Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:04 Hello, enthusiast. Welcome to Wine in the Bottle. I'm your host, Sarah, and this is the wine podcast for enthusiasts of all levels. And I like to take you off the page of the textbook into the greater world of wine. What do I have in my glass today is the question. This is a champagne, a true champagne from Champaign France. In fact, it's a Piper Hsic and Piper Hsic is one of the oldest champagne houses in rhymes, France. And I'm sure that I'm pronouncing that wrong. It's, maybe it's reams, I'm not sure. But Piper Hsk dates all the way back to 1786, I believe. And it was founded by a German man named Hsk, who fell in love with the champagne region and decided to create something beautiful champagne. Now, he was not the first person to make champagne that is credited to do Peron. Well, whether or not that is actually true is debatable, but dumb Peron famously said, come quick, I am tasting the stars when he discovered champagne. So what makes champagne so unique and so special, and what does it really mean? Well, that's a great question because I think to most people, champagne is ubiquitous for any bubbly wine, but that's not at all correct. Champaign is its own unique element, its own production style, and it comes from a specific place. In fact, any sparkling wine labeled champagne has to come from Champaign France. Otherwise it's not really champaign. So, so what makes this glass unique?
Speaker 0 00:02:12 It's biscuity and bready with a little bit of mushroom and hay. It's definitely been on the leaves for a while, which means that it has sat on the yeast cells in the bottle for an extended period of time For standard champagne, the restriction is that it must age on the Lees on the yeast for at least 12 months. If it has a vintage stamp on it, on the bottle, if it specifically says it comes from a certain year, it has to be on the leaves for at least three years, sometimes can be aged for a decade or more. This particular wine is the prohibition edition, and I'll bring the bottle back up again. So this is the Piper Hsic bottle. It's a brute, and it is their prohibition edition. So it was, um, in celebration of the repeal of prohibition. So this wine was definitely aged for a while, but I still get these beautiful primary characteristics from it as well. There's yellow, peach and apple honey. Suckle not quite as much. Citrus, I do get a little bit of lemon, but it's, uh, stone fruit, greenf fruit and floral. So if we take a taste here,
Speaker 0 00:03:54 Has really soft bubbles, and that could be because it's not really chilled at this point. It's been in my glass for a little bit. Um, when I first poured it, it foamed up beautifully. It had this gorgeous moose that just bubbled over, um, on the pallet. It's kind of got some weight to it. There's definitely a roundness and heavy, not full body, but definitely on the heavier side of medium. It is a little tany on the pallet, more lemony, a little yogurty. Um, and there is a bit of minerality in here as well.
Speaker 0 00:04:44 Nice bright acid to counteract that little bit of residual sugar. It's making my mouth water a lot and the finish goes on for miles. So I'm sitting here explaining it to you and I can still taste the wine. Fantastic, great cup. So what are the restrictions that make this a champagne? First of all, it has to come from Champaign, France, and then in the vineyard there are restrictions just on grape growing. So I'm gonna go to my script now. So there are only seven grape varieties that are approved for use in a champagne. Pinot noar, chardonnay and mune are the three most common. And then you could also use Petite Meier, Pinot Blanc, Pinot Green, and our ban. And those last two were recently added. So you get seven choices to put into your wine.
Speaker 0 00:05:58 Then the grape varieties that are chosen are suited to a cool climate because it is very cold in champaign. Even during the summers, it really doesn't get that warm and it's a continental climates. So the summers and the winters have a large range of temperatures and it's not very consistent. So frost is a huge problem. In fact, in 2021, the harvest was severely affected by Frosts in the early part of the growing season. So in, I believe it was March and April, there was an extended period of frost several days, and that damages the vines and prevents good growth basically. So the crop was reduced.
Speaker 0 00:06:59 Other things to know about the champaign region is that it has chalky limestone soil. So the drainage is, works really well. There's a lot of rain in the wintertime, and that rain just drains right through the limestone and forms a reservoir underneath, which can help later in the year if there is no rain later in the year or in times of drought where there might not have been enough rain over the winter, there's still water in the underground reservoirs. So that's a unique aspect to champaign. And I think terroir has a a lot to do with what makes champagne special, because this style of wine is made all across the world. And we'll get more into the style in a moment, but the chalky limestone gives it a zing, a minerality that you don't find in warmer climate, um, or more fertile soil based mines.
