Welcome to Gewurztraminer

A brief introduction to Gewurztraminer, one of the most difficult grapes for growers to work with, but one of the most aromatically pleasing white wine's when made well.

Hi guys. Mark Aselstine with Uncorked Ventures. First, I hope everybody's having a good Thursday as we get closer and closer here to the end of the week. I also hope that everyone's temperatures locally are coming down. If you are looking for 'where the heck is my wine clip shipment?', the short answer is, we delayed a week or 10 days or so. We had mid-80 degree temperatures last week in San Francisco. Quite frankly, I was in Walla Walla for the week and, so 80 degrees in San Francisco, at least over 100 elsewhere. I talked with somebody in the Midwest yesterday. He said they were 108 locally. That's not a good time for us to ship any wine. Wine is on its way. You should have it shortly. Thanks for the patience, as always during the summer months. We know. It's tough.

I'm joined today by two bottles and you can tell these are a little bit interesting looking to start with. They're both Gewürztraminers. A couple of words about the grape first, to start. Traminer is kind of the grape family. There's 10 or 12 of them floating around. The fact of the matter is, traminers are historically good at changing genetics on us. Over the past 100 years or so, we've ended up with a bunch of different versions of the grape. They're all kind of cousins at this point, but not directly related, you know, father-son kind of thing. 

Gewürztraminer. We don't see it much in California and you're starting to see it more in the Pacific Northwest. Amity is an Oregon player. Novarro is kind of an entry-level producer. California is Anderson Valley. You don't see it a lot in California. You don't see it a lot outside of kind of the Northwest because, quite honestly, it needs cold weather. If the weather gets too warm, the grape grows and grows and grows. The vines are almost unwieldy, where you see, if you've ever grown pumpkins in your backyard and they tend to grow a foot a day. The grape vines actually do a little something like that. Big vines, kind of foliage everywhere, leads to a lot of grape growth and it leads to pretty crappy wine. They need cold weather.

The other problem with that is they lay in cold weather so that they can keep their best traits. One of the best traits is they have this beautiful floral aroma that the grape's well-known for, but it is also a very early bud-break and a very slow ripener. Early bud-break in cold climate sounds all fine and good until you realize that in cold climates, you're more likely to have a early spring frost. That literally kills off an entire crop of grapes.

Gewürztraminer, it's something that if you find yourself saying I don't love Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc's not really exactly my thing, I am constantly looking for something on the white wine side that I enjoy, the aromatics on the thing are great. The acidity is usually pretty high. That's both because that's what the grape takes, but to make it well, you have to make it in a cold enough climate that you keep most of the acidity. It's well-worth a look. Look for Oregon, California's Anderson Valley probably makes the best stuff in the U.S. right now. The Finger Lakes region of New York is definitely trying. They've had a wide variety of success and not exactly success with it. They're coming and getting stronger as it goes. It's well worth a look.

If you're somebody who wants to branch out a little bit, Gewürztraminer. I'll ask you the question the same way we ask people sometimes when we talk on the phone to them. Name a part of France. The quick version that people come up with, Bordeaux, Burgundy, Champagne, blah blah, blah. They go down the list. The Lower Valley, the Round Valley, and then we mention Alsace. They kind of stare at us. This is an Alsacian varietal. Anderson Valley does an Alsace Festival. It's a really really interesting look into world wine that you probably don't see all the time. If you're a member of our cheapest wine club, our Explorations Wine Club, you might be receiving an Amity Gewürztraminer. You might now. We got split shipment going right now. If that's something you're interested in and you'd like to try Gewürztraminer, shoot us an email. We can find you a bottle or two. 

Once again, Mark Aselstine with Uncorked Ventures. Have a good week.