Cafes & Wineries

One of the fascinating and attractive things about sake breweries are their (usually) much longer and storied histories than the wineries of the western world. While there are a few wineries that have been in existence for a few hundred years, there are many more sake breweries that have been doing their thing for many hundreds, some continuously operated by a single family.

Kamotsuru Shuzo may not be one of the oldest breweries in Japan, as it can only trace its history back to 1623, and really only began production under the Kamotsuru name in 1873, but it is one of the most respected. Kamotsuru Shuzo is responsible for pioneering a wide range of firsts in the sake industry, including being the first brewery to export its sake to the US (in 1896, no less); the co-inventor of the modern rice polishing machine in 1898; and the first to produce a daiginjo sake in Japan, among other things.

The company’s name, like so many in Japanese, benefits from a clever double meaning. Kamo is both a reference to a chain of mountains from which the brewery gets its water, and Kamo(su) is also the verb to make sake. The second half of the company’s name, Tsuru, means “crane,” a noble and very auspicious bird for the Japanese culture.

When it comes to kamosu, Kamotsuru represents an odd dichotomy between technological innovation and strict tradition. In many ways Kamotsuru can be considered one of the most pioneering sake breweries in Japan. They claim many firsts in the world of sake including being one of the first Japanese breweries to export sake to the United States in the year 1896. Don’t ask me who might have been drinking sake in the U.S. at that time. Perhaps more notably, Kamotsuru brewery can claim to be the co-inventor of the modern rice polishing mill in 1898, along with another company. In 1905 were among the first breweries in Japan to produce ginjo class sakes, whose rice had been polished to at least 60% of its former mass, and in 1958 they claim to be the first brewery to produce a daiginjo class sake (made from rice polished to less than 50% of its former mass).

Today, despite such a history of innovation, a visitor to Kamotsuru might be struck by the seemingly traditional approach taken towards sake brewing. Kamotsuru still makes use of wood where many have switched to stainless steel, and continues many of the labor intensive manual processes of sake making that have been automated by other breweries. And, of course, the brewery insists on producing incredibly high quality sake, of which this sake, named “Sokaku” is their second most premium product, and the highest quality sake that they export to the United States.

Sokaku is a junmai daiginjo sake. This means that no additional alcohol is added during the brewing process and that the rice has been polished past the 50% point. As a mark of its premium quality, the rice used to make Sokaku has been polished to 38% of its former mass, a delicate and expensive feat, and one that the brewery feels makes for a more refined and delicate brew. It is made in the dead of winter in Hiroshima prefecture as the snow blows in cold from the sea of Japan.

While it’s easy to buy sake by the label (many of them are quite attractive, and when you don’t have any idea what they’re saying — I don’t — it can be an interesting aesthetic gamble) it’s generally best to know what you’re getting yourself into. However, it is worth noting that this sake rates pretty high up on the aesthetic scale. Anyone who could receive this individually gold boxed, hand tied, handmade-paper-labeled bottle and not be impressed probably isn’t worth having as a friend anyway.

Tasting Notes:
Colorless in the glass, this sake has a nose of white flowers, dried orange rind, tropical fruits, and wet stones. In the mouth it is ever-so-smooth, with clear stony, rainwater and floral qualities wrapped in a slightly creamy, melted vanilla ice cream jacket with hints of wet cedar on the finish. The sake conveys a purity that marks the best daiginjo sakes along with a silky weight on the tongue that entices sipping again and again. World class.

Food Pairing:
This sake seems like it would do beautifully with butter poached fish of any kind, but especially…butter fish! A nice filet, a splash of lemon and a glass of Sokaku could make any evening spectacular.

Overall Score: around 9.5

How Much?: $80

This sake is available for purchase on the Internet.

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Coffee runs and cab rides given up in tight times

BY CANDICE CHOI • ASSOCIATED PRESS • June 22, 2008

The “latte effect” of the go-go years had consumers spending $4 a day on coffee. Now the downturn is forcing them to rethink the wisdom of such habits.
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As inflation squeezes budgets, middle-class Americans are taking fresh stock of their spending in search of ways to save a nickel

Original post by Robert

There are those in the wine world who seek out (and often pay for) the best possible advice they can get. Winemaking and winegrowing are sciences as much as they are arts, and these days, there are plenty of experts to be had in both arenas. And then there are those in the wine world that no matter what the scientists, experts, and even their friends say, choose to follow their instincts. Call them pig-headed, call them eccentric, call them iconoclasts, there are certain people that will always walk their own paths when it comes to wine.