Speaker 0 00:08:02 So what happens in the vineyard is that everything has to be done by hand in champagne, no mechanisms can be used, it cannot be mechanized at all. It's all done by hand and it's regulated. So in good years where there is a lot of rain, the yields have to be controlled because there is a cap put on by the regulatory authority. So the farmers have to go in and select the in fluoresces or um, the great bunches before they've formed berries. They have to choose the best ones and call the rest because they can only produce a certain amount per hectare or per acre. But the restrictions don't end in the vineyard. Once you, you get to the winery, you have to follow some specific rules and regulations in order to create traditional method champagne. And all champagne is traditional method. So first of all, you make a base still wine from one of those seven grape varieties.
Speaker 0 00:09:16 The still wine then gets bottled and you put in a liquor de, which is sugar mixed with wine and yeast. And what that does is you put it in the bottle and you cap the bottle and it goes through a secondary fermentation in the bottle that it will be sold in. And that that is a regulation as well. It has to be secondary fermented in the bottle in which it will be sold. So in that bottle, the yeasts eat the extra sugar and they eventually will die. And the cells, this is kind of gross, the cells will settle to the bottom of the bottle and then it has to sit there. Champagne does not go through a filtration process like some still wines do, most still wines. Instead to get rid of the sediment, it is racked and riddled. So you take the bottle, you put it in a rack, and you start out horizontal.
Speaker 0 00:10:25 And then every so often depends on the producer, you go in and turn the bottle ever so slightly. So now it's at a slight angle and it's also been rotated. And the best champagne houses do this by hand. It's a very slow, very tedious process. Some champagne houses will use what they call a gyro pallet, and it is mechanized, and it will do that same thing just on a more consistent level. So once you have rotated the bottle to the point where it is now vertical, you dis gorge and get rid of all that sediment. So you freeze the neck of the bottle, open up the cap and the pressure from inside the bottle because that secondary fermentation has produced carbon dioxide, which has mixed in with the solution of the wine. And that's how you get those beautiful bubbles. It's carbon dioxide. So the pressure pushes on the ice in the neck of the bottle, which has trapped all the sediment inside and pops it right out.
Speaker 0 00:11:40 Then you top off the bottle with a solution of wine and sugar, which depending on what style of wine you're making, what style of champagne, uh, you could, could put more sugar or less sugar or none at all. If you're okay with the sweetness as it is, that's called do massage. And uh, this new wine or the same wine that you had in the same bottle gets corked and sent off for sale. And that is traditional method. And traditional method is made throughout the world, but it can't be called champagne. It has to be called sparkling wine. And in Germany it's called Zs. In South Africa it is, um, capla. And here in the United States it's traditional method. Sometimes you'll see it referred to as method traditional in French <laugh>. So there is a little bit of backstory about what makes champagne special and how there are multitudes of sparkling wines throughout the world that you can try that are still made exactly the same as champagne, but from a different region. So if you hear the term sparkling wine, don't shy away from it. And now I think I'll cut to an interview with Paula Cornell of Cornell Sparkling Wines here in the Napa Valley and see what she has to say about Champaign and California sparkling. Um,
Speaker 2 00:13:13 So thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Um, I always like to give my guests the opportunity to introduce themselves because you know better than anyone what your passions are. So what's your elevator pitch?
Speaker 3 00:13:25 What is my elevator pitch? That's a good one. I even know that <laugh>, um, I guess it would be, um, Paula Cornell, fourth generation sparkling wine producer. Um, my great-grandparents and grandparents all made sect in Germany. And then my father here. And I'm just re in a different way taking the tradition and redefining it. So it's really wonderful. I
Speaker 2 00:13:49 Love that <laugh>.
Speaker 3 00:13:50 Thanks. Thanks.
Speaker 2 00:13:52 So I, this whole episode is about champagne, but you mentioned sect and so I would love to bring up what the differences are because I know a lot of people who in the general population think champagne is synonymous with all sparkling wine. And it is certainly not. It is a very niche category. So champagne versus sec, what's
Speaker 3 00:14:15 The difference? Sect is German champagne only. It's made in German <laugh> and there's like sparkling wine, like, uh, Prosecco. There's many different ways of producing it. But most German sect is made in the method champagne wa which is the traditional champagne, which means that it's made in the bottle that you are, you're getting Yeah. With no and all, um, all um, naturally fermented and not, um, processed in any other way. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:14:48 So if you were to set down a bottle of your sparkling wine from California mm-hmm. <affirmative> a bottle from champagne and a bottle from Germany that's in the style of sex, would you be able to tell the difference?
