Tag Archives: Illinois wine

Wine writing yes, sports writing no

In one of his other lives, the Wine Curmudgeon was a sportswriter. At the time, it seemed like a good idea.

I mention this because my alma mater, Northwestern University, is enjoying an especially fine football season that the nation ?s sportswriters could apparently care less about. The Wildcats, who started a record for hapless futility when I was in school in the late 1970s, are 5-0 and could win the Big Ten championship.

Yet the sportswriters who vote in the Associated Press ? college football poll apparently have little interest. They put Northwestern a grudging 24th this week, its first time in the top 25 this season despite its record and record-setting performances. Teams that have been in the top 25 include Baylor, which gave up 70 points last week, 1-4 Arkansas, and 2-2 Michigan.

In this, they remind me of all those wine writers who know everything there is to know about regional wine — and they don ?t have to taste it to know everything about it. Once, Northwestern ?s football team was not very good, so the writers ? attitude is obvious: It ?s Northwestern, so we can ignore it.

The difference between wine writing and sportswriting is that wine writers usually listen to reason. No doubt this is why so many fine wine writers, like Dan Berger and the late Joe Pollack, were once sportswriters. Pour a wine writer a glass of something, and they ?ll almost always be fair about it. That ?s why DrinkLocalWine has been such a huge success. Too many sportswriters, though, are a different story. The Winestream Media seems open-minded and humble in comparison.

So, if and when Northwestern wins the Big Ten, I ?ll toast its victory with a bottle of Illinois wine ? a chambourcin from Prairie State Winery, perhaps, or Lynfred Winery ?s sevyal blanc. Know any sportswriters who might want to join me?

A personal note: The Northwestern alumni magazine recently did a story on graduates in the wine business and somehow managed not to include me (with a headline that never would have passed muster with the late, great Dick Hainey). Ordinarily, I let this stuff go by, but for some reason this slight really bothered me. I ?d like to think my success represents the school well, but I ?m probably just being sentimental.

Winebits 217: Organic wine, wine snobs, regional wine

? Crummy organic wine? One reason why organic wine has never taken off, in the way of other organic products, is that the consumer doesn't see a difference in quality. And that, says a top natural-leaning winemaker, is holding back the business. Monty Waldin spoke disparagingly about ?Parker 100-point ? wines, calling them ?not real wines," and admitted that not all organic wines on the market are high quality: ?There ?s a lot of boring, crap, industrialised organic wines on the market, and if the industry ?s going to implode, it ?s because of that. ? The article, in Britain's Drinks Business magazine, doesn't pull any punches — very refreshing in a trade magazine.

? Franzia on wine snobs: Fred Franzia, the man behind Two-buck Chuck, celebrated the brand's 10th anniversary with some of his famous invective: "We have won the battle with snobs and other elites who didn ?t believe we could provide excellent wines at an inexpensive price. This changed the wine culture in the U.S. …" The interview, on the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat's website, also notes Franzia's claim that Two-buck Chuck increased the size of the U.S. wine market by five percent. That may or may not be true, but it's certainly a Franzia-like statement. That would mean Two-buck Chuck added $1.5 billion to the $30 billion U.S. market, which seems like a lot of $2 wine.

? Regional wine and restaurant wine lists: The Springfield, Ill., Journal-Register looks at why regional wines don't do well in restaurants and discovers that consumers — shockingly — have made up their minds before they taste the wines. "We get a bad rap from people who think Illinois only sells sweet wines," says Bradley Beam of the Illinois Grape Growers and Vintners Association. "That may have been true 10 years ago, but the wines of 10 years ago are not the wines made today." This is a well done story, and one that media outlets in other regional states should do more often.