This week’s Wine Word of the Week is horizontal tasting.

Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine:
A horizontal tasting is one in which a number of different wines of the same vintage are compared.

Layman’s terms from Kori:
A horizontal tasting is one in which you taste different wines of the same vintage and same varietal from different wineries. For example: 2005 Fielding Hills Syrah, 2005 Columbia Crest Reserve Syrah, 2005 Gorman The Pixie Syrah. Oftentimes, our monthly wine tasting dinners are horizontal tastings.

When most people outside of the state think of Washington wine, they only think of Walla Walla. That’s a great tribute to the marketing prowess of the Walla Walla community and its Wine Alliance but hardly an accurate statement about Washington State wines. In fact, the Walla Walla wine industry was built on the back of Columbia Valley fruit.

Even today, when you buy a bottle of wine from a Walla Walla winery, I’ve found that it is just as likely to carry a Columbia Valley designation as a Walla Walla Valley designation. In fact, when Gary Figgins bonded Leonetti Cellars in 1977, the first modern-era winery in Walla Walla, there were almost no Walla Walla vineyards. The fruit was sourced from elsewhere in the Columbia Valley. When the Walla Walla AVA was approved in 1984, there were just four wineries and 60 acres of vineyards, most of it in the Seven Hills Vineyard.

It was the early 1990’s before the Walla Walla Valley’s second decent sized vineyard, Pepper Bridge Vineyard, was planted, and in early 1995 there were still only seven bonded wineries in Walla Walla. Today, there are almost 100 wineries and 1,600 acres of vineyards in the Walla Walla Valley. That is certainly significant but small in comparison to the total of over 650 wineries and over 32,000 acres of vineyards for the entire state of Washington.

Please don’t get me wrong; I’m not trying to downplay the significance of Walla Walla to the Washington wine industry nor the quality of its wines. But I believe it’s important to also visit wineries in and taste wines from the other Washington State AVA’s, Columbia Gorge, Horse Heaven Hills, Lake Chelan, Puget Sound, Rattlesnake Hills, Red Mountain, Snipes Mountain, Wahluke Slope, Yakima Valley, and the all-encompassing Columbia Valley to really and truly understand and appreciate Washington wine.

Today, the second largest concentration of Washington wineries after Walla Walla may be in Woodinville, just 17 miles north and east of Seattle. Home of the state’s oldest, largest, and most well-known wineries, Chateau Ste. Michelle and Columbia Winery, the Woodinville area now boasts over 40 other wineries but no vineyards. Almost all Woodinville wineries grow their grapes in the warm, arid climate of Eastern Washington including the Walla Walla Valley.

If you are a regular reader of Wine Peeps, you know that we visit wineries and taste wines from all over the state in our quest to be your link to great QPR wines from Washington. Walla Walla, Spokane, Chelan, Tri-Cities, Prosser, Red Mountain, Yakima, and Woodinville have all been on our travel itinerary in 2009, not to mention our attendance at a number of Washington wine tasting events. The easiest way to find our take on Washington wines is to peruse our Washington State Wine category and read any of the 130 posts we’ve done on Washington wines.

Today’s post is part of a series featuring the Women of Washington Wine. In an industry once dominated by men, more and more women are joining the ranks as winery owners, vineyard owners, and winemakers. Being a woman myself, I am fascinated by these women and what they have done and continue to do. Through this series, I hope to introduce you to some of the brightest female faces in the Washington wine industry.

Heather Neff, along with her husband Dean, founded Nefarious Cellars in 2005. Heather handles the white winemaking duties while Dean is in charge of the reds. Nefarious currently produces about 2,000 cases per year, and the Neffs plan to maintain that level of production. Their winery and estate vineyard is situated on the South Shore of Lake Chelan and boast gorgeous views of the lake. After visiting all 13 wineries in Lake Chelan this summer, I believe that Nefarious is producing the best wines overall in the area. The Neffs have two sons, George and Cooper, and their dog Lucy is often in the parking lot to greet visitors as they arrive at the winery.