Speaker 3 00:15:00 That is a very good question. I probably would, um, probably would just because to me champagne is definitely has a very specific, um, taste to it. Um, maybe not taste is the right word, but there's definitely a flavor that I think is that goes, goes through all champagnes, um, that's a little bit more yeasty than we can ever, uh, produce here. Um, German sec, I, I honestly, I have not in this, in the most recent years had any, so to be able to sit down and say what the similarities would be as far as taste, because they're using now pretty much the exact same grapes. Yes, there are some that are made in with Riesling and other dry whites mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but they too are doing more chardonnay and Pinot law also. But my father had a sparkling that was called Xero Tropin that he did in the very German style. Cause it was a hundred percent Riesling, but it was bone, bone dry. So you would never have known that it was Riesling. Wow. So I think that that, I think that even today that would surprise most of us, um, in Germany how dry some of those wines are.
Speaker 2 00:16:17 Yeah, absolutely. Because a lot of German wine is, is associated with sweetness.
Speaker 3 00:16:22 Absolutely. Which is really sad. <laugh>. It's sad that we just, just automatically feel that way. Yeah. I mean, I think people are missing the boat when we're not drinking as much. We're not drinking great Rieslings Pinot Blanc, um, goer's demeanors. We're, we're, we are thinking constantly that they can only be with Asian food or that they can, that they're gonna be sweet. And by far they're not. And they go with like bubbles, they go with everything.
Speaker 2 00:16:51 So. Hi. So if you had to make an unconventional pairing with sparkling wine and something totally off the rails that no one would expect, what would you pair it with?
Speaker 3 00:17:02 Oh, last night we had it with a beau, beautiful filet of beef with horse radish and we had some, the B blanc and wa that we've got a mimosa drinking now. But yes, I mean there's enough acidity and enough backbone that, um, it goes with a lot of different things. And it's just like German wine. You people think that, oh, sparkling you can only drink with dessert or, and no, it goes with so many different, so many and it's really about the style. No, you don't wanna be drinking if French extra dry, which is fairly sweet mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But if you have something that's got some backbone and age to it, it definitely goes with a little bit of everything. My father was funny cuz he had, growing up we had a bubble bubbles called Rouge and it was a hundred percent gamb and it was delicious on the dry side. So when I would do winemaker dinners, even back then, people were feeling much, the most people felt much more comfortable when they were drinking something that was red that was bubbles, ah, that, uh, dryness or sweetness was still there. But, um, they felt I could just see that people felt more comfortable cuz it was red
Speaker 2 00:18:15 Because it was spread. That's so interesting.
Speaker 3 00:18:18 <laugh> in our minds, the things we do. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 00:18:20 <affirmative>. So I wanted to ask your, I I went to your talk at the Art of Champaign screening and what stuck out to me was that idea that champagne is, is so well known. I have a new best friend, um, <laugh> champagne is so, so well known, so ubiquitous. But if California sparkling could be called anything other than that to sort of bolster it's reputation, um, it could be. And do you, do you feel that way with other regions in the world as well? Like German sect and, um, Italian kava or Prosecco?
Speaker 3 00:18:57 I think I, I think that all those countries have, all the different countries have a much more sexy name for their wine. I do think it's hard for the consumer Prosecco, you can't say that all Prosecco is method champion law by any means. Yeah. So I think it's difficult no matter what nomenclature you're using. I just hate the thing that's sparkling wine <laugh>. To me it sounds really cheap and it doesn't sound good. Yeah. Um, and yet in all respect of cha uh, champagne, I certainly don't wanna be calling it champagne. I get tired of trying to explain method champagne wa which, <laugh> which that's my job is to explain method champagne wabe. And then everyone since then, and ever since that night, I say that a lot, God, we have to come up with something much nicer and they'll go, well, why don't you have that on? Yes, sure. My free time. Don't do that.
Speaker 2 00:19:49 It just
Speaker 3 00:19:50 Seems that, um, it's hard for the consumer to know what is traditional champagne. Traditional champagne, um, style or it's something that's been pumped with co2. And even with pricing, it's hard to explain too, because you have all those proseccos coming into the market that you can buy from anywhere from, uh, from $6 to $25 mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And my Bri goes anywhere from $15 to $25. And here that's method SHIs. So it's hard to even put a price on it. Um, so I don't know, I always tell everybody to look for method, champagne, raw or traditional method
Speaker 2 00:20:36 On the bottle.
Speaker 3 00:20:36 On the bottle. But yeah, we need to come up with it. So any ideas people have, we need a better name. <laugh>, I say, but it seems like lately I've been saying I'm in the bubble business. Business Yeah. Versus, um, versus in the sparkling wine business. Just because again, I just think that's, but bubbles could be just about anything. It could be bubble bath, it could be. So I'm like, oh, that's okay. As it's got bubbles in it.