Jim Dierberg seems to be one of those people. He’s a man that puts a lot of stock in his intuition. He proposed to his wife on their first date, and the first time he set eyes on a piece of property near Santa Ynez Valley he knew it was where he needed to live and to make wine. And not just any wine. Jim decided that this little plot of land was where he was going to make the Cabernet that he had dreamed of making for years.

Never mind that the idea of making Cabernet Sauvignon in the chilly, fog-influenced Santa Ynez Valley (known, for good reason, for it’s cooler climate Pinot Noir and Chardonnay) was pretty much the most insane idea anyone had heard of for some time. Jim spent nearly ten years fending off his friends and neighbors, all of whom confirmed the insanity oh his plans. In those ten years he methodically planted his vineyards and experimented with rootstocks, built a winery, and (perhaps just to prove that he wasn’t totally bonkers) bought some land in the neighboring Santa Rita Hills and started making excellent Pinot Noir and Chardonnay under the Dierberg Estate and Three Saints labels.

Jim’s faith in his own vision wasn’t easy to shake, perhaps because Jim lived on the property that came to be known as Star Lane Vineyards for those ten years. And he needed little more than a good set of eyes and a thermometer to prove to himself that the tiny little North-South valley where his vineyards climbed up the steep valley walls was a climatological anomaly. At the start of his driveway, several miles away, the mid-summer fog would be thick and the air a chilly sixty degrees Fahrenheit, but out his front door it would be sunny and between 80 and 100 degrees.

Indeed, the Happy Valley, as this little crease in the San Rafael Mountains is named, happens to be both the highest and the hottest place in the entire appellation. Daytime temperatures routinely climb above 100 degrees and nighttime temperatures often fall well below fifty degrees. This wide range of temperature, known as the diurnal shift, is coveted by winemakers for its ability to coax complexity and richness out of grapes of many varieties.

Now, after ten years of work, Jim and his winemaking crew, which includes winemaker Nick DeLuca and consultant David Ramey, are releasing the first vintage from Star Lane, including this wine, which is a special selection from three specific blocks of the vineyard. The vineyards are planted almost exclusively to Bordeaux varietals, with the exception of a little Syrah that is mixed in amongst the Cabernet Sauvignon, and are so steep in places that there is only one guy on Jim’s staff that is willing to drive the tractor between the rows (he apparently keeps asking for a raise on this account).

The vineyard management crew, all of whom are full-time employees rather than hired contractors, pick the grapes in the dead of night to escape the day-time heat, and load them in small batches into the winery (which has been built with two distinct sections, one dedicated to the Dierberg Estate Burgundy-style wines, and the other dedicated to the Star Lane project). The grapes ferment slowly with native yeasts, and are then aged in 100% new French oak barrels for 20 months before bottle aging another 14 months before release. The wines are never filtered and are fined lightly with egg whites before bottling.

Star Lane makes about 1900 cases of this special Cabernet Sauvignon, and about 9000 cases of their estate Cabernet (which is also fantastic).

Santa Ynez Valley, barring some serious effects of Global Warming, will never be known as a place that’s ideal for growing Cabernet Sauvignon, but if Star Lane Vineyards continues to produce blockbuster wines like this one, Santa Ynez Valley may well become known for at least one Cabernet.

Tasting Notes:
Inky garnet in color, this wine bursts out of the glass with a rich nose of earth, tobacco, and dark fruit aromas that had me salivating immediately. In the mouth it is rich, heavy, and pure liquid silk on the tongue, with powerful flavors of black cherry, vanilla, and chocolate mixed with an undertone of dirt. The wine has just the slightest touch of sweetness to it that I eventually decided was a hint of residual sugar, but couldn’t possibly hold against this wine in all its lusciousness. Perhaps it’s best to think of this wine as a monster Napa Cab, that isn’t from Napa. A wine for those times when you’d prefer that your wine not show a little restraint.

