Oh lord, a blog from Lodi—the 2025 farewell

Harvest morning in Mokelumne River-Lodi's Abba Vineyard, planted to Syrah.

Farewell by Randy Caparoso

Oh lord, a blog from Lodi was the title of the very first blog posted on the Lodi Wine page in August 2010, written by yours truly. Over 1,200 posts later, I think it is fitting that this should be the title of my very last post, as I will departing Lodi wine country in July of 2025. 

First, I’d like to thank all the region’s growers and vintners who have welcomed me into their community these past fifteen years. But also first, I need to thank you, Lodi Wine’s dear and patient readers who have indulged in this site’s continuous flights and forays into viticulture and vinification, farmers, winemakers and all the characters peppering the region’s past and present, the seemingly endless variety of grapes and equally varied wines, almost every iota of the dirt, topography, climate and natural or human circumstances—each and everything that has distinguished the Lodi appellation from any other in the world. The goal has always been differentiation, the gist of every post appearing on this page.

Those of you who have stuck with it all these years may have noticed that these posts have never been exactly short, or lacking in detail. Unlike almost all other blogs, which assume readers can absorb only so much information at a time. Instead, the Lodi posts have endeavored to provide everything you need to grasp a subject. Why? Because I’ve always abided by the same principle, or belief: That readers deserve a thorough, never partial, explication of everything, stated in plain English. 

Wegat Vineyard, old vine Zinfandel planted in 1958.

There’s a reason for that. In fact, I did the exact same thing throughout my previous career as a restauranteur. That is, I would never insult the intelligence, the tastes or curiosity of my guests. I always assumed the best, believing that those who sit at my tables deserve the most complex, exciting dishes, and the finest, most intricate wines. I never believed in dumbing anything down, and I’d be damned if I ever treated Lodi Wine readers any differently. 

Especially when it comes to Lodi grapes, wines, vineyards, their history and its people—simply because they are among the best and most interesting in the world. There’s always lots to talk about. Why would I leave anything out?

I have never actually explained this approach on this page. Didn’t think I had to because it has always been there, in black and white, enhanced by lots of colorful photos and images. I hope you have enjoyed them over the years. And if so, these are the final words I share with you now...

Corner at Lodi's Ham Ln. and Lodi Ave. in 1969, when sidewalks were being installed alongside blocks still planted to vineyards.

A growing groundswell

I'm stuck in Lodi again. In 1969, when Creedence Clearwater Revival released their iconic song Lodi, the official population of Lodi was 28,691. Today it is 67,679 (according to the 2023 census). As a community, Lodi celebrated 100 years of existence in 1969, having been known as Mokelumne prior to 1869.

Lodi, in 1969, had absolutely no reputation for wine, except as a region associated with sweet, fortified dessert wines (i.e., Port, Madeira, Sherry, Muscatel, etc.), which most Americans were still drinking (aside from generic jug wines) at the end of the sixties.

Although it would take Lodi another 25 years to really get into the premium quality varietal wine groove, it wasn’t as if the region was doing nothing in 1969. According to a 1970 UC Davis report on the “California Grape Situation and Outlook” delivered by Extension Viticulturist A.N. Kasimatis, “North San Joaquin Valley [which would be defined as the Lodi AVA in 1986] accounted for 25% of the 1969 California wine grape crush,” whereas “California’s famous coastal winemaking counties account for a mere 8% of the total 1969 crush....”

Cinsaut harvest in Bechthold Vineyard—own-rooted vines planted in 1886, named the California State Fair Vineyard of the Year in 2014.

Today Lodi crushes just over 20% of California’s wine grapes each year, virtually all of it for table wines. Quantity, however, does not necessarily correlate with quality, or recognition. When wine consumers across the country, or around the world, think of California wine, the first thing they think of is Napa Valley. No doubt, there are still many consumers who think all California wine is made in Napa Valley (the actual figure is 4%).

Alas, this perception has not changed all that much since 2010. Lodi, however, is in the same boat as many other regions in California. Santa Barbara, Paso Robles, Livermore Valley, Santa Cruz Mountains, Amador County, Lake County, Mendocino—all these regions still struggle, like Lodi, for recognition, despite the excellence of their grapes and wines.