Speaker 2 00:21:06 I love that. Um, do you have a preferred method of more like the house method or the vintage method of sparkling
Speaker 3 00:21:14 Wine? I think both. I mean, Tru truly it's both for me. Um, um, for my, for my brand, it's important that I have something that is truly, um, has my heart and soul, which is the Blanton Noah and, uh, Mylanta Blanc. It's still on the east. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So those are vintage wines and they're all Napa Valley. Okay. Um, so from my brand as we go on, everything from Napa Valley is vintage and meaning that it's also aging longer on the ye Yeah. Where the Bri is a year and a half on the east and it, but it's a California appellated. But it definitely fits the needs for, um, bubbles that can, you can be enjoying every single day and that you, which you should be, I mean, to me, I don't care if you're drinking the Brit or the, or if you're not drinking mine, but drinking, I think bubbles is a really enlightenment for each day.
Speaker 2 00:22:12 As Don Perignon supposedly said. Yeah. You're tasting the star.
Speaker 3 00:22:16 Absolutely. Ab absolutely. You know, and I never, I mean, here we have a mimosa in front of us. I truly disliked mimosas terribly because I think most of it, what we've all had, especially if you go out is the least expensive bubbles that, and usually it's not method cir and bad orange juice. Yeah. But if you get great orange juice and great bubbles, it really makes a whole elevated, ex elevated experience. So now, my God, I kind of like this to start the, and no, I don't do that every day. <laugh>.
Speaker 2 00:22:51 That's the wine
Speaker 3 00:22:52 Business. Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh
Speaker 2 00:22:54 Yeah. It's, uh, it's funny. I, my day job is, uh, that I'm sales and concierge. I tell my guests all the time, you gotta, when you're in Napa, it's okay to start early
Speaker 3 00:23:04 <laugh>. Yeah. You be, um, I do like when people are visiting here and, um, I do not have a tasting now, so everything is here at the house and just as you see, part of it is being entertained by these creatures or you or the guests entertaining my dogs <laugh>. Um, but I do like to catch people in the morning because I think it's more, it's fun to start your day out with some bubbles and, um, it's obviously good to finish your day off too, but I like them before they've hit every cabernet producer, <laugh>. Exactly.
Speaker 2 00:23:38 Can they come to you after? Yeah. Several glasses and 15%
Speaker 3 00:23:42 Wine.
Speaker 2 00:23:46 So what do you think makes the Champaign region so unique?
Speaker 3 00:23:53 The heart and soul? Definitely the people. The, the people, the history, um, the legacy that has taken place. Um, like what we heard in that movie was the strong influence of, of very strong women, um, that have made that business so, um, have carried on for so long. Um, I think, and they've mastered their trade. I mean that's, it's an incredible trade. I think other parts of the world, including the United States, we, we all make good bubbles, but I think it can cont we can continue to do better. And I think we are doing better too. Uh mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah, they're jokester, <laugh>. Uh, but yes, uh, I think it's, to me it's a lot of the tra tradition. Tradition is really been part of it. And their legacy of vineyards, they do so much sourcing of, I mean, one, I believe it's Krug that has, I can't even believe how many different vineyard sites that they're sourcing from to make their mind, where then there's others that are getting their grapes from one, one vineyard in particular mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So it's all over the board, but the stylistically it's just different from what we're doing.
Speaker 2 00:25:07 Definitely. Absolutely. Um, I think terroir factors in pretty strongly as well. And I know that, you know, there's debate on whether or not terroir is, is functional in a glass of wine. I think it is. Um, because of everything that goes into growing that dairy that goes into your bottle, it's really, it, all of the factors are important. So the, the chalky soils of champagne versus our 33 different soil subsets.
Speaker 3 00:25:37 Absolutely. Absolutely. And to be, the last time I was there was, uh, just before Covid and to be there in the middle of February with snow on the ground and it being truly a winter wonderland, which we don't get, we don't get here. I'm turn this off. Sorry. <laugh>. So my psychiatry is definitely making jams, so it is cracks me up. We're all open the door some mornings and there's boxes of fruit out there and it, oh God bless it. I better do something with it. So I, I love, I love I love being able to do that, so
Speaker 2 00:26:13 That's awesome. My grandmother used to make jam all the time, but she's got really bad arthritis now, so it, it makes the story hard. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:26:21 It's hard. So please help yourself. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 00:26:25 Thank you so much. So, um, what's your take on caviar and Champaign?
