A bottle of 2001 Cornas from August Clape got me wondering recently about a thing called bottle variation. You see, the Cornas was a show stopper. My notes read: “Mouth-watering aromas of green olives and black fruit. A huge syrah, rich, maybe a little monolithic, but with loads of ripe plum and distinct olive and grilled meat characteristics. The clear favorite at the table, where we enjoyed it with homemade pasta and red sauce with sausage.”

Problem is, I’ve had a bunch of this wine (I originally bought a case) and I don’t remember loving it. To find out why, perhaps, click here for .

First I theorized I drank the other bottles too early. Cornas, a 100 percent syrah made in the northern Rhone in France, is a very traditionally-made, sometimes hard and tannic wine that famously requires lots of bottle aging.

But then I looked at my fellow tasters’ notes on cellartracker.com and was amazed to see how deeply disappointed half were, versus how passionately enamored the other half read. Same wine, same vintage! “Red, flat, and boring,” said one. (How uninspired do you have to be, to say only “red” when summing up a red wine? Plus, in Cornas, red is the only wine they make!) On the other side, tasters confessed they’d unequivocably fallen in love.

Now I’m thinking that my 2001 Clape Cornas is the victim of bottle variation, which happens when some samples from the same wine simply turn out better than others. Bottle variation isn’t something that lots of people run into, especially casual drinkers, because most wine is made in large quantities and at pretty modern facilities that have a lot of control over their overall quantity. But some wines, especially artisanal ones like my Cornas — August Clape makes only about two thousand cases annually from a mere 10 acres — can show marked differences between individual bottles. Some of the production might have been fermented in older, funkier wooden vats; some grapes might have been picked riper than others; some vats might have gone into bottle later than others, etc. And although Clape blends the final wine after fermenting and aging each vineyard lot separately, the individuality of some of the original batches might still shine through.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to my next Clape Cornas, just to see if I’m depressed or elated by it. I’ll let you know.

Dear Wine Girl:
I am not a big Champagne fan but your post did get the tastebuds tingling. Can’t wait to try the new Champagne if it ever makes its way over to the UK.
Glasgow Sally

Thanks for visiting Wine Girl, all the way from Glasgow.
I have never before met a British person, even via email, who said she is not a big Champagne fan! Originally in fact it was the British craze over this strange, fizzy wine from France that made the Champagne market. The wonderful English wine critic Hugh Johnson talks about grower-champagnes a bit (not highly, interestingly enough, but this was a while ago) in “A Life Uncorked” and I’m sure there are plenty representatives of the category in the UK, even in your Scottish neck of the woods. Here’s a tip: look for RM or SR on the label. That stands for “Recoltant-Manipulant” or “Societé de Recoltants,” which means the wine was farmed and bottled by the same guy or gal (rather than purchased as grapes by a big producer).
Click here for a very informative story about grower champagnes (which I was delighted to find are sometimes dismissed by their critics as “farmer fizz”).
Cheers,
Heather

One of my favorite California reds is a blend called Generations. It’s the flagship wine from Charles Krug, better known for making jug wine since the forties and ejecting Robert Mondavi in the sixties after he had a fist fight with his brother and co-owner. (Peter Mondavi, the recipient of the left hook, still runs Charles Krug and recently changed the recipe for the Generations, which is why I don’t buy it anymore, but that’s another story.) In the bad old days, Generations was a cabernet-based wine that tasted as good as some of Napa’s most famous reds — at about a quarter of the price, probably because of the low profile of the Other Mondavi.

Anyway, three generations of my in-laws celebrated father’s day last Sunday, so I brought over a bottle from the 1997 vintage that I’d lovingly cellared for almost a decade. Tasting it made me think: why do people keep wine? Should they at all?

For how I appalled myself with my own answer, click here:

The answer is, for the most part, no. I know this sounds contradictory coming from someone who gutted her walk-in closet and filled it with bottles. But truth is, today most wine is made so it’s drinkable right away. Even in parts of the world (e.g. Bordeaux) known historically for making wines that are virtually unapproachable in their youth, the style is now to round things out a bit. So in most cases there’s no reason to delay gratification when it comes to wine. And when it comes right down to it, wine is about gratification. Certainly not price or prestige, so toss those considerations out the window when you’re considering whether or not to open that special bottle you’ve been hanging on to.

