Ingredients listings and key taste components found in commercial wines

Barrel tasting dark, rich, vividly flavorful Cabernet Sauvignon.

Sugar and spice and all that’s nice, as the old nursery rhyme goes.

There are lots of nice things in wine, although there are very few wineries that actually print “Ingredients”—that is, additions dropped on top of natural components of wines during the winemaking process—on back labels; ostensibly, because it is felt by most of the industry that most consumers might be shocked if they find out what actually ends up in commercial grade wine. If you are not required to list everything going into a bottle (a circumstance many consumer advocates think should be changed), why do it?

I was at one Sonoma County winery’s tasting room just last week, tasting the brand’s signature estate grown Cabernet Sauvignon. The owner explained that over the years she has had problems impressing upon consumers that her grapes are certified organic and the fact that her wines are made in the lowest interventionist way possible (that is, without compromizing quality or terroir expression). So she borrowed the idea of printing ingredients on her back label from another winery that specializes in minimal intervention wine. This is the exact wording found on her bottlings...

Jun 18, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

The new light (and chillable) red wine paradigm

The 2023 Christina's Outlier, the Grenache-based Lodi grown red that now stands as the epitome of the new "light and chillable" red wine paradigm.

Last week, Dr. Stephanie Bolton—Lodi Winegrape Commission’s Director of Grower Education and Sustainability—organized what she called a “Light, Chillable Red Wine Rendezvous,” attended by a dozen an a half local vintners. Why? Because Bolton truly believes this style of wine is the wave of the future, thus calling for serious discussion. 

In fact, some of the vintners who attended are already reporting market success with this style of red wine. It is an emerging wine category that may very well help drag the American wine industry out of its current state of doldrums...

Jun 16, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

How AVAs and vineyard designations on labels increase your enjoyment of wines

Boots in dusty, ultra-fine grained sandy loam defining much of the Lodi AVA, making a direct impact on the sensory qualities of the region's wines.

Let’s start with two questions:

1. What is an AVA?
2. Why are AVAs important?

AVA stands for American Viticultural Area; a concept first established in 1980 by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, or ATF, to recognize places of origins of American wines, which appear on wine labels.

At that time, the ATF—an independent bureau within the United States Department of the Treasury—began receiving and handling petitions for AVAs from regional wine or grape growing organizations across the country. In January 2003, under the provisions of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the ATF was reorganized and the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) was created to oversee the process of defining officially recognized American Viticultural Areas...

Jun 11, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Are own-rooted grapevines superior to grapevines grafted on rootstocks?

Two east side Mokelumne River-Lodi Zinfandel specimens over 100 years old: (left) from Kirschenmann Vineyard planted on its own natural roots; (right) Steacy Vineyard planted on St.George rootstocks.

When wine buffs talk about the great wines of the world, they often talk about terroir, an important term of French origin that entails the natural environmental factors—such as climate, soil, topography, aspect, elevation, latitude, etc.—that have a direct effect on grapevine growth, and ultimately on the taste of wines. While terroir is more than about natural conditions—the hand of man also plays a big part of winegrowing—soil plays a crucial role.

Because the closest part of any plant to the ground is its root system, another hot topic of discussion when it comes to grapevines is rootstocks. That is to say, the rooting habits of specifically chosen rootstock selections that might be favorable to a site's soil, or to meet specific objectives such as drought tolerance, disease and pest resistance, grapevine vigor, canopy growth, a targeted average cluster weight, and a host of other concerns...

Jun 5, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Minerality in Lodi wines

Assyrtiko—a grape known for minerally, sometimes briny qualities—harvested in Perlegos Family's Thera Block, in Lodi's Clements Hills appellation.

Let’s talk about minerality, something a growing number of consumers look for in their wines. 

But why? Because many wine lovers have grown tired of the very qualities which have made American wines—particularly those of predominantly warm Mediterranean climate regions such as California (over 80% of wines produced in the U.S. are from California)—so popular for well over the past 50 years: Fruitiness. That is, predominantly fruity qualities in both aromas and flavors of wines.

Many of the consumers who are tired of fruitiness are turning to wines expressing some degree of minerality. As a sensory descriptor, it alludes to what the word suggests: Perceptions that suggest minerals, stones or an earth-related component in a wine's nose or palate feel, often in the presence of subdued fruit, floral or oak-derived sensations... 