Speaker 3 00:26:32 I love it. Yeah, I love it. And matter of fact, I'm doing, um, in the middle of, uh, launching a high low program that is, um, um, high being a caviar with Polanco Caviar, which is a family, uh, caviar producer in U Uruguay. Oh wow. And, um, so I'm doing, that's the high and the low is fried chicken. Oh, love it. So I've partnered with Dave Cruz, who, um, started with not, he did not start with, but he was with Thomas Keller in the inception of ad hoc. And so started that whole fried chicken craze there. So we're just now starting this that really, it's back to bubbles go with everything and you can have a beautiful classic setup of caviar, but you can also have a great omelet with caviar on top or, um, I mean, you don't have to have anything with just caviar, <laugh>, caviar. Caviar and fried chicken goes with the salt and the, um, the fat content of it just is perfect with the acidity of both Brit and blanche and wall of any bubbles. It just really goes well. So it's not a new combination by any means, but it's something that, but I think that, um, saltiness of caviar and it's back really fried chicken too, the saltiness of both of them. It just, the, the acidity and the yeast just sort of eats through with all of that. And it's luscious. I
Speaker 2 00:28:08 Love that. <laugh>, I'm a big fan of, of fried chicken and wine with fried chicken. I had a ghost block souvignon blanc that I compared with ad hoc fried chicken. And I thought it was the most amazing thing in
Speaker 3 00:28:19 The world. <laugh>. It does, it really, um, it's really excellent. I mean, there's really, it really works out well. So, but yeah, I think, um, I think, I mean caviar and caviar also to me, it reminds me of learning about when I was working for Robert Maddi, we would do, it was the era of lots of cigar smokers, <laugh>. Yeah. And I would go into downhill and I was so clueless about ordering cigars because I'd have to order quite a bit mm-hmm. <affirmative> mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I thought I knew I liked a particular cigar. What did I know? I'm not a cigar smoker. <laugh>. So sitting down with Juan Diego from Polanco Caviar, I thought I knew something, forget it. I knew nothing. I mean, just the whole breath of knowing about how caviar's produced, um, nomenclature of names that we think we is a type of caviar, meanwhile just a marketing group. So it was really, it was, it's fascinating. There's so much to
Speaker 2 00:29:30 Know. It's just as nuanced as champagne itself
Speaker 3 00:29:33 E Exactly. So Oh wow. What our job is now to make it all much easier so people can enjoy it. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 00:29:43 So with aging champagne, there's all the different styles in between mm-hmm. <affirmative> minimum 12 months on leaves, sometimes up to five years. Do you feel like the different aging categories go well with different occasions or different food parents?
Speaker 3 00:29:59 That's a very good question. <laugh>. Hmm. Let me think about this one. Okay. <laugh>. Um, personally the older and needier egg wine is, for me, I enjoy just consuming drinking it and enjoying it. Um, the things that are a little bit heavier as well as those that are lighter weight, I love having with, so the lighter weight yes. Can be drank by itself, but it's also great with fruit or with, um, I mean here I, since I had chickens, I do a lot of deviled eggs. Mm-hmm. Um, so I, it can go basically with everything, but I really enjoy the older yeas wines to drink by themselves just because it's, I'm savoring it. I'm, I'm truly savoring it. However, they do, like what I was talking about, beef, they also would go great because they can stand on their own.
Speaker 2 00:30:56 Oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3 00:30:58 So it's a little, it's over. My answer is also toothpaste because I wanna be selfish and enjoy it in one way and then in the other, it's, uh, I think it goes well with everything.
Speaker 2 00:31:09 Oh, that's good. Yeah. I mean, bubbles really do go well with everything. They're an every day kind of drink. And I found myself even in the last couple of years, sort of migrating towards the celebration bottles are more of those like aged reds that I've had in the cellar forever, instead of the bubbles which have become more of the like everyday normal occasion drink with everything kind of wines. And I, I think that that's kind of an overarching consensus throughout the wine community. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> just kind of a nice migration.
Speaker 3 00:31:41 And now we're so lucky in the United States to have, um, so many great grower champagnes coming in mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And that's why it was hard, um, for the Napa Valley, for the Blanton wa I knew it had to stay in that 50, $60 range because for me, also, why would I drink California sparkling even though I love that, that when I have some other great choices of, I just would like people to be open-minded with the French that they do drink mm-hmm. <affirmative> as well as the California that just because, um, something seems sexy on the outside and it has great marketing that try other things too. Um, because there's lots of brands out there that, uh, we all see, we all seem, we love the packaging, but there's some, there's other mines that are
Speaker 2 00:32:39 Mm-hmm. <affirmative> makes me think of those new commercials for Snoop Dogg's champagne. Oh yeah. What we, every doing
Speaker 3 00:32:48 <laugh>
Speaker 2 00:32:49 Lady Gaga is partnering with Don and it's just, it's obviously it's marketing ploy, but it's also kind of an endorsement because that person is putting their name on that brand. So if you could pick any celebrity from any field, who would you want to be your front man?