Heather’s current white wine releases include Consequence (a blend of Sauvignon Blanc, Aligote, and Viognier), a Viognier, and a Riesling. All three are really good wines. Both her 2007 and 2008 Defiance Vineyard Viognier have done well in our wine tasting dinners. And I recently tasted her Stone’s Throw Vineyard Riesling which is one of the best Rieslings I’ve ever had.

I had the pleasure to meet Heather Neff when we visited Nefarious Cellars on our trip to Chelan in July. Recently, Heather was kind enough to take time out of her busy schedule to answer some questions for me and our Wine Peeps readers.

Highlights from Q&A with Heather Neff:

How did you first get involved in the wine business?
My husband, Dean and I planted our first vineyard in 1998 as a test block to gauge what we could successfully grow in the Chelan area. In 2001 we moved to the Willamette Valley, went to school for enology and viticulture at Chemeketa, got jobs working with Pinot Noir, and started our own label: Nonni and Zing.

What were the steps that led to where you are now?
As much as we loved making Pinot, we decided in 2004 that it was a good time to return to Washington and stake our claim on a piece of property in Chelan. We liked what was happening in terms of wine and growth in the area, and we wanted to be a part of that.

Has being a woman been an advantage or a disadvantage in your wine journey? Please explain.
From a professional standpoint, it hasn’t really mattered for me. At the same time, I am not sure that I am one to really weigh in on that. I work for myself, and we have to make what we are work. I am not strong; and I can’t seem to lift anything, yet I am small enough that I can actually get inside a tank. It has been great for us to be able to play off our strengths in that way.

Do you believe a woman has certain built-in traits than can make her a better winemaker than a man? If so, please explain.
I have often thought that exceptional winemaking really comes down to something that you just have inside you. That probably sounds a bit cheesy. It is about education and training and knowing what to do when there is a situation, but it is also about having a vision and not letting yourself get in the way of staying on track. I work with my husband in the winery all the time, and we do see things differently and approach winemaking from different angles. I think that you could certainly say that women bring something different to the table, and judging by the women I know in this industry, certainly something amazing.

Do you use the fact that you are a woman to promote your wines? If so, how?
Absolutely! I am really proud to be in this industry and try to mention that I am a winemaker when it works into conversation. I am one of not that many in Washington, and the division of our winemaking program at Nefarious is unique.

What advice do you have for a woman wanting to get involved in the wine business today?
Take a winemaking class online or at a community college and try to get a job working crush or in a tasting room and give yourself the opportunity to find out if the wine business still interests you after you have had a chance to sample it. This is a field that you can get into and have success with, but it is also a lifestyle, and you have to love it for what it really is.

What are your thoughts about the Washington wine industry, in general?
This is an amazing state to make wine in, and the diversity of varietals is nearly endless. It is an exciting place to work and even more exciting when you hear how much people love Washington wine.

In recent years the Washington wine industry has grown at a rapid rate. Do you expect that trend to continue?
I think that there will be steady growth in the industry for years, but maybe not at the rate we’ve experienced recently. This is an amazing place to be a winemaker; and as educational opportunities become increasingly more accessible, that should help to inspire new winemakers.

I understand that you are the white winemaker while your husband Dean is the red winemaker. Besides the winemaking duties, how do you divide up the other duties associated with owning and running a winery?
Fortunately, we have different talents. Dean makes everything work here, he grows and maintains our beautiful vineyard, keeps the cellar in tip top shape. We joke that he is our handyman, heavy lifter, cellar rat, and disaster averter. I sort of call myself the pretty things department. I run the wine club, am the printing/website/graphic department, and I take a great deal of pleasure in heading up the “light” landscaping projects, like tossing a hydrangea in somewhere.

As the mother of two young boys, how do you maintain a healthy work/life balance?
The winery is our life, and I say that in a really good way. We make it fun and the boys participate. During crush, George (the 4 year old) is out there riding on his bike, on busy Sunday afternoons Cooper hangs out in his Baby Bjorn in the tasting room. We have had to figure out a juggling act of how to get the tasting room open each day and get through our list of “to do’s.”

What is your vision for the future of Nefarious Cellars?
I just want us to keep striving to be more successful each year in terms of the wines we produce. There is nothing better than hearing: “I just had your (insert favorite wine) last night and I loved it.” Our vision, really, is to never lose sight of what we started out to create here, which is a friendly, limited release winery that works really hard to make great wine.

