Harry Wetzel from Alexander Valley Vineyards is our guest today on California Wine Country with Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger. Also with us is Mariangela Guarienti, CEO of Della Toffola USA, the US branch of the Italian company that makes top-quality world-class winemaking equipment.

Mariangela Guarienti is CEO of Della Toffola USA,. Her family was in farming and produced wine. Her grandmother was of the Bertani family, who produce Valpollicella, Amarone and Soave wine in the Veneto region of northeastern Italy. She is an agronomist and she worked for a company in the commodity aid business in Africa, based in Zimbabwe. Later she went to Cile to open the South American branch of a competitor to her current employer, until 2009. Then she moved to California to open the US branch of Della Toffola. They had had sales through different distributors and when she arrived she set up their own complete operation.

Harry Wetzel is familiar with Della Toffola's machinery. Mariangela says that their service technicians are on call all the time during harvest. Steve asks Harry to describe this year's harvest and he says it has been ideal this year. They set records for tonnage this year, in several varieties. Dan says that '15, '16 and '17 have been good and '18 may exceed them both. Harry agrees that the last few have been good but slightly below average in tonnage. This year, though, is abundant.

Dan suggests trying to imagine how Sonoma looked in the late 1840s. There was almost no agriculture there yet. There were some prunes and vegetables sold in the city, but only in about 1880 and 1890 it started. Italian Swiss Colony was founded in 1881 as a utopian colony and that was the beginning of local agriculture and winemaking. Hops were grown early in Sonoma and now they are making a comeback.

Harry's grandparents, Harry and Maggie Wetzel, bought the estate in 1962. The buildings were dilapidated. The original Cyrus Alexander estate was in a shambles. His grandmother put a lot of time money and effort into restoring the original home and the original adobe building behind the house. They also have the original Alexander Valley schoolhouse on the property. Dan says it is really pretty and worth visiting.

Mariangela describes some of their machinery, including bottling lines. Dan says the automation is fascinating. Dan says small wineries might not need it but larger wineries are desperate without it. Harry says some smaller wineries bring in mobile bottling lines. In their case, they have grown their bottling line as the business has grown, from about 7500 cases to about 150,000 cases, over the years.

Now they will taste a 2016 Chardonnay from Alexander Valley Vineyards. They add about 1% of Viognier. One year they had a lot of it and added it to the Chard, and they liked it, it adds a nice floral aroma. 30% oaked, 70% in steel. Steve says the balance is very nice. Dan says there are pineapple flavors and also fresh peach aroma.

They are at the southern end of Alexander Valley. There are only a couple of wineries past them, Hanna and Fieldstone are up the road. They are about 15 minutes past Healdsburg. It's a big family owned and operated company and his dad is still in charge. The winemaker is Kevin Hall who has been there for about 21 years. Dan says Kevin Hall has been working in the Alexander Valley for a long time and his wines always have fresh fruit components. The Gewürtstraminer that the are tasting is an example of that.

The Gewürtstraminer is the first bottling of this year, a 2018. It was picked on September 10th and is being bottled today. Dan gets gardenia and carnation aromatics, with some turpine components maybe like night-blooming jasmine. It's succulent without being sweet. Dan says to drink it with some spicy Thai food.

Eva Dehlinger from Dehlinger Winery and Dominic Foppoli of Christopher Creek are our guests on California Wine Country with Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger today. Eva Dehlinger tells how her father founded the winery over 40 years ago. Dehlinger Winery is small, independent family-owned and operated in the Russian River Valley. They specialize in four varietals, Chardonnay, Pinot, Cabernet and Syrah. Eva is the winemaker and general manager.

Eva became a winemaker by being born onto a farm and having a strong connection to agriculture. She studied environmental sciences at Stanford. She thought she would become a brewer and started studying brewing at UC Davis, then had an epiphany and realized she needed to work with wine.

Dan Berger got to know Dehlinger Winery when it was founded in the 1970s. When Dan started writing about wine, it was hard to find the wine. Dan had to travel to Sonoma County to taste it. Dan says that at the time, nobody had heard of Pinot Noir from Russian River Valley. They were pioneers, it was considered very obscure there. Russian River Valley wasn’t even an official appellation then and Dan says the roads weren’t even marked correctly and he got lost.

