2004 Cheverny, 'Domaine du Salvard'

We are tasting a flight of Sauvignon Blanc wines at work tomorrow, in an effort to solidify some sense of where our wines can and do fit into the marketplace. I can't wait, as I really feel that I need some more specific guidance from Marketing and the owners as to where the wine should be going, stylistically. I should have a lot more info to guide some critical blending decisions that need to be made early next week.

I have been busy procuring some examples of wine types from around the globe, and the selected wines have begun to arrive this week. In one of the shipments, from The Wine Cask, in Santa Barbara, I ordered an extra bottle of an inexpensive wine from the Loire appellation of Cheverny. I do not know much about this AOC, but turned up some info on the web. Apparently Cheverny AOC allows reds from Cab Franc and Pinot Noir, and whites from Sauvignon and Chardonnay. I think I remember seeing a note to the effect of 60-85% Sauvignon being typical in the appellation whites. (If someone has more solid knowledge, please share!)

SO, I have a bottle here at home this evening of the 2004 Domaine du Salvard Cheverny (blanc,) imported by Kermit Lynch, and retailed at $13.

Definitely a familiar Loire aromatic in the nose; a tiny touch sulfurous, but yielding to a kind of struck flint, crushed granite minerality. Fans of solid acidity will appreciate this wine, and yet it has a very new-world richness on the palate. I would guess that we are in the 13%+ alcohol range here, almost a new-worldish opulance, but tempered by the minerality and structure of the wine. Lime zest is the nearest we come to overt fruit in this wine, perhaps along with slightly underripe apricot. I think that this is definitely worth the price of admission, maybe more bang for the buck than a lot of California Sauvignons...

This is going to be LOVELY with dinner tonight; I am making a homemade pizza on crisp handmade crust, with sliced yellow squash, fresh chevre, cracked peppercorns, fennel seeds, and a drizzle of a fruity, slightly bitter olive oil. Some salad on the side, (using up the last of the store-purchased salad, as I am starting some arugala this weekend, per my last post.)

There is a bit of chill in the air this evening, but I just got the fireplace started, and it will soon be glowing with a gentle heat. A good night to read, I guess!

Sacramento Delta Blues

A few years ago, I was hiking with my parents & youngest brother and sister in Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park. We could see the high peaks in an arc above us, capped with snow even in the height of summer, forming the Continental Divide.

"The snow on this side of the divide all flows into the Mississipi Delta," my brother told us. They had learned about this in his Junior High Geography class over the past year.

"So where does the snow on the other side end up?" my father quizzed him.

After a few puzzled minutes, he admitted he wasn't quite sure. "I don't exactly remember, but it goes to the Pacific, I think. The Colorado River?"

"LA," I said, smiling. "It actually mostly ends up going to Los Angeles." Which wasn't exactly true, but not too far from the truth.

I had been reading a copy of "Cadillac Desert," a fantastic book that covers the water policy in the Western US over the past 75 years or so, in all of its absurdity. I was amazed to learn about the government building hundred-million dollar water projects in the West so that farmers here get free or cheap water to grow the same crops that the government is also paying farmers in the southeast and midwest to plow under; the fact that the thirst of Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, and the Imperial Valley had placed so many demands upon the Colorado River that it ceased flowing into the Gulf of California, destroying a historically rich estuary and the accompanying ecosystem; the destruction of a rich Salmon fishery in the American and Sacramento rivers through diversions and dams.

This morning, a story caught my ear on NPR's Morning Edition. It was about many fish species experiencing severe population decline over the past three years due to diversion of water from the Sacramento River Delta. One of the species involved was the Delta Smelt, listed as an Endangered Species, which could potentially trigger reductions in the flow of water for irrigation purposes.

KLC and I just returned from visiting great friends in Sacramento over the Thanksgiving holiday. The five hour drive to Sac parallels the amazing California Aqueduct through the San Joaquin Valley. Millions of acres of farmland stretch for hundreds of miles; cotton, pistachios, citrus, row crops, almonds, stock yards, grapes, poultry barns, alfalfa, dairy units, and every other imaginable agricultural product. In addition, hundreds of cities, large and small, depend on this aqueduct both for municipal drinking water and for economic stability and purpose.

Much of this abundance would not be possible without the water projects. The value of the crops produced in the Westlands Water District every year is upwards of $30 Billion. 2/3 of the cities in California depend to some degree on this water, diverted from the Sacramento and American rivers. The story said that during the months of November, December, April, May, and part of June, the Westlands Water district supplies 95% of the salad greens consumed in the United States! And all of this despite the fact that many advocates of sustainable agriculture maintain that the water district should have never been irrigated in the first place, with soils containing toxic levels of selenium, arsenic, and molybdenum.

Just another reminder that irrigated agriculture is, by definition, very difficult to justify as sustainable agriculture. I know this, and yet I work in an industry where our vines are irrigated aggressively throughout the season, altering both the yield, and the essence of what the vineyard sites would otherwise be, and what the wines would be like. In the north part of our county, the exponential growth of vineyard acreage over the past 20 years has lowered the water table alarmingly; hundreds of feet in some cases, at the same time as a housing boom increases the demand for water to drink, flush, and keep lawns green.

Water rights are destined to become one of the central issues of existence in Western America over the next several years; maybe even more important than gasoline prices, housing costs, or immigration.

I think that I'll plant some of my own greens this weekend, to get me through the winter without adding to the depletion of what little water is still allocated to the Delta Smelt.

NPR: Morning Edition, Wednesday November 29, 2005 'Delta Smelt Endangered'

First Posting

Hello!

I wanted to stake out a place on the web to create and to share. This will be my first weblog project ever, and I don't know just what the frequency and/or length of contributions may be, but perhaps ultimately I will develop a pace and cadence that feels right.

I think that the main focus for creating this log is to foster sustainablity within my own life, and the lives of those around me. On so many levels, our society rushes headlong into the future while considering only the present. All of life on this planet is a complex economy of inter-related species, ecosystems, regions, cycles and ideas that wind throughout every animate and inanimate action and reaction; even forward and backward through time itself, connecting everything and everyone together at once. I wish to force this consciousness upon myself, and to hold myself accountable to living in accordance with this understanding in my daily life.

I especially wish to explore some of my favorite, meditative activities; growing things, creating things, and gathering good people and ideas around myself. There will definitely be discussions of gardening, preparation and enjoyment of food and wine, and celebration here.

Well, here it goes! I am excited and intimidated all at once, but this should be an interesting process.