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Many thanks to Heather for sharing her story and thoughts with us. I wish her and Dean all the best and will be following their work and Nefarious Cellars with great interest, and I hope that you will too.

As we get older, many of us make our “bucket list” of things we want to do, people we want to see, and places we want to go before we kick the bucket. Even though I don’t consider myself all that old, and hopefully not close to kicking the bucket, I’ve started making some of those lists for myself.

Because I’m a wine lover, one of my lists is a bucket list of wines. Some of the wines on the list I already have, some are wines I’m hoping someone might give me as a gift, and some I’m hoping to be able to purchase if the slump in high-end wine prices continues. But in every case, the wine holds a special place in my mind as I visualize tasting it someday. My list is a work in progress, but here’s what I have so far:

2005 Beaucastel Chateauneuf du Pape
1997 Bryant Family Cabernet Sauvignon
2006 Charles Smith Royal City Syrah
2006 Chateau Dereszia Aszu 5 Puttonyos
2001 Chateau d’Yquem
1996 Chateau Lafite Rothschild Bordeaux
1996 Chateau Latour Bordeaux
2000 Chateau Margaux Bordeaux
1982 Chateau Mouton Rothschild Bordeaux
2000 Chateau Pavie Bordeaux
1990 Chateau Petrus
2003 Chave Hermitage
1996 Dom Perignon Champagne
1985 Domaine de la Romanee Conti Richebourg
2003 Guigal Cote Rotie la Mouline
2003 Gunderloch Trockenbeerenauslese Nackenheim Rothenberg Riesling
1996 Henschke Hill of Grace
2005 Leonetti Merlot
1996 Penfolds Grange
2005 Quilceda Creek Cabernet Sauvignon
2000 Roberto Voerzio Barolo
1997 Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon
1992 Taylor Fladgate Vintage Port

If you believe there’s a wine I should definitely add to my list, please let me know (and if you’d like to share a bottle of one of these with me, I’d probably be available). As I add wines and especially as I taste wines on the list, I’ll give you an update on whether or not the wine lived up to my high expectations and whether I believe you should put it on your bucket list of wines.

Cheers!

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is vertical tasting.

Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine:
A vertical tasting is a comparison of different vintages of the same wine.

Layman’s terms from Kori:
A vertical tasting is one in which you taste different vintages of the same wine from the same winery. For example: 2005 Fielding Hills Syrah, 2006 Fielding Hills Syrah, and 2007 Fielding Hills Syrah.

Our monthly wine tasting dinners are really the foundation upon which Wine Peeps was built. We have been getting together each month with friends to taste and evaluate wines throughout a four-course meal for years. Last Friday’s dinner featuring Washington Malbec was our 75th wine tasting dinner.

To mark this milestone of sorts, we decided to change up our normal routine a bit in order to taste a few more wines. It was a gorgeous late summer evening, so we tasted through eleven Washington Malbecs outside on the deck. Each person was asked to take one pour of each wine, taste it, and then give a preliminary 1-11 ranking in order of preference. We then tallied up the scores in order to determine the six “finalists” that would move on to the dinner portion of the tasting.

For those of you who are not very familiar with Malbec, its ties go back to Bordeaux, France, where it was originally one of the five varieties used in red Bordeaux blends along with Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, and Petit Verdot. Today it is only used sparingly in Bordeaux but has really come into its own as a stand-alone varietal in Argentina. And, in my opinion, Washington State is beginning to produce some excellent Malbec as well. In general, Malbec is not as tannic as Cabernet Sauvignon but is spicier than Merlot and goes well with a number of different foods. Speaking of foods, Mom’s meal of creamy tomato basil soup, mixed green salad, leg of lamb with red wine gravy and lemon thyme, lemon zest rice pilaf, marinated grilled vegetables, and lemon sorbet was fabulous and a perfect complement to the wines.

While all six wines we tasted with dinner were good, the 2006 Barnard Griffin Reserve Malbec and the 2006 àMaurice Cellars Malbec stood out from the rest. They were my two favorites from the first sip right on through the meal. On top of being excellent wines, they both have QPR’s of 5 bangs for your buck.