Dominic tells about the Foppoli home ranch in Windsor. They have produced Chardonnay since he was a kid. Christopher Creek was started in 1972 and he took a chance to buy the winery six years ago. They make about 40 different wines now.

They taste a 2014 Russian River Valley Chardonnay, unoaked. Dan says it’s very gentle with a fresh fruit component. Dan says that the newer drinkers like a Chardonnay that is more delicate and not so oaky. The 70s or 80s style wines were fleshier. Today better quality wine making means a more delicate approach to oak. Dominic says his first wine was unoaked because he couldn’t afford oak barrels. Barry says this has a silky texture and harmonious flavors. Dan says it’s soft but not lacking in acidity. Eva says it’s very fruity and fresh and would have a broad appeal.

Dan says this is an example of the new style of wine in Sonoma County. He thinks the mid-palette richness comes from the skin contact. That’s when you leave the juice in the tank, were the juice is in contact with the skins.

The next wine coming up is an Orange Wine, which is made with even more skin contact. Dominic says that traditionally they make a barrel of orange Chardonnay and one of orange Viognier every year. You leave a white wine on the skins, like a red wine.

Eva’s white wines are made with minimal skin contact and they do not make orange wine. The goal is to extract more different flavors and she thinks Viognier is good for that. Dan says the skin contact white wines tend to want to spoil so a winemaker has to be very strict with sanitation. Dan tells of a wine from the Jura region in France, which have a very strong odor. This one is cleaner and fresher. It has just enough of the “orange” style to still taste the Viognier. Dominic says they only make 25 cases of it. Eva says orange wine is atypical and controversial in the US.

Next they taste a 2015 Dehlinger Winery Chardonnay, which is a counterpoint to the one they just tasted. This is a traditional oaked Chardonnay, no skin contact, barrel fermented and aged for a year on the lees. Dan says this is the way that oak should be done. Eva says it is unfiltered so it retains a lot of textures and flavors.

Dominic remembers drinking Eva’s father’s wines when he was a kid. Their family estates are about two miles from each other as the crow flies.

Next they taste the 2015 Dehlinger Winery Altamont Pinot Noir. Altamont refers to the soil type on their property. 2015 was a very classic vintage in the region, but with low quantities. Particularly the Pinot Noirs, have very intense flavors and color.

Tom Simoneau is back on the show with Allen Estate Wines owners Ron and Laura Allen, who join Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger today. Allen Estate Wines winemaker Chris Taddei is here too. Barry Herbst is also back in the studio today, after spending a lot of time working on the setup for the new Bottle Barn online retail site. Steve begins by asking Ron and Laura to tell the history of their winery.

Ron says that in Sonoma County, wine permeates you. Their children went to school with the families of great local winemakers. Talking to them, the Allens thought they could do it too, on a small scale, and set out to do it to the best of their ability. They started in 2005. Chris remembers that Ron had steel tanks in his garage.  Ron and Laura have been married 22 years. She workid in the dot com world. Ron used to buy one great Bordeaux bottle per month, and never drank them. He still has the whole collection. No matter how little he made, he always found some money for his wine collection. He wanted to do something in the Bordeaux style, single variety, single vineyard.

Chris Taddei fell in love with wine in college. He worked in restaurants and started his own company. He had a small company that traded in motorcycles, mopeds and cars. He had a bottle of very fine wine once and got hooked into the whole culture of food and pairings. Flash forward, he met his future wife Laura, who was from the area. He wanted to make wine and now they do.

They taste a Chardonnay called Provacateur. When Ron was making his wine in the garage, she noticed they had no Chardonnay. So she wanted to make some of her own. She wanted a clean wine, unfiltered. Some of the wines from around there disagree with her, mainly whites, and she had a specific type of Chardonnay in mind that she wanted. So their winemaker Chris Taddei decided to make a "clean" wine.

He explains that clean can mean a lot of different things. Fermentations can cause histamines, secondary fermentation can too. He uses very low sulphur, 18-36 months in the barrel. The wines they made didn't make her sick. Bob Cabral explained this to her and she asked Chris to make the wine with the smallest amount of chemicals possible. This extends to the vineyards too. Ron explains that in a wet environment with rain and fog, you have to manage the grapes to have healthy vines. They never have to blend anything to correct it.

