WINE SPECIAL CASES

IN CASE you haven’t noticed, there are a lot of new wineries in California. A whole lot. Five years ago there were roughly 300 of them in the state; today there are 500 or so. The number of wineries in the Napa Valley alone has almost doubled since 1978, from about 75 to around 140.

Many of the new wineries are very small. Many of them have strange and exotic names like Chateau Chévre, Hop Kiln, Deer Park, Calafia, Casa Nuestra, Far Niente, Storybook Mountain, Donna Maria, Pommeraie, Ravenswood, River Run, Grover Gulch, Argonaut, Yankee Hill, and Scharffenberger. And many of them have such a small production that their wines are impossible to find, even in California.

And yet, I’ve learned as I’ve visited new wineries around California that an astonishingly large number of these new, small, strangely named establishments sell their wares (at least in token quantities) right here in Dallas.

I’m not sure why California vintners are turning to Texas. It probably has something to do with the increasingly sophisticated (and thirsty) wine market here. It might also have something to do with the fact that Californians, like the rest of the country, are starting to look at Texas as a sort of state of the future, and hence as a good place to get their commercial feet planted while there’s still room. Whatever the reason, the wine lovers of Dallas have cause to be thankful because much of what is coming out of these new California wineries today is very good.

On the other hand, the availability of all these new wines in Dallas may prove to be something of a mixed blessing. Sure, they’re good wines. Sure, Dallas is lucky to have them when lots of other important cities around the nation don’t. But now Dallas wine drinkers are going to start having the same problem their counterparts in California and a few other markets have had for several years: How do you keep the damned things straight? How can you possibly keep up with the flash flood of new wine that is already beginning to saturate the marketplace?

Well, if you’re serious about the matter, the answer is not a pretty one: You’re going to have to drink more wine. There’s just no way around it. Drinking (or at least tasting) all these newcomers is the only way you’re going to be able to get to know them, to figure out which ones you like best, and to get their names burned into your consciousness so that you know what to buy the next time.

It’s a job you’ll have to do yourself. But to help you get started, here are some notes on 10 new (or almost new) California wineries that sell their products in Dallas and that produce terrific wine. Just because they’re sold in Dallas, though, doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to walk into your neighborhood Hasty Liquor store and walk out with one of each. They are distributed in Dallas, but they’re distributed sparsely. (Matanzas Creek, for instance, is currently available only at Marty’s.) And not every wine each winery makes is shipped here. But what is here is worth looking for.

One final note: These wines aren’t cheap; they’re among the best California has to offer, and their makers know it. Expect to spend $8 to $15 a bottle and maybe more in a few cases. But expect to get your money’s worth.

Acacia. These folks make what is quite simply some of the best Chardonnay and Pinot Noir in California. Several of each, in fact. The ’79 Chardonnays have disappeared from California by now, but there might be a stray bottle or two around Dallas. (The best of the three is designated Winery Lake, but all three -even the lowest priced one, from the Tepusquet Vineyard in Southern California -are splendid.) The Pinot Noirs are particularly impressive because Pinot Noir is such a darned hard grape to do anything sensible with in California. There are four 79s, the first three of which are now in release-Lee (the lightest and the most fun of the three, with an attractively spicy, piney bouquet), St. Clair (the biggest, with a trace of CO2 that will probably disappear shortly), and Iund (my favorite, an elegant wine with a particularly intense finish). The ’80 Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs, which 1 tasted with the wine maker earlier this year, are no less impressive.

J. Carey. Not yet a very well-known winery (and one that frequently gets confused with another establishment, the Richard Carey Winery), J. Carey is a potential champion in a potentially very important new wine district in California: the Santa Ynez Valley (just northwest of Santa Barbara, 100 miles or so from Los Angeles). The region seems particularly well suited to white wine grapes, and Carey’s Sauvignon Blancs and Chardon-nays have been extremely good -trim, understated wines, rather in the French style (the 1980 Sauvignon Blanc, for instance, is a lot like a good Muscadet). But I’ve also had very good Cabernet from J. Carey and have heard favorable reports on its Merlot. There is also a Cabernet Blanc, which I’ve stayed away from because I don’t have much truck with that sort of wine, but I suspect it’s perfectly fine for its type.

Duckhorn. Duckhorn is not something you use to call waterfowl, but rather the name of a man who spent 10 years or so as a grape grower and vineyard consultant in the Napa Valley before deciding several years ago to make wine himself. Thus far, he has concentrated on red wines – a Cabernet and a Merlot in 1978 and a Merlot alone (with 30 per cent Cabernet for ballast) in 1979. All are calm, well balanced, and eminently drinkable -not sledgehammer monsters like many Californians, but sensible, well-behaved wines. The ’78 Cabernet is particularly noteworthy because of its intense berry flavor and vaguely peppery character and the ’79 Merlot because of its intensity and long lasting, highly articulate finish.

Flora Springs. A nice new winery specializing in Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc, but also producing quite good Chenin Blanc, Johannisberg Riesling, and Cabernet. The whites are clean and have plenty of fruit (the ’80 Chardonnay has an especially nice roundness on the palate), but the ’80 Cabernet (which I tasted at the winery in several lots before it was blended) figures to turn into particularly enjoyable wine.

Iron Horse. Serious, mainstream wines, most notably Cabernet and Chardonnay. The 1978 Alexander Valley Cabernet, for instance, is a beauty – big and dark with a complex bouquet (hints of cedar, traces of mint) and a deep range of flavors. Only slightly less impressive is the 1980 Sonoma County Chardonnay, which is oaky (but not too oaky), fruity, and fat.

