This week marks the second annual “Regional Wine Week.” You might not have ever thought about the concept of “Local Wine,” but as a reader of a website called “chefs dot com” you most likely consider yourself a “foodie.”
Well, all good foodies know about being a “localvore.” This newly-coined term signifies people who are dedicated to eating food grown within their local food shed. Many proponents define this as the “100-mile diet.” Localvores strive to support local farmers, reduce environmental stress caused by transportation, and keep jobs and revenues in the local community…all while eating the healthiest, most delicious food possible!
While the term “localvore” is only about five years old, the concept of eating local is, of course, ancient. Think about it…just a few generations ago people ate what grew in their own backyards, or at the farm down the road. It was the same for wine…all throughout history people drank what they grew, which somehow melded perfectly with the local foods.
So, in full circle salute, the wine community is taking notice of the benefits of local products and is encouraging wine and food lovers to discover something new (old?) and “drink local wine.” We don’t have a cute name for our followers yet, but I am working on that. Localwiner? Vinalocal? Locavin? It all sounds a bit too much like “crazy local wino” for my taste, so perhaps for now I should just stick with the initials “DLW.”
Regional Wine, aka Local Wine, in the United States generally refers to wine from any of the smaller wine-producing states. Many people use the term “The Other 46” to refer to wine made from any state save the “big four” of California, Washington State, Oregon, and New York. The folks over the at “Drink Local Wine” website, who can take credit for much of the recent publicity and drive towards local wine, define “Regional Wine” as any wine not from the major wine producing states along the West Coast. Either way, “local wine” leaves a lot of ground to cover.
As most of you know, I am located in Austin, so Texas Wine has always been close to my heart. And here’s a shocker for you….Texas is the fifth largest wine producing state in the country, with over 4,000 acres of vineyards, and 177 wineries at last count. Texas has a long history of wine production, starting way back in the 17th Century when Spanish Missionaries arrived and vineyard cultivation began near modern day El Paso.
Many of the Texas Vineyards are located in areas that get pretty hot during the summer, so Texas prides itself on warm-weather grapes including Tempranillo, Sangiovese, Syrah, and Viognier. The High Plains region around Lubbock is cooler and grows some mighty fine Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Chenin Blanc, and Chardonnay.
I have dozens of “favorite” Texas Wines, but for the sake of time I’ll just tell you about a few. First, there’s a wine from Flat Creek Estate grown on the beautiful shores of Lake Travis in the Texas Hill Country. Here they make a wine they call the “Super Texan.” This wine won a double gold medal at the San Francisco International Wine Competition upon its first release in 2005. Super Texan is a blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon. It's a rich wine, with a virtual basket of dark fruit flavors - blackberry, plum and cherry – dominating the nose and palate, with just a touch of spicy, floral flavors. This is a medium-bodied wine, great for food, with smooth tannins and a supple mouth feel.
Brennan Vineyards, just outside the Texas Hill Country Appellation in the small town of Comanche, specializes in two of the grapes that Texas does best. The Brennan Vineyards Viognier is a stand-out white wine of Texas, full of peach, pear, apricot and outrageous floral aromas. A medium bodied white wine, this is rich in flavor without giving you the full-palate press of some heavier whites. The Brennan Syrah might just be the richest Syrah I have ever tasted, full of cherry, berry, smoke, and spice aromas; rich as velvet on the palate. There’s not much else to do in Comanche, Texas; so if you ever find yourself on the road through town, be sure in a visit Dr. Brennan. His brand-new winery is located right next to a historic homestead that serves as his tasting room.
Llano Estacado Winery in the Texas High Plains was one of the first Texas Wineries to open up post-prohibition. The winery was founded by a group of Texas Tech Professors who thought that wine grapes would make a good crop to supplement the cotton and sorghum already thriving in the high-altitude area around Lubbock. Apparently, they were right as some excellent wine comes from this region. The red blend known as “Viviano” is one that is near and dear to my heart, as it was the first Texas Wine I ever tasted after moving to Austin from California, some 15 years ago. One taste of this rich red wine full of the flavors of pepper, currant, and plum forever changed my view of Texas as the land of Sweet Tea and Lone State Beer.
If you ever get the chance to try some Texas Wine, I hope you do so. While we love the wines of Oregon, California, and Washington, it is nice to know that other states and areas are home to excellent wine as well. Other states that make great “local wine” include New Mexico, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Arizona, Idaho, and Missouri. And by the way, wine is now made in all fifty states, so wherever you may travel, make it a point to eat local and drink local…you never know what you may find!