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"Easily among the best champagnes I've ever tasted, the Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot 2001 is a truly remarkable sparkling wine, both in heritage and taste. It is elegant, but fun and flavorful, and ultimately a very refreshing experience."
NewS & REVIEWs
Vintner's talents have grown, aged
Richard Peterson has helped California's industry boom,
crafting winners for wineries such as Gallo and BV.
For a generation, Richard Peterson has helped shape California's wine industry.
He is the guy who taught the Gallos how to make sparkling wine. Peterson helped engineer E.&J. Gallo Winery's transition from its reliance on ports, sherries and other sweet dessert wines to dry table wines. Later, he made some of the state's classic vintages at the historic Beaulieu Vineyard in Napa Valley, put Monterey County on the winemaking map and developed Seagram's first wine cooler. [...] Read the complete article
Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot 2001: Profile and Review
[...] The Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot 2001 is a truly remarkable sparkling wine, both in heritage and experience. While I haven't had a great deal of experience with French Champagnes, I have to say that this wine has earned the top spot on my list of top 10 California sparkling wines. Everything about it -- the color, the bubbles, the taste -- is clean and crisp, bright and brisk. While this wine has been shown as, and reported as, a rose-petal pink color, the sample I tasted was more of a golden apricot blush. The bubbles were tiny, lively, and endlessly arising. To my taste, the wine was a near-perfect, across-the-board balance of acid, sugar, tannins, alcohol and flavors. The layered fruit flavors of green apple, citrus (grapefruit), and berries (cranberry, strawberry) are well blended and linger well in the finish.
[...] Easily among the best champagnes I've ever tasted, the Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot 2001 is a truly remarkable sparkling wine, both in heritage and taste. It is elegant, but fun and flavorful, and ultimately a very refreshing experience. Overall composite score: 97 points. Read the complete article
Now We Know What "Wine Women Want"
The results are in for the first-ever National Women's Wine Competition held here in Santa Rosa, California last week. Perusing the list of winners, it seems women want what we all want, good wine (maybe a finer palate than mine can discern some subtle differences, see Do “Chick Wines” Really Exist?).
Six wines earned double gold (unanimous gold by all panel judges):
- Kestrel Cabernet Sauvignon 2004
- Serenity Merlot 2005
- Unionville Vineyards Chardonnay 2005
- Milano Carignane 2003
- Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot 2001
- Gloria Ferrer Blanc de Blancs 2003
Wrotham Pinot Sparkling Wine: 2000 years of history in a glass
This is the extraordinary tale of a new Napa Valley sparkling wine with a most unusual pedigree. It is made from grapes that trace their roots back to a grapevine planted over 2000 years ago by Roman armies [...]
Such an unlikely migration defies belief unless you know the man behind it. Dr. Richard Peterson is one of California's most talented, sought-after enologists. Among his feats was successfully filling the very large shoes of André Tchelistcheff, the famous Dean of American Winemaking, when he retired from Beaulieu Vineyards in 1968. Asked to name his own replacement, Tchelistcheff selected Dr. Richard Grant Peterson, then head of E. & J. Gallo Winery’s New Product Development and Research division. When asked why he chose Peterson as his successor, André said simply, “When a normal person is pricked with a pin, they bleed blood. Like me, when Peterson bleeds, he bleeds wine.” Read the complete article
Continuing Our Marathon
Sparkling Bubbles Primers & Reviews...
At midnight, with the toast: [...] This is when you want to pull out a sparkler with a story to tell, such as the Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot Noir Reserve Napa Valley Sparkling Wine Blanc de Noir ($60 for the 2000, $50 for the 2001). The story: This wine is made with grapes from what could be the rarest stand of vines in California, a 2-acre plot in the Napa Valley. They stem from an ancient vine believed to be a natural seedling of pinot noir that Romans introduced to the Wrotham area southeast of London 2,000 years ago
The Minimalist Meal
Searching for an epiphany
at Press in St. Helena
It should come as no surprise, then, that Press is owned by Leslie Rudd of Rudd Vineyards and Pat Roney of Girard, who put together the [wine]list along with another partner, Reuben Katz of Culinary Institute of America at Greystone. They should be praised for the company they keep, some of Napa's best and most unusual, such as 2000 Richard Grant Wrotham Pinot Blanc de Noir ($88) made by Richard Peterson. Read the complete article
Peterson's Progeny
Most famous for his daughters,
unassuming California wine pioneer Richard Peterson finally puts his name on a
wine's front label
[...] In a great intertwining of science and history, this brand-new Napa Valley
wine likely descends from Pinot Noir vines that the Romans brought to England
2,000 years ago. This clone was cultivated and made into red wine by the Romans
in a village called Wrotham (the locals call it "Root-um"), 25 miles
from London. Wrotham winemaking essentially ceased when the Romans left, but the
vine stayed. In fact, it thrived. It naturalized and grew wild, showing a remarkable
resistance to powdery mildew, even as it was enshrouded in English mists. It was
forgotten, however, until the late 20th century, when a tiny local winery began
cultivating it. Read
the complete article