If you haven’t yet had the pleasure of enjoying Washington Malbec, this list is a good place to start. Cheers!

From 1st to last in the group consensus rankings with dinner:

2006 Barnard Griffin Reserve Malbec (Columbia Valley): Deep red. Very aromatic with aromas of dark fruits, spice, and oak. Blue and black fruits and spice come through on the palate. Medium-bodied with medium tannins and a long finish. Well-balanced and smooth. Great by itself or with food.
Quality: 4.5 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 5 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $35; Village Wines (Washington), $34.35

2006 àMaurice Cellars Malbec (Columbia Valley): Deep, dark red. Great nose with aromas of black fruits and spice. Flavors of black fruits and a hint of pepper. Medium to full-bodied with medium-high tannins. Smooth and well-balanced with a long finish.
Quality: 4.5 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 5 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: The Grape Choice (Kirkland, WA), $34; Available elsewhere, $33 to $39

2005 Dusted Valley Malbec (Columbia Valley): Deep, dark red. Dark fruits and popcorn on the nose; black pepper and dark fruits on the palate. Medium to full-bodied, medium-high tannins and a long, slightly hot finish.
Quality: 4 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 3 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: The Wine Alley (Renton, WA), $35

2006 Watermill Winery Estate Malbec (Walla Walla Valley): Brilliant, dark, dense purple. Mocha, vanilla, and some vegetal aromas come through on the nose; spices, black pepper, black fruits, plums, and black cherry on the palate. Medium to full-bodied with medium tannins and a long finish. Well-balanced and smooth.
Quality: 4 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 4 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $28

2006 Saviah Cellars Malbec (Walla Walla Valley): Dark, inky purple. A bit tight on the nose at first. Black fruit, movie theatre popcorn, and vanilla aromas lead to black Bing cherries, blackberries, green peppers, and black pepper on the palate. Medium-bodied with medium tannins and a medium, slightly bitter finish.
Quality: 4 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 4 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $30

2005 Beresan Winery Malbec (Walla Walla Valley): Dark red. Aromatic with black fruit and floral aromas. More black fruits come through on the palate. Medium-bodied with medium-high tannins and a long finish.
Quality: 3.5 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 2 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $25; Available elsewhere, $28 to $33

The rest:

2005 Gilbert Cellars Malbec (Columbia Valley)
Quality: 3.5 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 2 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $26

2007 Alexandria Nicole Block 20 Reserve Malbec (Horse Heaven Hills)
Quality: 3 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 1 bang for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $35

2007 William Church Winery Malbec (Wahluke Slope)
Quality: 3 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 2 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: The Wine Alley (Renton, WA), $30

2007 Nefarious Cellars Malbec (Snipes Mountain)
Quality: 3 stars (out of 5)
QPR: 2 bangs for your buck (out of 5)
Where to buy: Winery, $27

2005 Gamache Vintners Estate Malbec (Columbia Valley)
Quality: 2.5 stars (out of 5)
QPR: NR (not recommended)
Where to buy: The Wine Alley (Renton, WA), $35

Kori did not approve this post. She won’t tell you any of this. In fact, she is embarrassed that I am writing about her. However, with all due respect to some great female wine writers and friends: Catie, Teri, Margot, and too many more to mention, I sincerely believe that Kori is the “go-to gal” for Washington wine.

What qualifies me to make this pronouncement? Fifty plus years since my first sip of wine, and observing Kori pass me up in wine tasting before age 30 just like she did to me in tennis at age 10. She’s a prodigy in wine, just like she was in school and in tennis.

Let me give you a little background on Kori. She was raised on a working cattle ranch in Texas, and intimately involved in agriculture ever since she could walk, participating in 4-H, and showing calves at all the major livestock shows by the time she was 10 years old. So when her interest turned to wine, she didn’t just visit tasting rooms, she visited the vineyards, kicking the dirt and talking to the growers to see what unique characteristics the land might bring to their wine.