Food Pairing:
This is a wine that while perfect for grilled meat, I would simply prefer to drink on its own. It’s big enough to demand all of your attention.

Overall Score: between 9 and 9.5

How Much?: $100

This wine is available for purchase on the internet.

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

During the off hours, we’ve covered a lot of ground this past week, visiting relatives, seeing sights and uncovering a story or two. A little visual lagniappe for Sunday, give everyone a little break from the verbal meanderings let you all get caught up.

A mini waltz across Texas, on a tank of gas, from Tioga to Strawn to Temple and back. The cool pool awaits, so you all sit in your rooms and stare at the screen or come out, as it pleases you. I’m heading for my back yard, and a little sun and silence. Happy summer, y’all.

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

I know how you think. You’re sitting there, scratching your head, wondering, “now what on earth am I going to do here in the middle of the summer to exercise both my brain and my taste buds in a sophisticated way?” It’s a good thing I caught you early on in your musing, otherwise you might have frittered away the whole summer in frustration, trying to come up with something suitably intellectual and delicious to occupy your time.

So instead of sitting there updating your cellar list in Excel, or converting that old rolodex of recipes into a new digital form, you can head up to Napa and go to Tastϵ. I honestly don′t know whether the damn thing is called “Taste Three” or “Taste Cubed” but it’s a big taste with a little three after it, and it may well be the coolest food conference ever devised.

Those of you in the high tech industry can think of it as TED for food and wine. For those of you who have no idea what the hell I’m talking about, here’s (maybe) a more accessible explanation. Think about a conference where, instead of one cooking demonstration after another, some of the world’s foremost scientists, intellectuals, musicians, writers, chefs, and winemakers come together to discuss a wide range of issues having to do with everything from the aesthetics to the ethics of food and wine. There are lectures, demos, performances, and of course, some tastings. But it’s all highbrow, you know?

OK, so perhaps that didn′t quite capture it. The thing of it is, the conference is nearly impossible to describe well. It doesn′t quite fit the mold of anything else out there in the world of food and wine. So rather than resort to metaphor, let me just tell you how the conference works, and who’s involved. The whole thing is set up as a series of themed sections, each hosted by a moderator, and comprised of a series of short format presentations by some amazing people.

Here are a few examples from this year’s roster:

• Dan Barber, owner of Blue Hill &amp Blue Hill at Stone Barns talks about his restaurants, career, and his Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture

&bull Journalist Novella Carpenter talks about the current phenomenon of urban farming.

• Editor-in-Chief of Gastronomica, Darra Goldstein talks about food as a path to peace in the Middle East.

&bull Chateau Musar Winemaker Serge Hochar on the passion for wine that kept him from fleeing civil war in Lebanon.

• René Koster, director of the Dutch “Restaurant of the Future” project, talks about how we make food and drink choices.

• Artist Laura Letinsky shares her haunting photographic images that evoke unseen people and relationships using the detritus of a meal.

• Author Christopher McDougall talks about the health and nutrition secrets of Mexico’s legendary Tarahumara runners.

• Entrepreneur Barry Schuler shares his ideas for mapping the wine grape genome.

• Author of The Billionaires Vinegar, Benjamin Wallace talks about forgery and fakes in high stakes wine collecting.

As you can see, this isn′t your mother’s food event. I’ve never been to the event, but I hear nothing but rave reviews from everyone who’s gone.It’s apparently great brain food. Check out the whole program on the event web site.

Taste3
July 17th - 19th, 2008
Culinary Institute of America
Greystone Castle
2555 Main Street
St. Helena, CA 94574 (map)

Tickets are $1950, and discounts are available for those in the industry. Ticket price includes lunches, winemaker dinner, and gala dinner and reception. Tickets will likely sell out by early July so they should be purchased in advance online.

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Dusty Grapes
“I spend a lot of time photographing in vineyards, and sometimes the landscape just gets overwhelming. It’s too much to look at. So there are times when I get tired of the grand vistas, and instead retreat to smaller things, like the perfect bunch of grapes.” — Michael Regnier

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Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Mixed bag from a crazy week. Where to start? Bruni writes in the NYT about Italian food being the Tex-Mex of Europe. I just wish sometimes that Italian in America was as good as some of the Tex-Mex I’ve had here at base camp. Don’t get me started.