This wine is nicely balanced, says Tom. Laura says she loves blind tastings. She describes this wine as having half old-style oaky and half steely and acidic. Tom says it has lemon and butter together. Ron says it's about 30% ML. Laura says it's not syrupy. They stir the lees every week. This goes for $46. Ron explains that she is in charge of all their white wines and he takes care of the reds.

Barry tells about the new Bottle Barn online operation. The site is live. You can buy individual wines, sampler sets and they will have flash sales. There will be some great bargains and there is free shipping of 6 bottles or more anywhere in the country.

Tom and Steve have been talking about wine on the radio since 1991. Steve tells about how they came up with a ratings scale based on the number of wine stains produced by the wine. For example, 3 stains would be a good one and a great one would rate 5 stains.

Steve also talks about Della Toffola USA, the producer of high quality winemaking equipment with offices in Santa Rosa. They will be on the show in a couple of weeks. Chris Taddei mentions that he knows the company, their equipment and their service personnel which are all first-rate.

After the Provacateur, they will taste a barrel sample. The Provacateur was a Russian River Valley Chard. This barrel sample is Sonoma County Petaluma Gap. Ron says that both of these are from the Wente clone, but they have two different flavors.

Darek Trowbridge from Old World Winery discusses natural wine on today's California Wine Country with Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger. Today's show was recorded live in downtown Santa Rosa, in front of the Bollywood Restaurant.

Darek Trowbridge is the owner of Old World Winery which produces natural wine, which they will describe on the show. Dan introduces the subject of natural wine. There are some people in the wine producing business who are seeking the old traditional methods. But Dan says nobody has defined Natural Wine. There could be 30 different kinds of it, each one different. Dan says it's a wide open discussion and Darek can help define it because he's doing it.

Darek mentions the book "Natural Wine" by Isabelle Legeron. She is French and lives in London. She holds the title MW, for Master of Wine. He says people have been making wine for 8000 years so there must be a simple low-tech way.

Dan explains in layman's terms that for a long time, thousands of years, winemakers have used sulphur dioxide. The natural wine movement is divided on it. It is absolutely legal and has no negative effects in a bottle of wine, on the human body, except to people who are drinking vinegar at the same time as drinking wine.

Dan asks, now many additives are permitted in wine? Darek says it's about 75. Dan says the quality of the wine is a crucial element in its enjoyment. If the wine is not good, there is no point in making it. Dan again says the problem is that there is no definition that people can agree too.

Darek says the preference for natural wine is similar to organic food, some people may choose to eat organically. People tried organic wine, which Darek explains is different than natural wine. Dan says that some organic wines simply don't last in the bottle at all.

First, they taste some wines from Darek's vineyard, planted in 1890 by his grandfather. This is a 2013 wine. Dan says you don't think about the varietal, it's just good. These wines are silky and soft. Dan says you don't have to age it very long. It's simple wine and just tastes good. Luminous. Steve reads the label, Early Burgundy, Russian River Valley.

After the break they taste a sparkling red, an old method called "col fondo" and he knew someone who taught him the process. First you barrel age a base wine, then the next year, you add fresh juice which will then ferment to make a sparkling wine. The sparkling is natural in the bottle. They leave it capped, and the little bit of sediment keeps it rich. Dan says this is where wine took its beginnings. Every single bottle is its own fermentation tank, so theoretically, every single bottle could be different. Dan says this is one of the adventures of wine tasting.  It is slightly effervescent, or pearly, or as Darek says the Italian term, frizzante.

Dan says this wine's lower acidity helps, especially at secondary fermentation; if you have too much acidity, you have to add some sugar to balance it, and with that you risk re-fermentation. The winemaker knows he has just enough sugar. Dan says it would be more expensive if they are paying "the bubble tax." Dan says fruit flies always go to the best wine and Dan had a fly in his wine. Darek says at harvest time in Sonoma County, fruit flies are all over the place.

Steve also talks about Della Toffola USA a new sponsor that is a major producer of high quality winemaking equipment. This family-owned company was founded in the 1960s in Italy. The Santa Rosa office is their US branch and they also have offices in Australia, South America, Mexico and many in Europe.

Dan Berger delivers the quote of the day, from Groucho Marx: "Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana."

That sparkling red was a 2015 that was in barrels for two years. Now they pour a 2008 that was made with sur lies fermentation.

Greg Morthole and Justin Seidenfeld both join Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger today on California Wine Country. Greg Morthole is the winemaker from Davis Bynum Winery and Justin Seidenfeld is the winemaker for a new project called Rowen. It's a new single vineyard at high elevation which has been in the works for 15 years.