Speaker 3 00:33:10 Uh, you know, for me personally, that was a question that was asked that night. My last question, the last question of the evening, I'll never forget that was who living or a lot living or dead? What would you choose? And I, and I did not answer quick enough. <laugh>. I would have to say, since I love the classics, it would be someone like Jackie Kennedy or it would be somebody like, um, um, Audrey Hepburn or something in that, um, um, princess Grace or somebody like that, that would be female. But also in this day and age, it would be, I'd love to have somebody that's released a strong individual out there. Yeah. Uh, it does crack me up and you look at the numbers for tequila mm-hmm. <affirmative>, what has happened mm-hmm. <affirmative> since every te there's so many tequila brands out there that have a either a musician or actor or someone behind them. It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2 00:34:09 It really is. And it's, it's something that I think can be helpful and harmful at the same time, because so many people will associate that person with that product. It sort of wipes the board for all of the other products out there. All of the other smaller producers who are still producing quality product and it's just not getting out because there's this face <laugh>.
Speaker 3 00:34:35 Well, and it's, it is, it's difficult. Um, I did this summer eight a tasting for Jameson rescue, and Christie Brinkley was there with her, um, vegan Prosecco. And I found it, it was lovely. But I found it really odd that that was the marketing, her marketing was that it was vegan when of course it's vegan. Yeah. So it, it just show, it had nothing to do with the quality at the wine, which was there. And it was lovely. She's beautiful and a great spokesperson for her brand. But to me, I just found that an, uh, an interesting marketing choice on her part. That that was gonna be, that was vegan when Yeah. All of our bubbles are vegan.
Speaker 2 00:35:21 And I think that just goes to show that some people don't know the process of wine processes and some wines are filtered and fined. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And that might include egg whites or gelatin or milk. So maybe those wines are not technically vegan, even though you're not consuming any animal product. But
Speaker 3 00:35:42 Bubbles
Speaker 2 00:35:42 Are filtered differently, not really filtered at all, it's just the disgorgement process. Correct. So there is absolutely no filtering in finding involved. So of course, naturally they're vegan <laugh>, but a lot of people don't.
Speaker 3 00:35:55 And, and it's funny you as you say that, because I'm constantly sitting around this table. I will be done at whole tasting and then I'll, someone will ask me a question, I'll say, do you know how bubbles are made? And it's because it is back to cigars or caviar. We don't know. So that's why I'm always please, you know, can I explain to you how champagne or sparkling wine is made? And then the light bulb goes off in people's eyes and now I get it. Now I understand. Which I think we just take it for granted that we, I take it for granted that everybody assume that they know how champagne's made. I grew up and out as you being a birder. I grew up with peacocks. Yeah. Because they killed rattlesnakes. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and living on the eastern side of the valley where it's more arid. There were quite a few more. So I have peacocks here. I don't think they know what a rattlesnake looks like. They would have a clue. <laugh> they not a clue
Speaker 2 00:36:55 Shelter.
Speaker 3 00:36:56 Exactly. They would not have
Speaker 2 00:36:58 Any idea.
Speaker 3 00:36:59 <laugh>. Hi. Oh god.
Speaker 2 00:37:02 Yeah. So it's just, it's one of those things that I find really interesting is how many different styles of wine there are. Even when you break it down into red, white bubbles and then break it down even further from there.
Speaker 3 00:37:16 So the tab walking, do you hear, I don't like chardonnay
Speaker 2 00:37:19 All the time, but there's so many different styles of Chardonnay.
Speaker 3 00:37:22 So then all of a sudden you put a Chardonnay in front of someone that is not a butter bomb, that's not over oat, that is got great fruit and great depth to it. Um, then all of a sudden, oh, I like that. So sparkling is very similar to the, it's, you know, someone will say to me, well, what Joe Blow had some other brand. Well, of course it, it's just like, I drink numerous different Cabernets. Um, of course you're gonna, we, I don't, you'd be sick and tired of drinking the same thing for all of us. Sick and tired, drinking the same thing all the time. I've had the pleasure of working with, um, when my family's winery closed in 92, I went from, um, working with my father in bubbles to Joseph Phelps to be, um, uh, VP of marketing for a couple of years.