The second reason you should not keep wine is for the simple reason that it can go bad. I have nine bottles left of a case of expensive, normally long-lived Kistler chardonnay from the nineties. I keep uncorking a sample, hoping that it’s only the last three that have devolved into a yellow sludge tasting of stale caramel and vodka. But no go. I waited too long, and now whole lot is over the hill.

Like, alas, the 1997 Generations. Although it was from a great vintage in Napa, and although I remember it having plenty stuffing in its youth, the bottle we drank Sunday showed signs of falling apart. It was still rich and flavorful, but it has lost structure and felt a little flabby on our tongues. The fresh, beautiful cherry flavors I remember now tasted stewed; if I really thought about it, in my mind’s eye I saw a fruit compote dessert on a plastic tray in an assisted living facility. I kept a few sips in my glass and went back to it, and by the time I did, it had stopped short like Marlon Brando in The Godfather and toppled among the tomato vines.

But you know what? We loved it and drank every drop. It reminded us of one of my father in law’s favorite stories about visiting Krug back in the sixties, when its tasting room — an invention, by the way, of Robert Mondavi’s — was a tiny outbuilding with a picnic table, a staffperson, and two open bottles. It reminded us of the day my sister in law and I bought this very bottle; we were inspired to call him to solicit the Charles Krug story one more time. I reminded us of the time my other sister in law came across an expensive bottle of French Krug Champagne in our fridge and — thinking it was a cheapo Charles Krug sparkler, which I don’t even think they make — popped it open to enjoy out of juice jar. (Another reason not to hoard wine.) Because the wine had once been young, then mature, and now accident-prone, we were reminded that, like us, stepping carefully over my father in law’s oxygen tube that trailed out of the dining room, wine is alive, and like all living things has a beginning, a middle, and an end.

Which leads me to the only exception to my new rule against keeping wine: sometimes you want to keep a bottle because of the memories. Along with dust in your closet, a cherished bottle of wine accumulates stories. And there’s no better way to set them loose than by uncorking it.

Dear Wine Girl:
I’m going to Bandol, France in July and looking for tips on visiting the friendlier wineries. Also, do all of them offer tastings and is it a walk-up-and-pay setup?
Thank you,
Bound for Bandol

Dear Bound:

Wine tasting in the south of France is one of my favorite life memories. In 2002, we spent three days tasting our way through the great red wines of Bandol, located just about an hour’s drive east of Marseille. Bandol is one of my favorite wines: unique, since it is made from 100 percent mourvedre (without the Provence staples of syrah or grenache); burly, because it is filled with the flavors of blackberry, brambles, earth, and to me, a tell-tale note of diesel; and long-lived, since mourvedre has a special ability to stave off oxidation. Except for the exchange rate on the euro, I’m so jealous of your trip.

Quick answer: there aren’t a lot of friendly, much less friendlier, wineries in Bandol — actually, in all of France. But don’t kill the messenger. Click here for the spots that will bountifully reward your perseverance:

The key to wine touring in Bandol — and this is true for most anywhere in France — is that appointments are almost always necessary. So brush up on your French, because it’s also a truism that most of the people who work in wineries there don’t speak English. (These days you can email a request for a tasting to some wineries, which is great, because you can avoid having to vous-votre on the phone.) There is usually no charge for an appointment, though, and typically it includes a tour.

Most importantly, give yourself an extra half hour to get to your appointments and do not leave your hotel without a GPS-equipped rental car and a good, detailed map. This is because is because the further you get into the French countryside, the more the locals practice what my expatriate sister-in-law calls “conservation of signs,” so you will get lost. And the staff, who are often the same people who own the winery and make the wine, get very angry if you are late. You do not want to get yelled at by a red-faced vigneron who should at that moment be eyeing his fermentation, so mark my words.

Most Notable
Domaine Tempier: The most noted of all Bandol, run by the well-respected culinary and viticulturist family the Peyrauds. Stand in the pergola-shaded patio and imagine the wine celebrities, from Richard Apple to Robert Parker, who’ve dined there. Drink the dry rosé that single-handedly sparked a revolution that changed American minds about pink wine.

Most Impressive
Château de Pibarnon: Set into the crest of a huge natural amphitheater, whose spectators are vines seated in rows and gazing out over the valley (plus a peek-a-boo glimpse of the Mediterranean to your left), this winery looks as awesome as its Bandol tastes. I especially enjoyed the spittoons, which are used barrels filled with sawdust.