Kori came to the state of Washington fifteen years ago to attend the University of Washington on a tennis scholarship. After a successful tennis career and graduating with a business degree from UW, she worked in the investment management business before embarking on her writing career. For the past twelve years, she’s been honing her wine palate and taking notes on wines, first traveling to Washington wine country, and then to California, Oregon, France, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. But she didn’t start writing about wine for others until we started this blog in January 2008.

The clincher for me about her extraordinary palate was her ability to ascertain more about a wine from just sniffing it than the rest of us could tasting it when she was pregnant with her daughter Sydney in 2006. As some of you have heard me say before, I believe that Kori has the best palate of anyone in Washington not named Paul Gregutt…and she is only 33 years old, so watch out Paul!

In sum, Kori is in the growth phase of her wine tasting career just as is the Washington wine industry. Yes, I know I’m prejudiced because I’m her proud father. But pay attention to her recommendations. She knows her stuff!

Many thanks to you, our loyal readers! The latest 100 Top Wine Blogs rankings list has Wine Peeps at Number 6. Below is the Top 10 as compiled by Alawine.com, home of the 100 Most Popular Wine Blog Rankings:

* Wine blog ratings are standardized composite logarithmic scores based on multiple relative link popularity rankings from three top search engines and Technorati, as well as Google page rank scores. As such, they are general quantitative ratings of popularity and do not measure quality of content or frequency of updates. This page last updated: September 15, 2009

For us at Wine Peeps to be mentioned alongside such well-established luminaries of the wine blogosphere as Tom Wark of Fermentation, Alder Yarrow of Vinography, Tyler Colman of Dr. Vino, and Eric Asimov of The Pour is very gratifying, yet at the same time very humbling.

You can be assured that we will continue to do our best to justify this lofty status in the wine blog world. Cheers!

The Columbia Crest Walter Clore Private Reserve, a Bordeaux-style blend, is the premier wine of Washington State’s largest winery. Former Columbia Crest winemaker extraordinaire, Doug Gore, started their Reserve Red program with the 1997 vintage, which became designated as Walter Clore Private Reserve with the 1999 vintage to recognize the pioneer who did the unexpected in Washington State—prove that premium vinifera grapes could flourish in the Columbia Valley.

We have had the opportunity to taste each Walter Clore vintage produced by Ray Einberger, who has been the head winemaker at Columbia Crest since 2000, and have tasted several of them multiple times. Every vintage we have rated excellent or better [at least 4 stars (out of 5)] on the Wine Peeps scale. Further, since these wines can usually be found for $35 or less, they also have excellent QPRs.

To illustrate, let me repeat a story that Kori told in a June 2008 post:

At Thanksgiving dinner a few years ago, Mom surprised us with a 1996 Chateau Lafite Rothschild (French Bordeaux) that set her back $400, just so that we could see what a so-called “perfect” bottle of wine rated 100 points by the experts tasted like. Now I’ll have to admit, it was a very good bottle of wine. But was it worth $400 or anything close to that price? Probably not.

In fact, later during dinner, we took the remaining half bottle of the Lafite and blind tasted it against a 2000 Columbia Crest Walter Clore Private Reserve (Bordeaux-type blend from Washington). Walter Clore is widely available at about $30 per bottle. In our blind tasting, two of the four of us preferred Lafite and the other two chose Walter Clore as their favorite.

Now if it’s worth the $370 difference for you to say you drank a Lafite, fine, but we’d rather have a case of Walter Clore for the same money ourselves.

From the results of a Walter Clore vertical we had last year and several tastings since then, I’d say that the 2003 Walter Clore is the vintage tasting the best right now. It has aromas of bacon bits and flavors of coffee and dark fruits, particularly blackcurrants. It is well-balanced, smooth, and downright yummy! The 2000 Walter Clore is still going strong, so I’d say that these wines will easily last 10+ years and seem to get better as they evolve through at least year six.

The bottom line: If you’re looking for an exceptional Washington State Bordeaux-style wine at recession-friendly prices, the Columbia Crest Walter Clore Private Reserve is an excellent choice. It is widely available through fine-wine retailers.

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is Bacchus.

Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine:
Bacchus is the common name in Ancient Rome for the classical god of wine whom the Greeks called Bacchos but, more usually, Dionysus.

Layman’s terms from Kori:
Bacchus is the Roman god of wine.