Tag Archives: Kluge Estate

Winebits 155: Thanksgiving wine, best wines, Kluge winery

? Wine blogs and Thanksgiving: There's a spirited discussion at Louisville Juice questioning whether wine blogs should offer Thanksgiving wine advice, and the consensus seems to be that it's kind of silly for us to do so. Or, as the blogger Thomas Pellechia wrote in a comment, "Bloggers are just like print writers – ? every holiday, every year, comes with a discussion of which wine to go with which food or a list of the best. All this proves to me is that print isn ?t dead ? writing is." Which seems an odd thing to say. People have questions about Thanksgiving wine, and it doesn't seem untoward that I — or any other wine writer — should try to answer them. Unless, of course, we're not writing for people who have questions about wine, which is another question entirely.

? Wine Spectator's top wines: A tip o' the Curmudgeon's fedora to my brother, Jim Siegel, for passing this along: The Spectator is releasing its top 10 wines of the year in a cyber-fest of video and on-line updates. It's subscription only, but you can see wines 8, 9, and 10 with a free link through Nov. 28. Two of those wines are $100 each, and the Spectator notes that the average price per bottle for the top 10 is $48. You may draw your own conclusions from the pricing.

? The end for Virginia's Kluge Estate: The winery, one of the best in the state, has been forced into bankruptcy, and an auction will be held on Dec. 8 to cover its $35 million in debts. Kluge will be missed. You can argue that its owners, Patricia Kluge and William Moses, made myriad bad business decisions, but they also made good wine. And it's always a shame when a winery that makes good wine goes out of business — and especially a winery that did so much for regional wine.

Winebits 153: Japanese wine, chips and wine, Kluge Estate

? Yes, the Japanese make wine: The Japanese have made wine for years, but few people outside Japan wanted to drink the sweet wine made with a native grape called koshu. That may be about to change, reports the New York Times. A wine importer and several family-owned Japanese wineries, working under the banner Koshu of Japan, are trying to be the first to produce koshu well made enough to succeed in the world market. And, somehow, an intriguing story about a little known Japanese native hybrid manages to work in Robert Parker. Amazing, isn't it?

? Potato chips and wine: I can't link to this — only have a news release. But Sokol Blosser, the well-regarded Oregon winery, has launched a marketing drive that pairs its wines with Kettle potato chips. There is a certain goofiness to this that the Wine Curmudgeon appreciates (though the news release has entirely! too many! exclamation points!), and Sokol Blosser has scored some social media points by using Facebook and Twitter in the campaign. The bigger question, though, is not pairing potato chips and wine. it's pairing expensive wine with potato chips. Sokol Blosser's least costly bottle is $15, and as much as I enjoy goofy pairings, potato chips and a $24 bottle of pinot blanc seem a bit out of balance.

? Virginia's Kluge Estate for sale? My pal Dave McIntyre has the sad news. Kluge, a key winery in Virginia that makes quality rose and sparkling wine, is in financial trouble. Writes Dave: "This winery's collapse could send the message that Virginia is not a good market for wine investment, even as the overall quality of the wines improves to impressive, world-class levels." The regional wine business has mostly avoided the recession-based devastation that has hit California and other wine regions, but apparently, it isn't immune.