Most Visitor Friendly
Domaine Bunan: One of the largest wineries in Bandol, Bunan has an easy-to-find, welcoming tasting room that does not require an appointment. Bunan is a name you’ll likely see again on wine lists when you return to the states, and their more luxe label, Château Rouvière, is often delicious.

Most Up-and-Coming
Domaine Gros’ ‘Nore: My new favorite Bandol comes from this oddly-named producer. Earthy, powerful, and well-priced. I see that you can make an appointment at their website, which makes things easier.

Bon appétit!

Dear Wine Girl:
What’s a Super Tuscan? How would I spot it at a wine store or on a wine list? And if I’m in a restaurant with a lot of Italian offerings I’m not familiar with, would I be safe to just go with a Super Tuscan?
–Super Italo-Curious

Dear SIC:

Fast and loose answer: a high-quality red from Italy’s Tuscany region that’s styled on French Bordeaux.

More nuanced answer: The Super Tuscan was born when Antinori, a big winery in Italy, tried to boost the quality, reputation, and price of Tuscan wine — at that time, mostly mediocre Chianti. They took the local grape sangiovese, blended it with cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc, aged it in French oak, and gave it the romantic moniker “Tignanello,” the name of the single vineyard that produced the fruit. (Tignanello also was not made with any white grapes, a dollop of which typically went into traditional Chianti.) With the help of Sassicaia, another red with a similar Bordeaux-style recipe, the new Super Tuscans helped Italian wineries bust out of the Chianti closet and play to the big boys from Bordeaux and Burgundy.

For my sure-fire method of spotting a Super Tuscan, click here:

Cynics can safely say the Super Tuscan is a marketing concept. In fact, the term was invented by the American wine magazine The Wine Spectator essentially as a buyer’s guide. But it did take some guts for Italian vintners to start whipping up these new reds. Many Italian wine lovers (both in Italy and abroad) who love the rainbow flavors of Italy’s many different, traditional wines have turned their noses up at the Super Tuscan, saying it tastes like it could have been made in Napa, Saint Julien, or anywhere else that has cabernet and new oak barrels. And because Super Tuscans are made from grapes and techniques that don’t conform to Italian laws governing the production of traditional wine types, they have to be bottled as “IGT,” which is a lowly official quality designation just above table wine.

But how can you spot a Super Tuscan?

Good luck. The label won’t say “Super Tuscan.” It probably won’t tell you which grape varieties are inside — although that wouldn’t be of much help either, since their IGT designation allows Super Tuscans to contain an array of grapes, including cabernet sauvignon, merlot, even syrah. Ergo my tip: If the wine’s from Tuscany and has a fancy “fantasy name” (as Luca, my Italian wine teacher, calls it) splashed big across the label, it’s probably a Super Tuscan. Or, if it’s from Tuscany but it’s not a traditional type (i.e., Chianti, Brunello, or Montepulciano), has a fancy fantasy name, and is twice the price of the Chianti next door, it’s definitely a Super Tuscan.

But, once you’ve spotted it, is that Super Tuscan always going to be a safe bet?

Well, yes, mostly — and it will probably be a high-stakes bet, too. What you can always depend on, though, with a Super Tuscan is that its fruit-forward, well-oaked flavors will comfortingly remind you of your favorite big red. So if you’re looking instead for a more indigenous experience in Tuscan wine, go for a Chianti or a Brunello at the same price and you’ll have a rewarding adventure. Drinking a Super Tuscan is like riding on a luxe cruise ship through the Adriatic; indulging in a great Brunello is like interning at sculpture studio in Florence.

One more note: If the arrival of the Super Tuscan on the scene hadn’t already made understanding Italian wine difficult enough, now other regions are making their own “Supers,” also with intricate fantasy names and unpredictable grape blends. Now, for example, you can get an IGT from the Veneto that tastes like a Valpolicella on steroids, that is, beefed up with some French-native grapes and aged in oak. The ever-present Vitiano, a delicious quaffer made of sangiovese and merlot by a winery called Falesco not far from Rome, could be called a Super Umbrian. The good news is that the Lesser Supers are cheaper — and still infused with the maverick, international-looking spirit of the Super Tuscan.