Speaker 3 00:38:16 Then went on to Mondavi and then have ran quite a few other wineries and then started a consulting business about 15 years ago. And I've just been lucky to work with so many great winemakers as well as great brands. And I, I'm lucky to be able to pull those out and have multiple vintages of things that, and to be with good friends, um, that are here in the valley that I always, I think when you drink a bottle of wine, oftentimes people drink that in a different country and they order the wine here and they goes, it's not the same. Well it's not the same because it was the whole experience that you had. Yeah. And for me, it's, I love drinking friends wines because it makes me happy that it was there. They produced it and their heart and soul went into it. So, um, I love, so I love California.
Speaker 3 00:39:10 Um, I love brown lens, so I love things from both north and southern rh. So I gravitate towards those. Okay. Oftentimes. Um, and then still drink lots of bubbles, <laugh>. So if I can drink, you know, somebody brings in a good bottle of bubbles, I'm always happy <laugh> and happy to learn about different areas. I had lunch in September with a friend of mine and she brought wines, let me see. We had a South African bubbles, we had a Croatian bubbles, we had a Russian bubbles. I mean, it was so much fun to taste some of these wines. I would never have the opportunity to to taste from these different countries. And they all have their own nuances. Definitely.
Speaker 2 00:39:53 So which type of tasting do you prefer more? Do you prefer regional side by side or a vintage side by side?
Speaker 3 00:40:00 Oh my goodness. You've got a great question. Oh, thank you <laugh>. Um, I would, well both in for different matters. Both. I think trying a, uh, vertical of wines is always incredible to see how something has aged over a period of time or how vintages have been so different as, as is the ter and soil. But then also to be able to taste wines that, um, that are pre fairly much fairly the same. That as far as the, um, the percentage of Chardonnay and Pinot oa the location, but to see what the winemaker style is as well as the where, um, where the grapes are going. But here, if you put most Napa Valley bubbles together, uh, you're gonna see quite a bit of difference, even though so many of us are getting fruit from Eros mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And we're getting it from different areas in Carneros, but really it's the style that the winemaker is putting on it. Just like a chef, you give chef this four chefs the same, uh, recipe is all gonna turn out differently. Does the Brockton noir? Correct. So what
Speaker 2 00:41:17 Can you tell me about your, uh, process for this specific
Speaker 3 00:41:21 Wine? Sure. So, um, the brand right now has two wines. The Brit, California and, uh, Napa Valley or Eros Long Noah. This was the first wine for me to release and it definitely is my baby. It comes from a great vineyard called Mitsuko. And Mitsuko was married to Jan Shram from Clogos. She was also a good friend of my mother's. So to go full circle, which is kind of cool, <laugh>. Um, she was given this vineyard by her husband for Valentine's Day and gave her, he gave her a Tiffany's blue box with dirt in it, <laugh>. And the note said for the 365 days of the year that I love you. And he gave her 365 acres in Eros. Oh my God. <laugh>. And for me, um, working for Mohabi all those years and doing events in vineyards surrounding this property, I never knew there was a piece of land that was 365 acres right in the middle of Carneros.
Speaker 3 00:42:30 Wow. So I'm honored to be able to have a few blocks there of both Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. So this, um, excuse me, this gets picked usually the third week of August. And, uh, the grapes all go into the winery. Chardonnay goes through a hundred percent mal lactic pinot's in French Oak. And then Robin, my winemaker and I usually put the blend together around now, usually it's just after Thanksgiving that we'll start working on it, and then it gets put in the bottle and it's aged for three years on these, just a little bit shy of three years, but three years as long as we can possibly keep it that way. Um, and we're just truly going for some elegance, some, um, some nice weight to it. And that's why the Chardonnay goes through Malo because in lieu of being able to age it for as long as we really would love to age it <laugh>.
Speaker 3 00:43:30 Um, it's that that really is what happens. Uh, we have a b Blanc de Blanc on the east right now from the same vineyard, which is a hundred percent Chardonnay mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And that will not be released until, it'll be de Gorged in 24. Okay. Um, and I'm gonna be showcasing that at this year's premiere Napa Valley. Uh, the first minute, this is the 19 Blaah that 18 I had for, uh, for Premier in Napa Valley a few years ago. And I used old Hans Cornell Blan to Noah, I think it was 86, belong to Noah as Thek. Oh. So it was called something old, something new. And the Blanc de Blanc will, um, it's from, we've decided that this particular, uh, five cases is from one, one piece of the block. And I'm naming it after my mother, because Chardonnay in Eros as well. In Champaign, it's the Queen. And we used to call my mother Queenie. So it is in honor of her. We're doing, we're doing that sweet <laugh>. Yeah. She was a, she was a character. So, mm.
