If you have a blog, here’s your chance to shine and enjoy fine wine: I’m offering a prize to each of the six bloggers who post the most well-written reviews of the californiawinehikes.com website. The contest starts tomorrow and will run for six months. The best review will garner its author the grand prize: a case of wine valued at $500.

To learn all of the details, please see my next post.

~winehiker

• For so many scents, a wheel makes sense
  When scribbling tasting notes, wine tasters often find themselves at a loss for words to describe what they’re sensing; one needs a handy tool. Thank goodness for Ann C. Noble.
  (tags: wine tasting notes aroma scent flavor taste wheel uc davis winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)
• What is That Darn Flavor?
  Another take on the aroma wheel from Alder Yarrow at Vinography: A Wine Blog.
  (tags: wine aroma sheet tasting)

One of the great beauties of wine - the thing that attracts so many of us to wine - is the almost infinite variety of scents that wine imparts to us. Wine offers a broad range of olfactory experiences across a notable spectrum of grape varieties and, beyond color, it is aroma that often characterizes our first honest impressions of a wine. From berry fruit and jasmine petals to dirty socks and wet dog hair, it is possible for a wine taster to smell hundreds, if not thousands, of scents in a glass of wine.

As a writer, I am quite fond of words. And yet I often find myself grasping for the right words to describe the aroma I’m smelling or flavor I’m tasting. Without a handy tool to assist with bridging that tongue-brain connection, I find that my tasting notes can sometimes be incomplete. Fortunately there is such a tool, and many wine tasters, novice and expert alike, use it regularly. We owe much to the wine scientists at the University of California at Davis, one of the nation’s leading winemaking and grape-growing schools, where years ago a wine aroma wheel was developed.

The ‘fruity’ section of the wine aroma wheel. Copyright A. C. Noble 1990, 2002, and used with permission.

Back in the day, an oenologist at Davis, Dr. Ann C. Noble, consulted with scores of wine lovers and wine tasters to list all the descriptive terms they could imagine for the smells of wine. After organizing, categorizing, and eliminating all of the terms that seemed ambiguous, Ms. Noble produced a list of 12 major categories of wine smells, subdivided into 29 subcategories and 94 specific terms. Toward ease of use while tasting wine, this list evolved further into a circular table, with relatively similar smells placed close together around its circumference.

A number of aroma wheels have been developed since the good old days at Davis, including two from the Deutsches Weininstitut, written in German, for red and white wines. There’s even an aroma wheel just for Zinfandel wines. And, if you’re truly serious about an olfactory experience with your next stack of pancakes, check out this Flavor Wheel for Maple Products.

There are even some wonderful online tools for learning about the scents and flavors of wine. If you have time to kill this weekend, pour yourself a glass of something aromatic and delicious, then sit down with your favorite PC for an afternoon with The Aroma Wheel Big Spin Game from Trinchero Family Estates, or step through how to identify wine with the interactive Experience the Aroma Wheel from Turning Leaf. Both are quite educational, and I recommend you browse them if you wish to understand more about your tongue-brain connection, if not also enhance your wine knowledge. As a handy tasting aid, you may find it helpful to have your own colored and laminated wine aroma wheel; purchase one online from Dr. Noble herself for only six bucks, or visit the UCDavis Bookstore.

Happy tasting!

~winehiker

• Napa Valley Merlots to beat out Cabernets?
  Soft sensuality vs. structure, depth, and ageability? Could there soon be a new top grape in Napa Valley? Am I making this stuff up?
  (tags: napa valley wine merlot cabernet sauvignon harvest tonnage winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)
• Center for Ecoliteracy
  The Center for Ecoliteracy is dedicated to education for sustainable living.
  (tags: ecology energy food garden green health literature research sustainability)
• How to Green Your Sex Life
  From Team TreeHugger: The Top 10 highly effective ways to hit the sheets.
  (tags: ecology environment fun green health life reference sex tips)

The history and impact of Information Technology is a long and interesting one. But now bees are dying, and we might be next. Could we be unwittingly killing ourselves off because of our cellphone use? From Dratz at Confessions of an IT Hitman.

read more | digg story

Cab vs. Merlot, or Cab/Merlot collaboration?

For years, Cabernet Sauvignon has been Napa’s most-planted grape variety. Indeed, these prized vines cover most of Napa County’s 40,000+ vineyard acres, representing 49.3 percent of all 2006 Napa Valley winegrape acreage. However, last year, Cabernet Sauvignon accounted for 56,247 tons of Napa Valley’s winegrape harvest, down a rather significant 13% from the record 2005 harvest.

Merlot, with a production of 27,042 tons and selling for an average of $2,691 per ton - more than doubling some 2005 sales - surpassed Chardonnay last year as the second-most planted variety. Some may find that statistic surprising, but Merlot sales - which have suffered in previous years - are on the rebound. David Whitmer, Napa County’s agricultural commissioner, remarks, “It’s amazing how much the movie industry can influence the wine industry.” Whitmer of course refers to the 2004 movie “Sideways,” which most of us know had a less-than-positive spin on drinking Merlot.