Dear Wine Girl:
I hosted a holiday dinner party recently and one of my guests brought a very special bottle from his cellar: a 1986 Château Margaux, in fact, which he’d bought upon release way back when. I was so honored — and so flustered — by his generosity that when we decanted the bottle and I noticed some off aromas, I dismissed them, telling myself that the wine couldn’t be bad. Also I didn’t want my guest to be embarrassed. But more than halfway through our plates of Argentinian carbonada (all of us trying, but failing, to enjoy the Margaux with it) my neighbor finally confessed he thought the wine was “really tannic.” Truth is, it was corked and the meal was ruined. What should I have done?
Signed, Corky in the Wine Country

Dear Corky:
Lots of bad things can happen to a good bottle of wine. My sister in law once ordered a case of artisinal zinfandel shipped to her home in Phoenix, Arizona, which seemed very convenient until the UPS driver left the package on her front doorstep on a 110-degree afternoon. By the time she came home from work, that big zin had boiled up through the corks, seeped through the seals, and puddled all over the bottom of the box. She tried a sample, but it was truly “cooked”: tinny, a little burnt, and just not fresh.

I’ve also tasted wines that are oxidized, which means that too much oxygen has been absorbed into the wine, either because I let it age for longer than I should have, or because it was bottled improperly in its youth. In this case, again the wine will look pale and taste flat and overalcoholic. (That’s because tiny bits of oxygen will soften and eventually erase a wine’s fruit flavors, leaving you with tasteless booze).

But what does it mean when a bottle is corked, and what should you do if this horror befalls you?

As for your Margaux, Corky, you seem sure it was corked, probably because you spotted the tell-tale wet cardboard taste of a corked wine. A bottle is deemed corked because it had the misfortune of being stopped up with a tainted cork. The chemical compound behind this tragedy is called TCA, and is actually very widespread in the cork-making industry. Some say one in ten bottles is stopped with a tainted cork, though how much TCA there needs to be in the cork before your average taster can detect its effect, is still hotly debated among the experts.

Don’t feel bad for not having identified the corked Margaux before it was too late. It’s hard to summon up the courage to declare a wine bad, whether you ordered it from a restaurant, bought it yourself, or (perhaps hardest of all) received it as a gift. There can be ego, expectations, and often a lot of money tied up in a wine. Not long ago I ordered a bottle of 2002 Brewer Clifton “Clos Pepe” chardonnay for $79 at a favorite restaurant in Sonoma, and because I’d spent ten minutes bragging about my smart selection and telling the whole history of the Clos Pepe vineyard, when the bottle arrived corked I wasn’t inclined to say so when the waiter gave me a taste. Let’s just say nobody, especially he, was pleased when I had to send the chardonnay back after it had been poured, sipped, and rejected by the entire table. By the time we got a new bottle and fresh stemware, we were done with the course I’d intended to pair the wine with. Boo, hiss.

So, to any reader saddled unexpectedly with a corked wine, I beg of you: speak now or regret later. Yes, if you detect anything off about a wine, it’s absolutely imperative that you raise a big red flag right away. In a restaurant, your waitstaff should be happy to taste and confirm your suspicions (or, if you’re being overly cautious, to reassure you that the wine’s not corked, but filled with the earthy flavors typical of this region, blah blah blah.) The trick is you’ve got to search out and destroy that corked wine before it gets into your friends’ glasses and literally leaves a bad taste in every one’s mouth.

Now, in your case, you had an easy out that could have saved both dinner and face: as you are opening any fine, older wine at home, you should taste it first. Explain to your friend that you are making sure it’s ready to drink or if it needs some time to breathe. If it tastes even slightly off, tell your donor that the wine seems okay, but has some funky aromas that are sure to blow off after a few minutes in the decanter. Serve the back-up bottle you pulled in case of emergency, and then after 15 minutes or more come back to your guest’s wine. If indeed it still tastes corked, then give a taste to your guest; especially after he’s been drinking an untainted vintage, he should be able to agree that –woe is me — the Margaux was cursed from birth.

Most of all, it’s good to remind yourself that after all, wine is not about ego or price; it’s about pleasure. And since no one wants to drink unpleasurable wine (no matter where it came from or how much it cost), there’s no shame in raising a red flag about a corked wine.

Oh, and feel free to ask your guest if he bought more than one bottle of that Margaux. If so, that’s great, because he can look forward to trying them; chances are, they’re fine, and he can experience them in all their intended wondrousness. There’s nothing so silky, so opulent, and so ethereal as Château Margaux. Maybe he’ll invite you too.