What Lodi can take comfort in, though, is the fact that nothing keeps a good region down. Just over the past few months, for instance, a Lodi Barbera (St. Amant Winery’s 2023 vintage) was named the Best of Show red wine at the California State Fair. Out of thousands of other California wines entered in the competition.

Jessie's Grove in Mokelumne River-Lodi, a farm still owned by the Spenker family who established it in 1870

Also at the 2025 California State Fair, Lodi’s Marian’s Vineyard (Zinfandel planted in 1901) was named California Vineyard of the Year; the second such honor bestowed upon a Lodi vineyard (Lodi’s Bechthold Vineyard, planted to Cinsaut in 1886, was named Vineyard of the Year in 2014). This is out of thousands of other excellent vineyards in the state of California.

Big awards for Lodi grown wines have been rolling in with regularity over the past fifteen years; showing that wine industry professionals, at the very least, are acknowledging the simple fact that, yes, Lodi grows and produces very good wines indeed.

Yet I think the most important progress made over the past decade and a half is the fact that Lodi grown wines are developing a reputation for distinctive wines that are phenomenal in the sense that they possess special sensory attributes that could only come from Lodi. The types of wines to which connoisseurs ascribe the classic French term known as terroir, or “sense of place.” Something which, frankly, most consumers, including most industry wine professionals, were totally unaware of ten, fifteen years ago.

Lodi's Borden Ranch AVA on a smoky morning.

Lodi is now known for its own, special terroir.

Don’t take my word for it. Over the past ten years, for instance, Alder Yarrow—an independent wine blogger still considered among the most respected, and influential, wine journalists in the world—has written several stories on Lodi wines. In 2021, for instance, he wrote that there are Lodi vineyards "hidden in plain sight within the vast swaths of vineyards... [which] are some of the greatest treasures of American viticulture.”

Around the same time Sara Schneider, the longtime former Wine Editor of Sunset Magazine, published an article in Robb Report entitled Why Lodi is the Most Exciting US Wine Region You’ve Never Heard. Of course, it hurts a little to be described as something “you’ve never heard of.” All the same, Schneider said some things a growing groundswell of wine cognoscente have recently become cognizant of, which is that...

In recent years, more and more longtime Lodi growers have been bottling wine under their own brands, reflecting ever-better quality. And at the same time, well-known outside vintners—some young and approaching cult-level status with their “cool-kid” followings—have noticed the potential of the region and have bought vineyards here or are sourcing fruit for their own labels. Together, they’re producing a fascinating range of Lodi wines, with bright, aromatic character profiles that are themselves somewhat shocking, especially if your reference point is the now-dated big, ripe fruit bomb...

Old vine Zinfandel in the sandy loams alongside the Mokelumn River in Lodi's Clements Hills AVA.

While, to paraphrase Marie Curie, the way of progress is neither swift nor easy, the important thing is that there is progress. When anyone of knowledge and influence opines that Lodi consists of “greatest treasures of American viticulture” made from a “fascinating range” of grapes produced by vintners of “cult-level status” with “‘cool-kid’ followings,” I would say that’s a good deal of progress. The word is out.

Turning water into wine

I would also say that, today, Lodi should be confident of eventually taking its place among the best wine regions in California, hence the country and the world, because it is in good hands. Beginning with that of Mother Nature. As I wrote back in August 2010, in the very first Lodi Wine post:

High quality wine comes directly from high quality growing conditions—perfect soils, climates, topographies, or terroir, as the wine geeks call it. For classic, old-timey grapes like Zinfandel or Carignan, terroir doesn't get much better than what is found in Lodi's oldest vineyards, adjoining the picturesque Mokelumne River. 

Field sorting Mokelumne River-Lodi Carignan in century-old vineyard.

The earliest San Joaquin Valley pioneers established their farms along the riverbanks because they could—finding deep, fertile, exceedingly plantable sandy loam soils atop an aquifer barely inches below the surface, long fed by pristine waters from the Sierra Nevada directly to the east. There is a reason why old vineyards can be cultivated for over 50 or even 100 years: Because they are growing in an ideal place, which is borne out in the significant quality of resulting wines. If not for that, vineyards are ripped out long before they become "old vines.”