Mastantuono. Owner Pat Mastan is an outspoken and rather eccentric former home wine maker who claims to have discovered the secret of wine making -a secret he says has thus far eluded everyone else. Be that as it may, he certainly makes good Zinfandel -which he specializes in, he says, simply “.. .because I love it; it’s everything I like in a wine.” He’s in one of the lesser-known wine areas in California, near Paso Robles, roughly halfway between L. A. and San Francisco – but it’s an area, interestingly enough, where Zin-fandel has been grown for most of this century. Mastan takes advantage of this fact, making some of his best wine from the 50-year-old Dusi Vineyard in nearby Templeton. The 1979 is dark (but with flashes of pink around the edges), chewy, and almost chocolatey, with huge amounts of delicious fruit. The 1980 (un-released as of this writing) is bigger and darker -almost black in fact -with a thick Port-like nose and plenty of tannin, but some surprisingly graceful flavors.

The Mastantuono 1979 Paso Robles Zinfandel, from two or three much younger vineyards, is lighter by comparison, but still huge and dark, with lots of elusive flavors and a long, lingering finish. Mastan describes the difference between the two thus: “The Dusi vines have wisdom; they’re something to look up to. The younger Paso Robles vines have that teenage syndrome -quality that wants to learn, but not yet mature.” Again, be that as it may, the wines are superb -skillful extensions of all that is best in the demonstrative California style. Mastan, incidentally, told me earlier this year that he planned to make about 300 cases (altogether) of 1981 Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, and Cabernet for the Texas market exclusively. Not having tasted them, I can’t recommend them – but I’d bet on the Cabernet. A 1980 Chardonnay I tasted, which Mastan made for his own use in experimental quantity, was unusual and had good fruit, but was nothing worth standing in line for.

Matanzas Creek. Belying the rather gruesome implications of its name (matanza is Spanish for massacre or butchery), this establishment’s wines are clean and extremely civilized. Among them are a good Chardonnay, a rangy dry Gewürztra-miner, an intriguing Semillon (though one that I’m not very fond of personally; I look for some delicacy and agility in Semillon), and an absolutely wonderful 1978 Sonoma County Cabernet -which has a multilevel, highly sensuous, gypsy-tearoom sort of bouquet (spicy, musty, lemony, dusty), plenty of substance, and a more than ample display of good, grapey flavors, finishing deftly with a suggestion of licorice.

Quady. This winery isn’t really all that new: Its excellent California-style Port has been on the market for three or four years and is widely acknowledged – along with the vintage Ports made by the J.W. Morris Port Works-to be the best such wine made in the state. But the winery deserves inclusion here, because wine maker Andy Quady has recently branched out: He now makes an extraordinary dessert wine -extraordinary both in the sense of its unusual quality and in the sense that it is very much out of the ordinary -called Essensia, using a variety of Muscat known in France as “fleur d’oranger” or orange blossom Muscat. It’s a fruity, unctuous, mouth-filling wine with a bouquet that does indeed suggest orange blossoms (or maybe orange blossom honey). It has the heady perfume and thickness of flavor common to almost any good, sweet Muscat, but it has a character that is very much its own. The closest point of reference I can come up with -and one that Quady admits was something of an inspiration to him – is the superb Rhone wine called Muscat de Beaumes de Venise -of which there are only a handful of producers and which is virtually unknown in the U.S., alas. (Visitors to California wanting to sample this unusual wine -the Beaumes de Venise – should call at the small wine shop called Kermit Lynch in Albany, on the edge of Berkeley.)

Charles F. Shaw. Chuck Shaw loves France’s Beaujolais, and he’s trying his best to make a comparable wine in the Napa Valley. He is succeeding mightily. His specialty is Gamay -the variety called Napa Gamay, specifically, and that needs some explanation. The variety most often used in Beaujolais itself is called Gamay Noir à jus Blanc -black Gamay with white juice. (All grapes have juice that is more or less white; the color comes from the skins of the grapes.) The variety that Californians call Gamay Beaujolais is not the same thing at all; it’s actually a kind of Pinot Noir. On the other hand, the variety that Californians call Napa Gamay might be what the French use. Just to play it safe, Shaw is trying to import some undisputed Gamay Noir à jus Blanc from Fleurie, the village where some of the most elegant Beaujolais is made -but there’s a two-year quarantine on the vines. Meanwhile, what he’s doing with Napa Gamay is just fine. His 1979 Gamay, which has probably all been bought up by now, was above all bright, fruity, grapey, and active in the mouth. It was a rather light wine, as are all of Shaw’s (as are Beaujolais), but certainly not a namby-pamby one. The 1980 Gamay, which is currently available in Dallas, is even lighter, but it’s no less bright and fruity, and has a subtle berry-like aftertaste that I find most appealing. Shaw has also made small quantities of Zinfandel -a medium-bodied, rather high-alcohol 1979 with a nice Bordeaux-like nose; and a wonderful 1980, clean and fruity and vaguely herby, with all the nimbleness of his Gamays, but a bit more body, too – but they haven’t been released yet, and may not get to Texas.

Shown & Sons. Yet another new Napa Valley winery, this one makes several different wines, most notably Chenin Blanc, Johannisberg Riesling, and Cabernet. Its 1978 Cabernet is a real winner-one of the best and most sophisticated ’78s I’ve tasted-with a fresh, lively bouquet, lots of Cabernet character, a nice tannin balance, plenty of fruit, and a long dry finish that stretches out like a yawning cat.

There are probably 10 times 10 new,small California wineries whose wines areor will soon be sold in Texas, and many ofthem are as good as the ones I’ve listedhere, if not better. I’ll try to keep up withsome of the more impressive ones in thiscolumn -if I can only keep up with themmyself!