Dear Wine Girl:
I am going to Calistoga in Napa Valley with a friend at the end of the month. We are going to taste white wines because neither of us knows anything about them. We are staying at Solage on the Silverado Trail, and I was wondering if you had any good ideas for whites for us to taste. I want to go to Château Montalena and Folie a Deux. Clos Pegas and Sterling are within biking distance.
Signed,
From Vegas to the Vineyards

Dear Vegas in the Vineyards:

Napa is not the first place one goes to drink white wine, since cabernet sauvignon is king there. But you are right to checkmark the chardonnay at Chateau Montalena, since it helped Napa dominate the famous 1976 taste-off between France and Napa. You can continue your historic-whites-of-Napa tour by visiting Grgich Hills in Rutherford, which was founded by Mike Grgich, the Yugoslavian refugee who was winemaker at Montalena when they won the Judgement of Paris. Grgich Hills’ chards are widely regarded to have epitomized the big, buttery style that dominated California chardonnay for so long.

For the best whites in Napa, click here for more:

Finally, although you’ll be in the northernmost — and hottest — end of Napa Valley, I’d recommend too that you take a drive south to the cooler Carneros district, which is more suited to white wine varieties, and where two of my favorites are Truchard (you’ll need an appointment, and be sure to taste their roussane and get the story behind how they mistakenly, though fortuitously, planted this white Rhône variety) and Acacia. But for the best white wine in Napa, head to Auberge de Soleil for lunch and order some good premier cru white Burgundies off the wine list.

Heather

Dear Wine Girl:
Thank you for bringing that rosé wine as a housewarming gift. You told us not to save it, but to enjoy it young and fresh, so we did. We had a friend visiting who is an aficionado and he was really blown away. You told us it a special bottle and that it has a story … can you let us know more about it?
–Your neighbors Mark and Tony

Dear Good Neighbors:

I’m really glad you enjoyed the rosé (and that it got me points with your enthusiast friend!).

The wine was a Bandol from the south of France (Bandol is a fishing village on the coast between Marseilles and Cannes; behind it are some dramatic hills and vineyards comprising the appellation called Bandol.). It’s made by Domaine Tempier, a winery that was discovered and made semi-famous by the Berkeley importer Kermit Lynch. He was the first American importers to appreciate and promote the winery, the region, and the grape (mourvedre) they use to make their rosés and reds. As opposed to most “blush” wines which are generally sweet and made as an afterthought, the rosés from Bandol are dry, refreshing, and serious about themselves as a wine. Plus they’re great with most any food, especially BBQ or roast chicken, any kind of fish, charcuterie, olive tapenade, even watermelon by the pool.

Sometimes you’ll see Tempier’s Bandol rosé in good wine stores (I snagged the last one at Whole Foods yesterday on my way to a picnic!), but your safest bet, as Bay Area guys, is to go to Kermit Lynch’s shop in Berkeley on San Pablo Avenue. (Readers can order online.) My only complaint is that this particular wine has got pricey over the years. With my discount at Kermit Lynch, mine came to $25. Ideally I don’t like to spend more than $15 on a rosé. But Tempier’s, with its distinct blood orange and earthy notes, is worth the exception.

Dear Wine Girl:
I have a big dinner meeting soon and I was hoping to bring something special. What would you think about a 1970 Lynch Bages? (Here are the tasting notes from the retailer I was thinking of buying the bottle from. It’s $299.) If I brought that to dinner would you be sufficiently impressed?
Signed,
Only dates women with “C” in their titles

For my surprising — and cost-efficient — recommendation, click here:

Dear C-list groupie:
Undoubtedly I would be impressed by the Lynch Bages, which is an older Bordeaux from a very well-respected chateau. But I would not recommend that you bring such an old vintage to an important dinner meeting. If you were attending a tasting among Bordeaux aficionados (or coming over to my house, hint hint) the Lynch Bages would be the perfect selection. But at your Fortune 500 dinner you will be enjoying food, so I would bring a special wine that you are confident will not be over the hill or spoiled, which unfortunately is a risk you run with a bottle with that kind of age on it. That way your associates will be both impressed and well fed and watered.

Why not impress them with a rare bottle of something up and coming and sexy? I was totally blown away the other day by a 2004 Fiddlehead “Seven Twenty-Eight” pinot noir from the Fiddlestix vineyard in Santa Rita Hills, which comes from the hot new pinot spot, and is only made in very limited quantities. (We ordered ours at one of my favorite local restaurants, Absinthe, in half-bottle for about $35. You should be able to hunt down a full bottle for about $40.) Something like that … unless these people are complete Bordeaux snobs, but even then you should splurge on something a bit younger so you can be confident that it’ll be drinking well.