Lovely show; perfect format — I enjoy the Winemaker guest shows beyond all others and this was one of the best of the bests.

QOTD: good question and one worth considering. I think the caliber and price of wines in contention might affect the varietal outcome. I drink most in the 20-50 USD range. I checked my score-notes over the past two years and found of my top 5 scoring wines (red), 3 were Syrah-based (primary), the other two being a Cabernet and then a large assortment of ties heavily biased toward the Pinot variety (but not w/out additional Syrah among others). I guess that answers that question, at least for the population of bottles I’ve consumed in that 20-50 dollar range. For my money (and palate), France does best by the variety, though I’ve enjoyed nice showings from CA and even more of Washington.

Since the Vayniac Cab is a 2007, I am excited to hear what a great year it was. Heidi is a wonderful guest and one of the best ever and I wish I had tons of her wines in my cellar but I don’t roll like Mott. Rhone wines are a better value to me that Pinot Noir but I do like good pinots as well, just realizing they will cost me more.

QOTD…Don’t know why all the hype about P.N. Syrah or Shiraz in my opinion
is a much more versatile grape but what I really love is Petite Sirah

John: I can only echo what the Vayniacs have already said about Heidi – elegant, lovely, gracious, and more. Great show.
Cottonmouth: Bring back the pizza guy.
Contrary Mary: Shut up Cottonmouth, you idiot.

@murso
I’ve never paid less than 30 bones for a Pinot. As you say there are no bargains. As Brice said the price of Napa wine depends on the ego of the winemaker and the press he/she gets. You have insulted me and my trailer trash palate. I hope you feel better now. As Gary says price is no way to judge a wine. I’d love to hear some suggestions for good Pinot Noir under 80 dollars. Something available from a good wine store like Garys or Kandl here in Cali. If you’d like to continue this, email me edwest_98@yahoo.com
Check this link. Some good info for wine prices. It’s a 10 year old story and a little simplistic but this guy is a real winemaker and makes some very good big reds.
http://www.coffaro.com/diary/1_99.html#rant

Heidi is a legend and it’s so refreshing when a legend is so humble and amiable. Great episode with some nice insight. If you ever have a chance to meet her she is real fun to chat to about all things wine.

QOTD: In my mind (palate?), there is a time and place for pretty much every varietal. i think the question speaks more to marketing than consumer preference. to the extent the amazing and accomplished ms barrett agrees, then i think the challenge is to convert (or at least penetrate the preconceptions of) the deep and broad california cab fan club to an alternative full-bodied, velvety, steak-enhancing wine, like syrah.

by way of example, in business dinner settings, i have ordered shafer relentless or elderton command and had it poured (unknowingly) to wealthy and experienced wine consumers who measure wine greatness against the best bottle of caymus cab that they’ve had — and absolutely blown them away.

asking folks whose palates are either too expansive or too indiscriminating to distinguish btwn (and choose an objective preference w/r/t) varietals as characteristically distinct as pinot noir and syrah to explain their rationales in a way that might inform future mktg decision-making will likely lead to unsatisfying results.

MY ADVICE: CONVERT THE CAB DRINKERS BASED ON BODY AND SYYLE — THE TRUE PINOT DRINKERS SEEK AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT EXPERIENCE; THE ‘SIDEWAYS’ PINOT DRINKERS DONT KNOW ANY BETTER…

The reason why Pinot is better than Syrah is simple. Syrah is almost always over manipulated and over extracted. I can point to at least a hundred mediocre Syrah’s in the market and maybe only a hand ful of very bad Pinot’s. Heidi is a great winemaker but she is crazy to front PInot with Syrah.

Great two part episode, Gary.

QOTD: I’m stunned at Heidi’s question. To me, P.N. and Syrah are two very different wines. The only thing they have in common is that they both have bad examples on the market. I can’t stand those dark-as-a-Merlot P.N.s, or those fruit role-up Syrahs. When you obtain good versions they’re spectacular. You should be able to see through a P.N., and it should have some earth to it: if it’s all cherry, a throat lozenge will do just as well. With Syrah, give me bacon fat or some kind of smoked meat. But if you can’t deliver that, then at least give me raspberries with some cracked white pepper and dark chocolate.

