The Wine Knows

The federal government has moved the Lake Chelan AVA one step closer to reality, as it has opened the proposal for comments, which can be submitted until Oct. 14.

Washington currently has nine AVAs: Columbia Valley, Yakima Valley, Walla Walla Valley, Red Mountain, Horse Heaven Hills, Wahluke Slope, Columbia Gorge, Rattlesnake Hills and Puget Sound.

One proposed AVA, Snipes Mountain, is in the pipeline ahead of Chelan.

A question that has been swimming around in my head needs discussion: Under federal rules, a winery whose name includes the name of an AVA must receive at least 85% of its grapes from that AVA. This was an issue in Oregon with two AVAs: Eola-Amity Hills (which originally was to be called Eola Hills) and Chehalem Mountains. It's an issue right now in Napa with the proposed Calistoga AVA.

Wineries with such names earn a "grandfather" clause - essentially a government pass - if they were in business prior to July 7, 1986.

No fewer than five wineries use "Chelan" in their names. A stickier question is Tsillan Cellars, whose name sounds like "Chelan" but is spelled differently. All of these wineries have started in the past few years, so none would get a grandfather clause to use more than 15% of their grapes from outside of the proposed AVA.

You see, so far not a lot of grapes are grown in the Chelan area, which is within the greater Columbia Valley AVA. Those that are tend to be grown by wineries for their own use. I suspect Tildio isn't going to sell its grapes to a competitor just to help with compliance.

I need to make a trip up to Chelan one of these days, and that's a question I'll be asking.

Currently, there are 13 wineries and 150 acres of grapes planted in the proposed appellation, which is 24,040 acres in size (compared with 11 million acres in the Columbia Valley and 4,040 for Red Mountain.

Alan Busacca put the proposal together for the Chelan growers. He successfully shepherded through the Wahluke Slope AVA and did work on the Horse Heaven Hills AVA. He's also done extensive studies on and work for Red Mountain, Walla Walla and the Columbia Gorge AVAs. In other words, with Busacca doing the work, getting approval is nearly a slam dunk.

Once they get past the name issues.