Hi there, for everyone on the blogosphere
After 2 years of blogging with a local newspaper about wine, I am now on my own. No more editors. Hurray! I can say whatever I want without worrying about reader reaction. Wow! What a feeling of freedom.
Let me start with something I have wanted to state for a long time, but could not. Lodi wines, by and large suck! Too ripe, too overoaked. They all taste alike; it’s impossible to distinguish varietals. I live in the Lodi appellation, and it is most unfortunate that the wines are so undrinkably huge.
However they are much better than they used to be 20 years ago when I first started tasting here.
There! It’s out of my chest. I am not saying anything that the widespread wine drinking world does not already know. But writing for the Stockton Record, it was impossible to insult local winemakers. Now that their Wine Blog is being phased out, I can finally say what I feel.
We’ll start with that. If you have any opinions please post it on this blog. I will be happy to receive compliments, but it’ll be more fun if you feel like tearing me apart.
M. Senegor
I'd give Lodi a "B" for winegrowing – though there are some passionate, self-directed players that would receive an "A". For winemaking, I'd give Lodi an "A-" for everyday-drinking, inexpensive, non-descript wines, but a "C-" for anything other than that. Mondavi did a great job moving Lodi from bad jug wines to table wines, but we've been frozen there. Once again, with many new boutique wineries in the works (I consult on red-tape, tedious permitting) you're going to start to see some excitement. In general, we're really just babies when it comes to fine wine production (except for a few small winemakers), and we're just beginning to understand what to plant where.