August 8, 2009
castello Your comment is awaiting moderation.
@murso
I?ve never paid less than 30 bones for a Pinot. As you say there are no bargains. As Brice said the price of Napa wine depends on the ego of the winemaker and the press he/she gets. You have insulted me and my trailer trash palate. I hope you feel better now. As Gary says price is no way to judge a wine. I?d love to hear some suggestions for good Pinot Noir under 80 dollars. Something available from a good wine store like Garys or Kandl here in Cali. If you?d like to continue this, email me via Mott.
Check this link. Some good info for wine prices. It?s a 10 year old story and a little simplistic but this guy is a real winemaker and makes some very good big reds.
http://www.coffaro.com/diary/1_99.html#rant

oops, I copy and pasted the moderation thing.

Syrah just can’t replicate Pinot Noir’s freshness and silky texture.

Gary, Heidi was great. Love the history and insight. QOTD – I love Syrah, and Pinot Noir,for different reaons.Syrah is the masculine,while Pinot Noir is the feminine. They both have their beauty and power.

Gary, I loved this show. Informing and very cool.

murso:
I actually watch Gary BECAUSE of his outrageous descriptors (sugar water & action figure come to mind – #212).
I just sometimes wonder if it confuses and scares off newbies or casual consumers in my line of work or sounds a little pretentious or who cares, is it a really good wine.

And I actually do understand the foundations of flavor. (just a bit).
diacetyl = butter flavors
gluconic acid=honey flavors
methoxyprazine = peas, green peppers (overly vegetal character)
leaf aldehydes can = grassy green odors
In oak, complex chains of phenolic compounds (lignin) when heated break down into smaller phenolics that resemble aromas of vanilla, clove, cinnamon
etc
murso = bitter, party of one!!! Wow.

I wish there was a part 3, 4, 5 and more! Like a good book, I was sorry when it was over. What an interesting life she has had, and she tells it with such enthusiasm. And she is so genuine. She wears it well.

QOTD: I like Syrah blends but I have found 100% Syrah to be too big for my palate.

Absolutely the best interview you have had on the show. I almost despaired of seeing Part 2 when you had another episode come out before this. She is definitely my hero and I want to make wine like hers.

Answer to the question of the day:

This one made me think, but my answer is not because Hollywood told me so.

I am leaving my answer based solely on taste (not price, or region for that matter).

First off I like both varieties because I think I get something different out of each one. My judgments might be limited to only what I have tasted but Syrah seems to be much more bolder (I get the fruit bomb, the thickness bomb, and hotness bomb, as Gary says, more often from Syrah). Syrah is in your face more often than the Pinot Noirs I have tried. Both offer different things to my palate that I enjoy, but I prefer Pinot more often.

Gary –
Exceptional guest, echoing my comments from part 1. A true class act, and a pleasure for me to see on WLTV. I truly enjoy this kind of guest (Brice and Heidi) as opposed to others like internet web site start up owners, band members or a self proclaimed pizza guy. The Heidi’s and Brice’s bring plenty of stories, experience and in-touch relations with what is going on in the wine world. Keep these type of guest coming!

Short comment about the wine’s prices. They are steep. Glad to see they seem to back it up (granted, opinions will vary by person) with serious thunder. Althiough I fully realize only a very small portion of us drinkers will ever ferret out a bottle of her brand.

QTD – I side with Heidi here. My cooking favors more deep, pronounced flavors and I like wines that are bolder and can stand up to my cooking. Thus my purchases sway way towards syrah vs pinot. I resevre the pinots for when I’ll be making fish or desire a red with a salad dinner. Even when I do pork, I’m incorporating heavier flavors/spices (balsamic, soy, garlic, chipotles, chilli powder, cumin, paprika, etc.) that I’m afraid a classy pinot might get too lost with all the flavors I bring to the table. Thus I veer toward syrah, shiraz, zins, Spanish Toro’s or Priorat’s, petite sirah’s, etc. If I was throw out a number, I’d guess 15:1, I buy syrah’s vs pinots.