Steve asks Greg Morthole He majored in natural sciences, he went to University of Wyoming but took many wine classes since then. First he went to Sacramento, then came to Sonoma County. It's very high and cold in Wyoming so they can't grow many grapes except in some western regions. There are lots of other cool climate areas in the US that are growing grapes now.

Davis Bynum has a long history. He started in 1951 and they ran into Robert Mondavi, bought some grapes, and simply started. 15 years later, he was working as a reporter for the SF Chronicle and he had wine on the table his whole life. He was one of the pioneers of the Russian River Valley and Pinot Noir. Dan remembers some of the other pioneers in the early Napa and Sonoma wine business.

As they taste a 2015 Chardonnay, Dan explains that it has a slight minerality that you don't see in California wine too often, because it is a risky wine to make that way. He likes the acid which Greg says is deliberate, they pick early. The flint and mineral will last, if it is aged.

Justin Seidenfeld has been with the Rodney Strong Wine Estates for 8 years, overseeing their Sonoma wines. This project started in 2010, with planting and then design and construction of the new cellar. He now oversees all of Rodney Strong as well as this brand. It is the Cooley Ranch, a 20,000 acre property. They have a 70 year lease. They isolated the best parts of the property, to isolate the best 200 acres for vines. They planted a gamut of Bordeaux varietals with some Syrah and Viognier.

They also taste a Russian River Valley Pinot Noir that Steve says is "silky." It's a 2016, Dan says the flavors are in the aftertaste, intense fruit, but it explodes on the finish. The pH is 3.55 which is low, and Dan says that means it will be stable once opened, and will still be good the next day. He thinks it may last 10 years in the cellar.

Justin tells the first Rowen vintage was 2014 and this 2015 is their first national release. It has almost all sold out. It's 60% Cab, 20% Malbec and 20% co-fermentation Syrah-Viognier.

Rowen means an unexpected windfall, since they didn't know how good the vineyard would be.

Justin says, "when you grow grapes at high elevation, it's warmer at night and cooler during the day, which maintains natural acidity with good structure, good color, silky tannins without low acidity making it flabby." Dan says it's 14.5% alcohol but you don't taste the alcohol so much.

The next tasting is a 2015 Pinot Noir from the Pommard clone, grown in Jane's Vineyard. Cola, orange peel, falling leaves, are all in the flavors. They use native yeast fermentations.

Then they taste a wine called 2040 from Rowen. (It's the bottle on the left in the illustration above.) The peak elevation on their property is 2040 feet above sea level. They planted the crest of that hill with Clone 30 Cabernet (the Disney clone). Silverado vineyards in Napa is the source. The clones get names from the sources, such as the Coppola clone. Dan tells that it was Walt Disney's widow who founded the property. That clone is also called Clone 30.

Randy Ullom, winemaster at Kendall-Jackson, is our guest in the studio with Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger on California Wine Country today. (This episode was originally recorded on October 19, 2016. There was no live show today Oct. 3, 2018, since Steve and Mike are traveling to Washington DC this week.)

Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger start by tasting a very nice Estero Gold cheese, courtesy of their friend Sharon Montgomery at Oliver's. Dan says this cheese is like a Manchego but he likes this one more for its nutty flavor.

Steve introduces the winemaster at Kendall-Jackson, Randy Ullom. First he asks Randy to describe how his career began. He talks about being a skier when he was young and so he went to Utah. He spent more time skiing than studying. He ended up in Chile for the northern summer, for skiing. He stayed for three years. While in Chile he saw the wine business there. He left Chile after the coup in the 1970s and worked in the wine business, for one year in Ohio, for five years in upstate New York and then in California in 1981. He became winemaster at KJ in 1997. Now he oversees the entire KJ portfolio, including about 20 winemakers on the team in three different tiers of specialists.

Dan says that when Randy was making wine at De Loach, he "met" Randy through the extraordinary wines he was making, which were unlike any one else's. He has a vision. He understands vineyards, when to pick and what varieties are doing what things in which vineyards. Randy sent Dan a pair of clippers, so they can go out into the vineyards and work the vines. Dan says that the KJ products are uniformly excellent and over-deliver for their usual retail price.

