The Wine Knows

Just a couple of FYI's:

Dear Europe: We realize you have been making wine for a long time. We appreciate that. We also realize that a number of folks here in the New World misappropriated some of your names and perhaps sullied them a bit.

For that, we continue to apologize. But really, get over yourselves already.

Are you looking for a way into the Northwest wine industry? Here's a business opportunity: Napa North, a wine shop in Klamath Falls, Ore., is up for sale. The owners are relocating to the Midwest and are, shall we say, motivated sellers.

Hoping someone knows... the JLC Winery website is down and has been for several months. Is JLC still around? Do they have a new web address? I wanted to order some wine from them but can't find them online, even on a google search. Also, did El Mirador close? I heard they did, but would like to verify that. I loved their zinfandel.

Last week, we chatted with Charlie Hoppes, owner/winemaker of Fidelitas Wines on Washington's Red Mountain. He and longtime Yakima Valley grape grower Dick Boushey have planted three acres of Cabernet Sauvignon on his five-acre property on Sunset Road.

It has been a cool spring again this year in Washington's Columbia Valley, with bud break occurring a couple of weeks later than usual. Winemaker (and now grape grower) Charlie Hoppes said vines are about as far behind as he can recall in his two decades as a Washington winemaker.

I am interested in hosting a wine tasting party for about 25 people in Woodinville. I would love some information if you've attended or hosted one before. I'd like to have it at a winery, but some of the prices from the local wineries are quite high, although I have not exhausted all possibilities.

Cal Knudsen, a Northwest forest-products exec, lawyer and Oregon wine pioneer, passed away April 24 in California after a battle with cancer. He was 85.

Knudsen planted a vineyard in 1971 and became partners with Dick Erath in the early 1970s, and Erath Vineyards' winery even changed to Knudsen-Erath from 1975 through the early 1990s. It changed back to Erath Vineyards after Erath bought out Knudsen's interest in the business.

Hey everyone!

I have a question for everyone. Several, actually... Tonight, we had a bottle of The Magnificent Wine Company (Charles Smith) Columbia Valley syrah (2006).

It was really an interesting wine, with gobs of sour plum flavors coming through and just a hint of a funk normally associated with Walla Walla fruit, which I found interesting. On the finish, this wine had a very distictive note. I liken it to green wood, almost green pine. Some might describe it as perhaps a stewed rhubarb or something - it seemed green without being vegetal, and had that drying quality to it without being sour. I immediately recognized the flavor as being just like what I have noticed from the Canyons Edge Winery Estate Reserve cab sav that we used to buy quite a bit of when it was always on sale at Yokes for $12. This flavor is not a negative to me at all, but I am curious if anyone knows what I am talking about and if they have ever tasted it before. Again, my best descriptor is green wood - not fully cured. Ever cut down a pine tree and get that green smell from uncured wood? To my palate, that is what this note tastes like.

John Newhouse 50, passed away Tuesday after a farm equipment accident.