Speaker 2 00:44:47 Was your mother involved with the winemaking at your father's
Speaker 3 00:44:50 Winery? She was the backbone of that winery. So she was definitely the, the power behind the throne as you would say. But they worked, um, very, they worked very, very well together and she definitely was his sounding board and, and did, um, all the entertaining, I mean, there's great stories of how, you know, he, you'd be coming to the winery at four or five o'clock and he liked you and it'd be, oh, Mary Louis, oh honey, I've got friends I'm bringing home for dinner in his fabulous German accent. Um, so now he used used to always say, oh God, no. But it never came out. Oh God no. Was always, oh God, though. So I, to this day, every time I do something that has to do, especially with the brand, I think he is rolling over in his grave going, oh, gut all honey mean, what are you doing <laugh>? So <laugh>, yeah. It was a great way to grow. It was a great one. Absolutely. And what's fun is that both the wines definitely have been, I don't think I started out that way, but it's b basically been an homage to, to my parents.
Speaker 2 00:45:59 It just kind of developed
Speaker 3 00:46:00 Into that. It really, it really did. Yeah. It started actually with Michael Vander Bile who designed the label. He asked why, um, I wasn't using these men. Oh. And because that was on my, uh, family, his, my father's family in Germany. John Cones guard has it on his label, I believe it was Trehan had it for their second label for years. And the very weekend that Michael Vander Bile had said, why aren't we using that? I was going through an old, uh, some Hans Corn newsletters. And in there it described what the meaning was. And in the, in the Bible, the men are sent over the mountain to make sure the land is fertile on the other side. And as the story comes back, they come back with these huge clusters of grapes and big size fruit. Well, in this newsletter it said Hans Spiels that Napa Valley and California is his land of plenty. And with that, oh, it's going on my label <laugh>, I don't have a choice. This is just, so I'm really glad that, um, I'm really glad I did that. It means a lot more. It means a lot, but
Speaker 2 00:47:13 That ties it in a little bit more. Yeah, that's really sweet. I love how much history is in this valley alone, even though, you know, in France they've been making wine for 2000 years. And here, you know, we're just getting started with timeline wise. I mean, we've been making wine realistically since the 1860s, but not to the standard that we make it today. And we're still getting, getting started.
Speaker 3 00:47:40 Yeah, there is, it's, there's so much history and it's, um, we either don't take time to learn it or we take it for granted. And it's, and it's great that there's still, I had a group here not long ago that, um, that said that they were asking a million questions about things and they said, can you please tell us about the saga of the Mondavis? And I went, well, sure. So I start telling about Robert Mondavi and Peter Mondavi and then it's time for their, their driver to be here. And just as they're getting on the bus, Pete Mondavi drives in <laugh>. And I said, Pete, I just told these people about the saga, your family who said, do they spend the night <laugh> <laugh>. So just the fact that so many of us, there's so many of us that are still around and still making, making wine and still loving what we do. And there's many generations here, um, in Napa Valley as well as Sonoma. And just, it's great that we are following that European tradition.
Speaker 2 00:48:43 Absolutely. Absolutely. So as we start to wrap up towards the end of our, our session here, um, what are some things that you would like the viewers to know about where to get your wine?
Speaker 3 00:48:58 Well, there's, uh, thank you for that <laugh>. Uh, I'm very lucky that here in Napa Valley I have so many great supporters of restaurants that a have been Don Giovanni and Gel Mustards that have been supporters from the very beginning. And I so appreciate that. And retail-wise, um, Gary's here in St. A Helen Sunshine Foods Seller Collections and Napa, um, but there's many, there's many more. Uh, the Brit is probably more available than the, and Noah and people can also find it on my website too. So, and the website's great cuz it has a lot of history. History. So I'm old, so there's a lot of history. <laugh>.
Speaker 2 00:49:40 Good. So visit the website, um, <laugh>. Well thank you so much again for hosting me here at your beautiful home. And
Speaker 3 00:49:48 My pleasure. Thank you for coming,
Speaker 2 00:49:52 <laugh>.
Speaker 3 00:49:52 Cheers.
Speaker 0 00:49:54 Gosh, I had such a great time visiting with Paula and her puppy dogs. It was a great conversation and thank you so much for joining me. And I think I'll finish off this glass of Piper Hsic. But before I do, if you are interested in expanding your palette the way that I did when I was studying for the W set, check out Vinebox in the link in the description disclaimer, I do get a kickback if you happen to purchase through my link, but Vinebox is a great product where you can try sample sized vials of wine from all over the world in many different styles without having to commit to purchasing a full bottle. Check it out, let me know what you think. And of course, like subscribe, drop in the comments what your favorite champagne house is and we'll see you next time.