They have 2400 different lots per year, so they have to do a lot of tasting and grading. They put each individual varietal together, then they have their 5 tiers. They also manage the Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates & Gardens, where they serve fine food and grow vegetables in their own garden. Dan says it's fascinating to see how passionate they are about their gardens.

They are tasting a Pinot Blanc from Amity Vineyards in Oregon. It's a variety widely planted in Oregon, very little in California. They love wines from unusual grape varieties. Dan would call it a baby brother to Chardonnay. It's interesting with nice flavors and great minerality in the finish. They grow a lot of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in Oregon but Dan thinks this Pinot Blanc is the best representative for Oregon vineyards.

They also brought a Chardonnay, from Santa Maria Valley, the Kendall-Jackson Estate appellation wine. They have vineyards on the Santa Maria Bench, which is an elevated portion of land. Dan says it's a difficult wine to make, with a great aromatic quality. The problem is, that if you serve these wines too cold, you never catch the character. It can't be 40 degrees, it has to be about 50-60. Randy Ullom mentions that it's basically room temperature, which is how they taste everything.

 

Our two guests today are Tom Mackey, the former winemaker at St. Francis Winery, now owner of Mackey Cellars, and Jim Morris, winemaker at Charles Krug. Barry Herbst is back in today too. Tom Mackey retired in 2012 after 30 years at St. Francis. Dan Berger says Tom knows where all the great grapes are so he is not surprised he is back in the business. Mackey Cellars has sold out its first two vintages, 2013 and 2014. Tom went to Fresno State after being accepted also at UC Davis. He chose his school because he had heard that Fresno graduates all got jobs right after graduating. Dan Berger mentions a lot of great winemakers who also went to Fresno State.

Tom started at St. Francis when they were small and located across from Chateau St. Jean. They had expanded as much as they could at that location so by the early 90s they needed more space. As they grew their production, in the last 90s they built a brand new facility. It was built in three phases, main building, barrel building and visitor center. He helped design and build it and also develop the staff.

Jim Morris is also in today. He is now at Charles Krug. He lives in Healdsburg and drives 45 minutes to Napa every day. He says, "there is nothing in Sonoma County to prepare you for Napa County." Dan Berger tells that once, a newspaper editor asked him to write a story "Napa versus Sonoma" and Dan says he found that there was and still is a difference.

Jim Morris is now the winemaker at Charles Krug, the oldest winery in Napa. Jakob Schram was their first winemaker and Jacob Berringer was their second winemaker.

Barry describes the new Bottle Barn website which will allow them to sell selected bottles online.

Dan says that when Tom started in Sonoma Valley, Kenwood was new and the name wasn't famous yet. But a lot of people in Sonoma County knew that Kenwood was a wine area. Tom remembers Buena Vista, Sebastiani and Grand Cru in the early  70s then St. Jean came in in 1974. The differences between Sonoma and Napa are less and less, mostly in the property prices. "You can't blame them for focussing on Cabernet because that's what they're known for."

They are tasting a 2015 Sonoma Valley Cabernet. The grapes came from St. Francis' Wild Oak vineyard. The vines are about 12-14 years old. The fruit is concentrated but balanced.

Jim Morris tells how they are reclaiming and rebuilding the Mondavi legacy and they are encouraging him to develop the property as an attraction. So, for instance, they have a comedy series at the winery. They are also part of the Napa Valley Film Festival. Next year they will do a music series.

Now they are tasting the Frei Brothers Russian River Valley Chardonnay which won a Double Gold Medal at the Harvest Fair.

Dan says that since a slowdown in the wine industry in about 1990, there have been great advances in grape growing and wine making. Dan thinks that more distinctiveness will creep into the varieties. Vineyard designation is the wave of the future as far as high-end wine. They also taste the Laurier Pinot Noir.

Jeff Hinchliffe, winemaker at Hanna Winery, is our guest, and Rene Byck from Paradise Ridge is also here.

Today’s Wines Tasted:

2015 Hanna Red Ranch Malbec

2017 Hanna Bismark Mtn. Vineyard Riesling

2017 Hanna Sauvignon Blanc

2016 Paradise Ridge Pinot Noir

2017 Paradise Ridge Sauvignon Blanc

Steve asks how the harvest is going. Jeff says you don’t really know until after it’s over. You can only look into the crystal ball so much, and you only know how well you’ve done afterwards.

