Liquid Amber - 2006 Barbera

Guess which wine was being produced in the northwest corner of Italy 400 years before the first Cabernet...go ahead, guess.

The grape, from which this wine is produced, is more widely planted in the old country than Sangiovese. It also makes up about 12% of the red wine produced in California. Know what it is yet?

When grown right, allowed to hang long enough to take the edge off its considerable acidity, it produces a wine with the wonderful aromatic mix of ripe plum, dark cherry, leather, and brown spice.

In the mouth, rich fruit abounds, and its silky mid-palate is framed by both balancing acid and fine-grained tannin.

Planted originally in the San Joaquin Valley, the grape's abundant acid was only employed to add a little bit of zing to otherwise flabby, overheated red wine. It is in the Livermore Valley on Block 3 of the Home Ranch Vineyard, though, that this often over-looked, under-appreciated variety shows true delicious character, presence of mind viz. a whole variety of foods, and courage in the face of mid-term aging.

Well??

One more clue...it also makes up 100% of Liquid Amber, the first release of 2009 for the Collector's Circle wine program. You got it now? Huh, do ya?

Oh, wait. This is embarassing. You see, I was giving all these clues: mostly a blending grape, high acid, not many 100% versions of the wine made, etc. etc. And it was right there in the title of this post all along...wow...really embarassing.

Anyway, the 2006 Barbera, one of the Collector's Circle's favorite wines, will be released at the Winery on January 10th. Only 192 cases were produced exclusively for members of the program. There are a few cases extra and a few spots left if you want to get this wonderful wine.

Getting to Know You...

My greatest fantasy, still, is riding the 1 line in New York and seeing someone reading my novel and being able to ask if she liked it.

At this rate the book will be done in about 25 years and I'll be too old to get down the subway stairs, but I do have the honor of learning pretty immediately whether we are doing a good wine job or not.

This past Saturday we released Fiore della Vita, an estate-grown Barbera to members of our Collector's Circle wine club at a party to commemorate the wine's debut. 177 club members joined us and I got a lot of valuable feedback.

Our Club members are truly the foundation of our business. For a small winery like ours, there is too little love in the wholesale end of the business...and I mean that literally. One of the most valuable things we can know is if we are creating the right kind of experience for those most enthusiastic about our wines. In the "broad market" the only real indication of "success" is getting another order from your distributor, but even then, you don't have any real sense of how the wine drinker feels about the wine...what pleasure, if any, it gave him.

Every day our club members and guests to the winery teach us more. Every day we get the opportunity to take the bad with the good, face-to-face...and do better the next time. And in a business setting, where real connections are hard to make, this is best kind of interaction we can have.

So, keep it up, make us better...let us know how we can provide an extraordinary experience for you.

Piemonte in the Livemore Valley

Exciting and frustrating at the same time was the New World's predilection to plant everything in the same place. A whole new world of potential offerings was available, but you didn't know what you were going to get for several vintages, and a lot of expenditure.

At Steven Kent (and before that under the Ivan Tamas name), we have been producing California-Italian varietals since 1991. Though Trebbiano has gone by the way side, Barbera has thrived.

From our 1.5 acre HRV vineyard in Livermore, we produce a Barbera (grown mostly in the Piemonte region of Italy) for one of our wine clubs that exudes rich aromas of black plum, leather, soy, and subtle citrus notes. And while 5 vintages isn't long history, there is no reason to believe that the grape isn't suited just right for our Region 3 climate.

Called Fiore della Vita in honor of the artwork (above right) created by Thom Roberts (the handsome guy, also above right) one of our Barrel Room staffers, this wine is available to taste for the next 60 days in our Livermore tasting room.