Jun 3, 2025 at 6:00 AM Permalink

A new, different, exciting style of ancient vine Lodi Carignan

Lorenza's Melinda Kearney with ancient vine Carignan in Lodi's Rauser Vineyard, planted in 1909.

Ancient vine Lodi Carignan, 2.0

Lorenza Wine—owned and operated by the mother/daughter team of Melinda Kearney and Michèle Ouellet—has recently released their first red wine sourced from Rauser Vineyard, an own-rooted, east side Lodi vineyard planted in 1909 primarily to Carignan, with small amounts of interplanted Alicante Bouschet and Zinfandel.

The 2023 Lorenza Rauser Vineyard Mokelumne River-Lodi Carignan ($36), however, consists entirely of Carignan. What is noteworthy is how this wine came about, resulting in a totally unique style of this varietal red...

May 28, 2025 at 6:00 AM Permalink

With their new Heleje brand, the Des Voignes family turns culinary dreams into dreamy contemporary wines

Chefs Jake and Shauna Des Voignes in their kitchen with their newly released Heleje wines.

Once upon the time there were two career chefs who met in a super-fine big city restaurant, got married, worked their fingers to the bone. 

Some would say it was a perfect combination since she was a pastry chef and he an executive chef, so it was match made in culinary heaven. Dishes and dessert, right?

But it really wasn’t. So they packed up and retreated (as Eva Gabor used to sing, goodbye city lights!), three kids and all, to her original home in Lodi. He continued to labor, as Executive Chef and later as Food & Beverage Director of the tony Wine & Roses Hotel. Once settled into life back in the country, however, they connected one of the family occupations—grape farming—with a passion that had been simmering, just waiting to ignite, all along during their restaurant careers: Wine. What could be more natural?

May 22, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Lodi grown wines shine at Historic Vineyard Society In the City tasting

Historic Vineyard Society sign marking Lodi's Marian's Vineyard, also recently named the 2025 Vineyard of the Year (for the entire state of California) by the California State Fair.

At the Historic Vineyard Society In the City tasting in San Francisco this past May 10, 2025, 42 wineries or brands presented a surprising variety of wines (not just Zinfandel!) sourced from some 65 vineyards certified by the non-profit organization known as the Historic Vineyard Society (a.k.a., HVS).

Since its founding in 2011, HVS has been fighting a seemingly uphill battle to preserve the state’s most historic vineyards. Sites going into wines more widely known, in the commercial wine world, as “Old Vine" wines...

May 19, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Michael McCay talks baby backs

McCay Cellars's Michael McCay barrel smoking his dry rub spiced baby back pork ribs.

Lodi is made for barbecue

The weather is warming up, folks, hitting the 80°s although in Lodi wine country we’re still enjoying those cool Delta breezes. Time to get out of the house, enjoy the rays of sun and cook up some barbecue!

For years now, Lodi winemaker/grower Mike McCay of McCay Cellars has made the perfecting of one of his personal specialties—dry rub seasoned smoked baby back pork ribs—one of his goals in life. I’ve had it enough times to know that he’s got it down. He can probably smoke ‘em in his sleep...

May 12, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Lodi captures Best of Show and numerous Golds at State Fair, what happens in wine competitions and age-old thoughts on wine appreciation

Blind tasting of Lodi reds.

A Lodi wine is named #1

First, this just in: The 2025 California State Fair Commercial Wine Competition just announced that this year’s “Best of Show Red” is the 2023 St. Amant Winery Barbera, which happens to come from Lodi’s Jahant appellation. It is hard to achieve something as lofty as this—chosen as the best red wine out of thousands of others entered into a wine fair that happens to be the oldest (ongoing since 1854!) and perhaps most prestigious in the country.

Barbera, as it were, is a grape that yields wines of very high acidity, far higher than almost all other black skinned varieties, but in Lodi’s sun soaked environment this acidity finds just the right amount of balance with the grape’s varietal fruit character. That is, when grown in Lodi, the typically high acid of the grape has a way of embellishing the fruit profile of Barbera, rather than taking over with a sharp, palate-prickling tartness...

May 8, 2025 at 7:00 AM Permalink