2011 was the most difficult small harvest and 1989 was the most difficult ever. The weather has been perfect for ripening for the last week, but it was hot earlier. This has been an unpredictable year, with no consistency in terms of yield. So far they have been picking Sauvignon Blanc so far and it’s keeping him busy.

Jeff found his way to UC Davis and worked as an enologist even if he had dreams of producing beer, not wine. He was a beer guy and went to school to become a brewer. His professor told him there was no future in microbreweries. He started at Christian Brothers in 1983 and discovered wine after he tasted a Dry Creek 1979 Sauvignon Blanc. After a while he met Chris Hanna, President of Hanna Winery, and he started a 20-plus year relationship. They are a small independent family-owned winery. Hanna was started in 1985. Chris’ dad is a retired heart surgeon. They are a small, nimble company that can react quickly to new ideas. Today they grow most of their own Sauvignon Blanc grapes. Dan says Hanna is a major producer in terms of quality, even with a smaller volume of production.

They taste two Russian River Valley Sauvignon Blancs of 2017, from Hanna and Paradise Ridge. They won three gold medals for their Sauvignon Blanc at the Harvest Fair.

Jeff refers to growing Sauvignon Blanc as “taming the green monster.” He grows his grapes in shade, which lets more aromas and flavors develop. He prefers to create the conditions that make his wine special in the vineyard, rather than in the winery.

Rene Byck says they lost their 2017 Sauvignon Blanc in the fire, and this vintage is made from acquired grapes, not their own from the estate. They compare the flavors of both wines.

They are tasting a Riesling. Steve detects pear in the nose, Dan Berger gets kiwi. Not floral, not honey. It has good minerality that holds the wine for a couple of years. He knows that in a couple of years those flavors will open up and it will be superb. Jeff says he has many vintages that are "really tightly wound" at first that benefit from some years of cellaring.

This is a 2017 Riesling, and they have some grapes including some Riesling grapes that Jeff picked today. All they use to make their Sauvignon Blanc are the grapes. The Cab are the small grapes, the St. Vicaire are a rare Bordeaux variety. They will pick their Sauvignon Blanc on Friday. The red varieties, the Malbec, St. Vicaire and Cab Sauv are several weeks away from harvest. Dan says this Riesling is one that you could put away. Not all of them are like that but this one is. Last week he opened a 2002 Riesling from Michigan that was astounding!

Rene Byck talks about a party being held on Sept. 22, a fund raising auction for the revival of the county after the fires. They end up tasting a Hanna 2015 Malbec with Alexander Valley fruit. Dan says this is also a polished wine, pure fruit, blueberries and chocolate. It's a very sophisticated wine, says Dan. Jeff notes that there is very little Malbec grown here and lots in Argentina. He went there to learn about it and everyone had a different secret. Malbec is easy to make, not easy to grow but it's forgiving to make.

Tom Simoneau has brought two guests from Treasury Wine Estates, Tamara Stanfill, PR Manager and Ming Alterman, Director of Digital. First, Tom mentions the talking wine bottles, which Steve promises we will get into, in detail. But first Steve asks them to talk about Treasury Wine Estates. It is based in Australia and they own a lot of historic wineries in California like Beringer, Sterling and Chateau St. Jean. They also own brands in Australia like 19 Crimes. Tom’s most fun wine of the year last year was 19 Crimes. Tamara explains that the convicts that were shipped to Australia are featured on the bottle labels. The convicts, if convicted of one of 19 crimes, were offered execution or to be shipped to Australia. In the studio they play the label of the Shiraz bottle with John O’Reilly and his crime. It’s “AR” for Augmented Reality. When you put your phone near the bottle, the label comes to life. You have to download the app at Living Wine Label.

First they pour a Chardonnay. The "Embrazened" line celebrates accomplished women, this one features Celia Cruz, the great singer. When you put your phone up to the label, you see a little video of Celia Cruz talking about how she was the first woman on her recording label and went on to become the most popular salsa recording artist of the last century. They also have Josephine Baker and Nelly Bly on Living Wine Labels, which will be appearing in wine stores soon.

They also taste a canned wine. Dan Berger tells that canned wine was first tried in the 1940s and today it is making a comeback.

Steve asks Ming to explain how to make the Living Wine Labels work, he explains you need to download their app then just hold the phone up to the label. The one called Walking Dead will look like a zombie attack that will break the screen of your phone (but not really!).  They are tasting the Walking Dead 2016 Cabernet Sauvignon.