While we’re on the NYT blog watch, something Eric Asimov said the other day struck me: “the dance that comes of shooting oneself in the foot.” He was referring to, who else? The Montalcinisti’s.

All week the spiders in my house have been attacking me in my sleep. I am covered with spider bites. My skin has been crawling for days.

So we have Tex-Mex, Italian, dancing, shooting and spiders; I sense a theme here.

Earlier in the week I was at lunch with my Italian wine loving friend, Paul. We were at a little place in our neighborhood, York Street, talking about wine and food. Tasting a few wines, more for pleasure than anything. At the table behind me an Italian wine importer is chatting up his rep. He goes off on a property in Umbria and the consultant, Riccardo Cotarella, and how all his wines are overblown and why does he make Sangiovese taste like Zinfandel and why, oh why does he make Merlot? It reminded me of someone who was commenting about Alice Feiring’s book ( or her position ) on a blog somewhere. I wanted to ask them all, “So you think you have a better idea? Then present it, get it out there and see what kind of mileage you can get from your point of view.” I know Cotarella is working to break away from the way he is perceived, we’ve talked about it. It’s like an artist that gets pigeonholed for a certain style and then, bam, he can only be a cubist or a surrealist or an abstract expressionist. Or a naturalist or a pure-wine Euro-loving Cali-hating effete snob. I want to say to these angry ones, have you ever picked up the phone and called these people? Or how about an email? Why not engage them in a dialogue? Why does everything have to be High Noon in this culture?

Look, the young importer seems to have a nice portfolio and I’m sure he is repping good people who are committed to their land. But is Cotarella any less committed to his evolution because he has found a thread of success that brings a lot of people to Italian wine? Quit knocking it. It’s cursing the darkness it’s a mobius strip that will only drive you nuts.

Another day I’m in my kitchen with a bunch of wine and food folks with this cat from Copia and he’s in the basement mixing up the medicine and all of a sudden we’re drinking Riesling with lamb, Chateauneuf du Pape with seafood stew, asparagus with Napa cab and some fruit compote with a maderized 1971 Clos Saint Denise from Bertagna and you know what? Maybe it’s bunko, but everything worked. Even the Burgundy came back from the brink.

Ok, so maybe the dude knows how to do group hypnosis and we all were under his temporary spell, so he could schlep his secret sauce. The point is, there is always another way to look at things, without applying some dogma to it. Just being with it, observing it, thinking a little about it, maybe letting yourself be changed by it and moving on down the road to the next scenario that the future has in store for us. Huh?

Right now 40% of restaurant business in the US is take out, so that means they aren’t selling wine to those customers. The restaurant business is in the tanks. I was in a restaurant last night with a friend and he gets a call from a client wanting about 20 or so bottles of wine. The fellow couldn’t have planned his business a little better? And now he expect the salesman to stop everything he is doing so he can waste time and gas on a losing proposition to deliver this poor-planner his pittance of Pinot. And then the restaurateur wonders why his business is doing so badly?

Another restaurateur can’t buy wine because he has to decide whether he should pay his wine bill or the note on his Mercedes. Of course, image is everything, so he stiffs the wholesaler. Again. And then someone like that will threaten the big suppliers if they don’t come in and spend money in the place. This whole thing this week is like watching a bunch of rats drowning from broken levees and in turn they start chewing off the arms of their fellow rats so that can have something to float on. Bizarre week in flyover country.

A comment on the state of the importer. Business is slow and people in Italy have got to know there is a slowdown in America. But hey, July is coming and then August and then Ferragosto, so we need to tidy up the office, get the orders in, so we can get on with our vacations.

I called a Brunello producer today. The last time I called him he was in India and said he’d call me back. Well, he must have forgotten. So I called and called and called again. Finally I reached him; he was in some ex-Soviet satellite city doing a winemaker dinner. I ask him how his Brunello is going. He says to me, “everything is Ok, everything is OK, just order the wine, Parker just gave it a 91.” How about Parker giving me a gas card?

I told him I wanted to know how his certification is going. I guess he is too busy spending time to develop the emerging economies to backtrack to the American circus. Just let Parker rate it and everything will be OK. NO-K.

