Zinfandel  

By John Schreiner

July 27, 2009

Zinfandel producer Camille Seghesio, a principal in California’s Seghesio Family Vineyards, has a clever phrase about the origin of the grape, considering that her grandfather came from Italy.

“It’s a European immigrant,” she told a recent Zinfandel seminar in Vancouver. “It came to California and became something noble.”

While there may be a bit of American exceptionalism in that line, the subsequent tasting of Zinfandel wines revealed many Zinfandels of noble quality. You might well argue that this is California’s best red variety – certainly the rival to Cabernet Sauvignon for the sensual pleasure the wines bring.

A group of Zinfandel producers recently was in Vancouver for several days of tastings and other events. It is something they do regularly around North America, through an organization called Zinfandel Advocates and Producers (ZAP).  There are almost 200 members in ZAP (membership is a mere US$44 a year), including one South Africa winery.

Most of the world’s Zinfandel vines are now in California, where the 55,000 acres of Zinfandel includes vineyards that are close to or more than 100 years old. The earliest Zinfandel vines came to California about 1851.

Researchers at the University of California and the University of Zagreb in recent years have elaborated the history of this variety. DNA analysis of vines suggests that the variety arose in Croatia centuries ago.

It spread throughout Croatia, where it was called Crljenak Kastelanski (presumably before producers put the variety on the label!). Disease then wiped out most of that variety. However, it had been crossed with another vine to yield Plavac Mali, a name you can find these days on bottles of Croatian wine.

(Currently, the Liquor Distribution Branch lists a Plavac ($15.64) from a Croatian winery called Caves de Dingal.)

Some of the Crljenak vines made it to Italy, becoming the Primitivo variety. For many years, it was assumed that this Zinfandel relative was the parent to California’s plantings.

In fact, some of the original Crljenak vines had also been preserved in Austria, under the auspices of emperor, since the Austrian Hungarian Empire once Croatia. Researchers now theorize that cuttings from Vienna came to California where, some obscure reasons, the variety took the name, Zinfandel. After a century or so of field mutations, producers are now indentify the superior clones, promising another jump in wine quality.

Camille Seghesio says that variety was widely planted across California after the gold rush swelled the state’s population and the demand for wine. “It satisfied a miner’s thirst,” she says.

During Prohibition, Zinfandel plantings expanded because it was one of varieties favoured by home winemakers (as it still is). Boxes and boxes of grapes were shipped from California, often with the warning that yeast should not be added, lest the juice fermented into wine.

Full-bodied red wines fell from fashion in the 1970s when everyone was going nuts about drinking white wines. Then Zinfandel producers, led by Sutter Home, discovered that consumers would also drink pink wines. White Zins, or blush wines, became hugely popular, stopping growers from pulling out old Zinfandel vineyards.

In the early 1990s, the publicity around the “French paradox” convinced Americans that red wine was good for heart health. Zinfandel has not looked back since and those old vineyards produce some of the richest, tastiest wines.

The LDB currently lists 56 Zinfandels, including the so-called white Zins. Here are some excellent Zinfandels to add to your cellar:

* Brazin Old Vine Lodi Zinfandel 2006 ($30).

* Gnarly Head Olde Vine Lodi Zinfandel 2006 ($20).

* Rancho Zabaco Heritage Vines 2007 ($23).

* Ravenswood Barricia 2006 ($46) …and worth the price. Ravenswood has numerous other Zinfandels are various price points. They never disappoint.

* Ridge. Well, anything from Ridge, which blends its Zinfandel with other red varieties to make very complex wines.

* Seghesio 2007 Home Ranch ($49). One of several good Zinfandels here from this winery, this particular wine is made an 1895 vineyard in which Zinfandel, Carignan and Petite Sirah are mingled in the same plot, to be picked together and vinified together.

* Michael-David Seven Deadly Zins ($28) or Michael-David Earthquake 2006 ($40). The latter is made from a vineyard planted in the year of the San Francisco earthquake, 1906.

goodgrog@shaw.ca

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