However, as Heidi states, pinots will move off retail shelves in northeast ohio. Syrahs rarely seem to move and receive less of a placement. I’m seeing more and more closeout prices on ’05 syrahs in our market (a few $9.99 syrahs that retailed for something in the mid-twenties). If I was to throw out a number here, I’d guess pinots outsell syrahs 5:2, maybe even higher.

Awesome ep. She seems like a terrific and über intelligent woman.

QOTD: I personally drink so many different types of wine that I can’t say that I have more pinot than syrah. Especially since I’m from MN and we have all kinds of cold weather varietals to get to know. I can say though that when I first started drinking wine in 2003, the first wine that I found on my own and really liked was the Yellow Tail Shiraz (2002).

P.S. I could hear a little bit of cell phone interference with your taping equipment. Same noise my alarm makes if I set my cell phone near it.

Gary loved the two part episodes, I especially loved how you kept the opinion of her wines being absurdly over priced to yourself. LOL.

GARY VVVVVVVVVV … been a while, crushing it …

QOTD: I think is that I will plant this Syrah, and maybe in a few years you can try your hand at a Hudson Valley Syrah.

PeacE

Dear Castello, apj_ bobwine,

Sorry guys. I vented in an ugly, and seemingly unfriendly manner. Yea, I get grouchy sometimes. It just seemed that:

1. to not remember a name of, or even if you’d had a good wine,
2. not grasp how or why a great artist and talent’s wine is $150, with
rudely insinuated skepticism,
3. insult the winemaker for ‘gouging’, and imply that YOU’re paying for her
first class travel, – and you can’t even remember having had a ‘decent’ wine
4. continue that YOU’re in a position to do her a favor by promoting her
product – a product in such ridiculously high demand that 99% of us may never see, taste, (and apparently, which some will be outright unwilling to pay for)(I went off on that topic on page 6 of the Lookout Winery episode’s comments)

seemed like so much unaccosted and ignorant rudeness, I was beside myself with indignance. Sorry to sound like such an uppity prick, but after 20 years in wine, and a bunch more in Haut Cuisine before that, I think I know a call when I see one. Example? Though not a K-J fan, and def. not a shill for the likes of them, I can remember the Cambria ‘Julia’s’ Pinot, and ‘Tepusquet’ Syrah from the early ’90’s. They were good. $20. I loved Richard Sanford’s winery, but he sold to Terlato years ago. (I wonder how that’s going). I Am absolutely MAD for Brewer-Clifton wines. (Mellville, too). You shoulda seen their 3 different 1993 vintage, recent disgorged/extended tirage bubbles, released for 2000. $35. Drank not unlike Dom, and I’d take any one (all three!) over a bottle of that jumped up Cristal ANY DAY. Recent good impressions have been made by Sea Smoke, Penner-Ash, and the very small, but tasty Kynsi Pinots. If all this perfumed, and excessive fruit is too much, there’s a whole world of Burgundy – and don’t be shy about stepping up to 1er Cru, or even Grand Cru. Geantet-Pansiot Gevrey-Chambertain immediately springs to mind.

As for descriptors being too simple, or too esoteric, all’s acceptable, but as is with Gary’s vivid imagination goes, it can be anything from humorous to helpful, if not ludicrous. I have something of a taste/memory and vocabulary, and use it to aid people in zeroing in on exactly what a particular wine is/ may be about. I prefer this to the method and old colleague had of describing EVERYTHING he liked as ‘lush’. I’ll give you lush…

Anyways, as said, sorry, sincerely, take my rant wth a proverbial grain of salt. That, and a toast – to your health, happiness, and continued furthering in yout enjoyment of wine! Cheers!

Friends again? XO, Murso.