Have you heard of the word staycation? That’s when you stay at home because it’s too expensive or you don’t want the hassle of traveling in these times. And more people are doing that. It’s only a small step before wine lovers do the same with wines. Hello Italian winemakers, marketers, owners, enologos and everyone else who is looking to the largest economy in the world for their wines: we do not want to be treated like we are total fools. Yes our demand for more than our share of the world’s energy is ludicrous. Yes we are fatted calves. But you are feeding from the trough and it’s got a shaky leg.

That same leg that the foot dangles from that got shot by its owner on account of we too, like the winemakers in Tuscany, and people all over the world, are still working this being human thing out. We are still trying to find our somewhereness on this blue orb. Do you or don’t you wanna dance?

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Leigh Dayton and Stephanie Dalzell | June 20, 2008

COFFEE-SNIFFING rats have confirmed what caffeine addicts suspect - the mere whiff of a good morning brew gets the brain up and going.

Scientists claim the energising aroma kick-starts genes that reverse the effects of sleep-deprivation.

“These results (help) explain why so many people use coffee for staying up all night,” claim researchers

Original post by Robert

Thu Jun 19, 3:03 AM ET

KAILUA-KONA, Hawaii - Police in Hawaii say a thief got his caffeine fix when he made off with more than 1,000 pounds of Kona coffee beans.
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Police say the beans were taken from a home sometime between May 27 and May 29. The beans were in 100-pound burlap bags.

Police are asking the public to report anyone trying to sell green coffee beans.

The Kona area of

Original post by Robert

How many times have I told myself not to meddle in the world of terroir? Having (or starting) discussions about the traditionally French notion of how wines possess unmistakable signatures of their place of origin is not unlike having discussions about religion and sexual orientation: you need to take care who you have them with.

But here I am again meddling in the “somewhereness” of wines, to borrow writer Matt Kramer’s favorite shorthand for terroir.

The question of the day is whether terroir includes the “bad″ flavors as well as good — and if it does, whether such flavors should be eliminated, or not.

We’ve already had part of this discussion here on Vinography, in the context of a previous discussion about the role of yeasts in terroir. While not a part of the main post, the conversation in the comments quickly turned to the role of the Brettanomyces yeast and whether it is a fundamental flaw, or whether it might be considered part of the regional terroir of the southern Rhone. While some might object to the suggestion that Brett and its typical horsey, barnyard aromas are a part of terroir, the question of whether it represents (or represented at one time) a regional style.

A recent piece of news bears on such questions. Scientists in South Africa, in collaboration with regional winemakers, have undertaken a series of investigations to identify the source of a series of aromas found in South African red wines. These aromas, which range from green wood to burnt rubber, are considered objectionable by some (myself included) while others consider them to merely be one of the typical regional qualities of wine produced in the country, and therefore an important signature of terroir.

Let’s assume for a moment that such flavors are indeed endemic to, and produced by, the region’s particular combination of geology, climate, and (sound) winemaking practices. If this is the case, but still many consider such flavors so objectionable that they will not buy (or worse, won’t rate highly) the region’s wines, should those flavors be eliminated?

To wit: if the scientists in South Africa manage to figure out what causes these aromas and then what to change in winemaking or winegrowing to eliminate them, should winemakers go ahead and effectively erase what many have come to consider a fingerprint of the region in an effort to make their wines taste better?

There are those who will stridently declare that just like the Brett that characterized Rhone wines of a certain era (much less commonly now), these aromas are fundamental flaws and need to be stamped out like nesting cockroaches. And there are those who will just as violently argue that stripping such qualities out of South African red wine will rob it of its individuality.

My interest in all this has to do with the implied balance between typicity on the one hand (how much a wine represents a certain place or type) and pleasure on the other hand. If winemakers make wine that is indelibly true to a place, but if very few people like it, does it matter how well the wine represents the place?

There’s no easy way to answer such a question, though I find it perhaps easier than most to step back from the romanticism of terroir and ask the question: what do these winemakers want to do with their wine? If they only aspire to sell it to a local market of people who don’t think it’s red wine unless it tastes like peeled willow bark, then there’s no need for a change. If they want to sell their reds on the global market, however, and that market demands wine without burnt rubber, then perhaps the terroir, or at least the regional style, needs a bit of an overhaul.

What do you think?

Original post by Alfonso Cevola