Despite last year’s fall in Cabernet Sauvignon production and the general rise in the production of Merlot, Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon is still the top dog, being nearly synonymous with Napa Valley itself. And although Merlot is enjoyable as a varietal wine, it is considered to be most successful when blended with Cabernet Sauvignon. After all, it is Cabernet Sauvignon which contributes the structure, depth of flavor, and ageability that Merlot often lacks. So while many vintners are creating excellent Cab-Merlot blends these days, don’t expect Merlot to edge out Cabernet Sauvignon as the new Napa Valley king of grapes, weatherwise or otherwise.

Mr. Whitmer says it remains to be seen how the dry winter of 2007 will affect the 2007 crop report, and suggests that near-term rainfall and weather conditions will challenge grape growers with their irrigation needs. “The next few weeks are going to be critical in that regard,” says Whitmer.

In the meantime, look for tasting notes covering six Napa Valley Merlots, coming next month to Winehiker Witiculture.

Sources: SFGate.com, The Napa Valley Register

~winehiker

• California Assembly Committee Calls for Phase-Out of Incandescent Lights
  A state Assembly committee voted Monday to phase out the incandescent light bulb. As a result, sales of the standard incandescent bulb will be prohibited in California stores starting in 2012.
  (tags: incandescent light bulb environment impact landfills lead ban energy conservation)
• Let’s Green This City
  CFL bulbs use one-third the energy of standard incandescent bulbs, last 10 times longer and save almost $30 each in costs. Find out why they’re changing the world.
  (tags: compact fluorescent light bulbs green mercury)
• From Renewable Energy Journal: Leading with the lightbulb
  Little things can add up, and add up quickly. Here’s data supporting the notion that if each one of us replaced one incandescent lightbulb with a compact fluorescent bulb, it would have the same impact as removing 1,000,000 cars from the road.
  (tags: compact fluorescent light bulb efficiency effect environment energy)
• LampRecycle.org
  Lamprecycle.org is a resource for any light bulb user seeking details on recycling spent mercury-containing bulbs. “Any light bulb user”? What about incandescent bulbs containing lead?
  (tags: light bulbs recycle recycling resources)
• Used light bulbs and thinking green don’t mix
  How many grassroots inquiries and local governments does it take to recycle an incandescent light bulb?
  (tags: light bulb incandescent recycle recycling resources mercury lead compact fluorescent)

When there’s an elephant in the room, could that room be the Oval Office? And if so, what planet is that elephant on?

Source: Tom Toles, Washington Post.

~winehiker

With Earth Day recently behind us, there’s been quite a lot of media attention devoted lately to replacing our energy-inefficient incandescent light bulbs with the much-more efficient compact fluorescent bulbs.

How many grassroots inquiries and local governments
does it take to recycle a light bulb?

According to industry stats, more than 90% of the energy produced by incandescent lamps is heat, not light, and this makes them far less efficient than compact fluorescent bulbs. In addition, fluorescents typically last 10 times longer. Even though fluorescent bulbs contain mercury, incandescent bulbs are responsibile for releasing comparatively more mercury into the environment. And one gram of mercury is enough to contaminate a 20-acre lake.

Certainly the price point is coming down on these compact fluorescents enough that more people are buying them, and they’re beginning to buy them in droves. I know I am. And so I found myself asking the question, How, then, will this greater supply of used incandescents impact the environment?

Apparently there’s no easy answer. I found the following statement on clutterfreeservices.com:

Incandescent light bulbs contain lead at levels that exceed hazardous waste limits and must be taken to a toxic disposal facility.

Yeesh! And I’ve merely been throwing them away for years, like everybody else. But wait! There’s more:

Fluorescent light bulbs contain a small amount of mercury and California law prohibits putting them in the trash. Many hardware stores will accept them for recycling. Here’s a complete list of places in San Francisco.

Fortunately a number of localities have adopted residential recycling programs for fluorescent bulbs. But are you, like me, unaware of the environmental impact of our discarding of incandescents? Apparently a lot of us who believe we’re acting green are about to dump unknown mass quantities of incandescent light bulbs onto our landfills. We either need viable recycling programs that separate the lead from the glass and metal - as I presume is similarly done for the mercury in fluorescents - or we need, each of us, to be aware of the locations of our hazardous waste disposal facilities.

And then actively make use of them, like I’m now going to do. (Sigh. One more trip in the car.)

Here’s a list of hazardous waste disposal facilities near my home in the south San Francisco Bay Area. If you look online for hazardous waste disposal facilities in your area and don’t find one, call your congressperson and ask why you can’t recycle your incandescent light bulbs. Tell ‘em The Winehiker said to raise Hell!

• San Francisco County (415) 554-4333
• Alameda County (800) 606-6606
• Marin County (415) 485-6806
• San Mateo County (650) 363-4607
• Sonoma County (877) 747-1870
• Santa Clara County (408) 299-7300

Is anybody else thinking about this stuff? Anybody??

~winehiker

• If you have wine, why hike?
  To wine or not to whine: The winehiker presents ponderous yet perspicacious platitudes.
  (tags: wine hiking philosophy ethics winehiker http://www.californiawinehikes.com)