Steve gives livingwinelabels dot com, to download the app. One of the Beringer labels shows an 1876-era newspaper about the Beringer brothers who founded the winery. Next they taste the Beringer Boubon barrel aged chardonnay. That aging gives the wine a richer character. Dan says it's an interesting concept wine for the millennial buyer. It is a big rich bold wine, soft and very richly flavored. The aftertaste leans on the barrel component, which is more then he prefers. Tom Simoneau says it almost has a Cola flavored finish.

Tom notes that at this time of year, the winemakers are busy with harvest and crush, so the PR and marketing people like Tamara and Ming can come on the show today. Tom is watching his own vineyard right now and is carefully monitoring the Brix values of his grapes and may harvest next Tuesday. He says the roads will be full of grape trucks now.

Don Chigazola is back with some Barbaresco wines from Italy today on California Wine Country with Steve Jaxon and Dan Berger. Don Chigazola is a wine importer whose company Chigazola Merchants specializes in importing special wines from Italy. Today has brought some wines from a single family producer Fontanabianca, in the Barbaresco region (in Piedmont, northwest Italy).

Don drives the back roads of Italy with his son looking for good local wines. He will establish a relationship with these producers and imports these wines into northern California. He also sells them around the country from his website.

First they taste a Fontanabianca Arneis, which Steve thought tasted like a Chardonnay. Dan says Chardonnay can be made seriously or frivolously. He says this Arneis is made seriously. The Arneis variety is native to northern Italy. Don thinks there might be someone growing it in Sonoma County.

Bob Andrews is Dan Berger’s go-to expert on Italian wine. Bob speaks fluent Italian and he has some great old Italian wines in his cellar.

The Arneis is not a simple fruity wine. Arneis is a low-acid grape, with low yields. This retails at $25. Dan thinks it would go with any kind of seafood, which does not use cream in the recipe. Bob Andrews says it’s deliciously dry. It would be great with some shrimp or oysters, they suggest. The alcohol is 13%, which is a point and a half less than most Chardonnays.

Next they taste a Nebbiolo from the Langhe district. It has a flavor that you will never get in an American wine. Dan says the flavor has a walnut component in it. It goes great with pasta with sausage, says Dan Berger.

The winery is Fontanabianca, of the Pola family, located in a medieval village called Neve. The family has been producing wine for generations and the grandfather was the first to commercialize it, in the 1960s. His son, his wife and their son take care of all the production today. Don was travelling in Piemonte, looking for a good Barolo to import. He discovered a small hotel called Castello di Sinio run by a San Franciscan, Denise Pardini, who has built a 5-star hotel in a rennovated castle . Don was looking for Barolo but she suggested he find a Barbaresco. She introduced him to the Pola family and they made a visit. Don loved all of their wines Nebbiolo, Barbera d’Alba and their flagship, Barbaresco, named Bordini.

Dan tells about the differences between the Barbaresco and Barolo wines. Nebbiolo also goes into Barolo, as well as Langhe Nebbiolo, a lower priced wine that doesn’t have to age as long. Don explains that the Nebbiolo is aged 6 months in oak. The Barbaresco is a DOCG which requires 18 months aging. It goes for $60 per bottle. Dan Berger says this one is two steps ahead of the others. Dan was buying Barbaresco a few years ago and he thought they all needed 25 years in the cellar. This is a 2010 vintage.

After the break they taste a Barbera, which Dan Berger says can be drunk now or put away. It has less tannin and more acid. Bob notes that the Barbera has more color than the Barbaresco. Steve likes the Barbera more than the Barbaresco.

Next they have a 2013 Barbera d’Alba. Dan says this one is the way Barbera should be made. It doesn't require a lot of time in the cellar, but it can bear 6-8 years. It has less tannin and more acid. Dan explains that acid it tart and tannin is gritty. All red wine has tannin, but it's not particularly necessary for certain wines. Beaujolais has very little. This wine has a balance between the acid and tannin. Dan says the tomatoes in a pasta sauce have acid as does the wine, so they would pair well. A Cabernet Sauvignon would not go so well with the same dish.

Bob points out that this Barbera has more color than the Barbaresco, but this has more tannin. Dan says ten years from now the Barbaresco will be in be...