Still, make no mistake: What also distinguishes Lodi is the fact that as a wine region, its history has always been driven by its smart, grounded growers, many of whom have been here ever since Lodi's first schoolhouse went up in 1859. Today's leading Lodi wine industry families—the Langes of LangeTwins Family Winery & Vineyards, the Phillips of Michael David Winery, the Spenkers of Jessie's Grove, the Feltens of Klinker Brick Winery, or the Mettlers of Harney Lane Winery and Mettler Family Vineyards—typically trace their roots in Lodi as far back as the 1800s. What other American wine regions can say that about their "typical" growers and producers?

Lodi has always grown a good chunk of the California grape crop; and not to be deterred, even during Prohibition Lodi's growers packed most of the country's grapes that were shipped to homes as far as Chicago, Montreal, Boston and New York (usually with specific instructions on "how not to have the grapes turn into wine"). Many a Lodi family, including the Mondavis, first made their fortune as grape packers, some even before branching out as growers or wine producers.

During Prohibition, Western Pacific Railroad train loaded with wine grapes packed by Lodi's Woodbridge Vineyard Association for the New York market. California State Railroad Museum Library.

In the late 1980s, Lodi's fourth and fifth-generation farming families—by then, numbering over 600 independent growers—began to get together and talk about the fact, according to Mark Chandler (former Executive Director of the Lodi Winegrape Commission, between 1991 and 2001), that "the trade and consumers still viewed Lodi as a jug wine region, even though we were the largest producer of premium quality wine grapes in the state, which we still are."

So in 1991, the growers voted to pool a quarter of a million dollars to form the Lodi Winegrape Commission in order to aggressively attack the issue of rehabilitating Lodi's image as a wine region. Says Chandler, "Our first goal was to launch marketing and PR awareness campaigns to generate a more accurate view of Lodi as a producer of premium quality grapes and wine. Most of our grapes may have been going into jug wines, but the growers were aware that they could do much more than that.

"Third, we sought to convince wineries, located both in and out of Lodi, to begin showing the Lodi appellation on their labels, thereby adding more value to the name of Lodi. In this third step, we've been extremely successful; and as much as anything, this is the reason why Lodi is now identified as a premium quality wine region."

Pinot gris harvest in Mettler Family Vineyards.

It takes more than reputation, of course, to impress skeptical consumers, feisty critics, and finicky restaurant and retail wine buyers. Great wines only come from great grapes, which come from great growing conditions. Concerning the latter, Lodi has always been blessed with two basic necessities:

• Soils so deep and rich that vines as old as 100 years have always thrived, even on their ungrafted rootstocks (Lodi cultivates thousands of acres of highly productive, phylloxera-resistant old or "ancient" vines, planted on natural roots before or just after the turn of the 20th century)

• An ideal, Vitis vinifera-friendly Mediterranean climate (comparable, for example, to the center of Napa Valley and much of Sonoma County), cooled by air flowing directly from the Bay Area through the Carquinez Strait and adjoining Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

Lodi's historic queen of grapes, Flame Tokay, which grew extremely well wherever Zinfandel also thrived.

Lodi’s pioneering families have been turning access to water into high quality grapes for well over 100 years. Jesus, it is said, could do better, turning water directly into wine. A lot people also forget that it was Jesus who first said, “The truth will set you free” (John 8:32). 

The fundamental and enduring truth about Lodi is that it is a unique and good place to grow wine grapes, manned by heroic, hardscrabble farmers. The result, as Chandler was saying back in 2010, is that “the quality of Lodi wines speaks for itself, and so now, it's just a matter of expanding on that message.”

I will no longer be sending out those messages on this page, but it doesn’t really matter. Others will pick up the slack, and you will continue to learn about Lodi’s continuing excellence of grapes and wines because that is exactly what the terroir naturally delivers.

So long, Lodi, it’s been good to know you!

Single, high-wire trellised Cabernet Sauvignon in LangeTwins Family's Jahant-Lodi Railroad Vineyard.