a Thai red curry, and it held up nicely.  I’ve tasted many Muscat Canellis from Texas, and this one may be my favorite.

A note on the alcohol content:  I noticed as I was tasting that the alcohol was a bit high.  Not enough to detract too much, but enough to keep it from being perfectly balanced.  However, the bottle doesn’t list the alcohol content.  Texas wine law allows producers to label their wine as “table wine” and omit the alcohol percentage on the label, as long as the wine has less than 14% alcohol, and Homestead has done this.  I bet it’s pretty close to that 14% maximum though! 

Desert Rose is $13 a bottle, but unfortunately I don’t know of any locations selling it in the Houston area.   Homestead does have a wine club though, and ships to Texas residents.  Better yet, use this as an excuse to visit Homestead and the other wineries on the Grapevine Wine Trail, just outside of Dallas.  It’s an easy weekend getaway if you live in the Houston area.  While you’re there, stay at the Gaylord and visit their incredible wine bar!

Texas Wineries: The Bluebonnet Trail

October is Texas Wine Month, so it’s appropriate that I do my first post about Texas wineries this month.  The Go Texan Wine web site is a great place to start planning a trip to some wineries, and if you’re in Houston, the Bluebonnet Trail is an easy overnight getaway.  Check out their handy map.

We traveled this trail last year, but didn’t follow the official trail order.  Instead, we drove north on I-45 to Conroe, and then headed west on 105 for the first day.  We spent the night in Brenham, then drove back east toward Houston on 290.  Below I’ve listed the wineries in the order we visited them, with some notes on each, as well as where we stayed in Brenham.