+1.
And I am constantly struck by the prevalence of people here who bash Parker’s palate as well as the prevalence of SQN idolizers. Seems like a contradiction. Add the two groups together and you get about 140% of posters! 
I was disappointed in the retort to Eric’s piece (or would it be, in this context, ‘peace?’).* To me, it read as a rant, a shoot from the hip diatribe that was a poor read. As an example, something basic such as subject/verb agreement left something to be desired (e.g. “Washington and Oregon makes fabulous syrahs, too”).
Legitimate counterpoints to Eric’s column are certainly appropriate; I just thought this author did a poor job attempting them.
*I am a friend of Eric as well.
Here is a link to RC’s background, for those interested:
http://aboutrandycaparoso.blogspot.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I have a recollection of attending an HdR seminar sometime back, having him as one of the panelists, and thinking that I didn’t agree with much of what he said. Not that his information was “wrong,” but just that my opinion/experience was different than his. I wish I could remember the substance in more detail…
While I agree with much of what RC said in his opinion piece, it did come across as perhaps unnecessarily confrontational. Asimov was writing for a specific purpose–here are some different, low-alcohol Syrahs that you may not have tried or heard of.
Bruce
So is this is going to turn into a similar thread to the Alice Feiring criticizes Jay Miller one?
VB
Great point! Somehow the math just doesn’t add up, does it?
I think that sometimes the criticism of critics can go a bit too far, but I will say that I do think this guy could really use a good editor…
" (let’s not forget, Washington and Oregon makes fabulous syrahs, too)."
No one seems to be addressing the crux of Eric’s article. Syrah sales are down in CA. Really down. Why? He thinks because of too many styles. It’s an interesting legit argument. Randy response is legit, but is not really addressing Eric’s reason for writing the article. It’s is a defense of wines he loves. I wish Randy would have addressed his idea of why Syrah sales are down, or if he thinks they are not, and in fact up, then why? Let’s not turn this into a bash-Randy thread as Hardy intimates. Let’s make this about discourse.
Fellow berserkers: Randy Caparoso here, if you wanna bash more directly. No, I don’t usually lurk around wine geek forums, but I do have quite a bit of background upon which my observations are based: since 1981, a regularly published newspaper wine columnist (The Honolulu Advertiser) and industry magazine editor (right now, primarily as Bottom Line Editor of Sommelier Journal, and in the past, as a frequent contributor to Sante, Practical Winery & Vineyard, Vineyard & Winery Management, Restaurant Hospitality, etc.).
I’ve also managed restaurant wine programs as a sommelier and managing partner since 1978, and have opened over thirty restaurants from Honolulu to New York. Been around the block, you can say.
If you did indeed read my response to Asimov’s column, you could see that there were two very specific, basic points being made:
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It’s displeasing to read a piece disparaging a single grape for reasons of “high alcohol,” as if the alcoholic level of any single wine (be it a 7% Ruwer River Riesling or a 15% Priorat or Shiraz) is what defines quality or sense of place. If you also read Asimov’s piece, you would have read a comment basically saying that at high alcohol levels syrah loses its varietal definition. Why should that irk me? Because the majority of the top quality West Coast syrahs being made these days are pretty much “high” in alcohol. Sine Qua Non, Jaffurs, Tyrus Evan, Amavi, JC, Neyers, and on and on: nary a sub-14% alcohol wine among them.
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So why should I care? Because I happen to respect the people who are working hard to produce these beautiful wines. Obviously, American syrah in general is not selling hot cakes, so how does a column in a widely read paper like The New York Times asking what’s “wrong” with syrah help? Especially one that draws erroneous inferences, like the fact that high alcohol always means jammy, sweet, unvarietal character. I can see a consumer picking up a beautiful bottle of Jaffurs or Neyers, and then putting it down because he/she read somewhere that 15% alcohol makes for lousy wine. It’s a sad thing that wine lovers often believe everything they read, and so if what they read is just dead wrong, then somebody has to say something.
Or maybe you don’t think influential wine columnists shouldn’t be called out? Then we need to agree to disagree.
Lest there be other misunderstandings: my favorite wines in the world happen to be, in rough order, red Burgundies and Pinot Noir, French Chablis, Mosel-Saar-Ruwers, Bandol, and California zins. Hardly the taste of someone who “prefers” big alcohol.
Someone also questioned my point about the “big syrah push” of the mid-nineties. Not much to say there, except for the fact that we all know that vintners on the West Coast began planting syrah in earnest in the eighties, but that most of what exists in the ground today definitely was planted from the mid-nineties on. Hence, syrah producers current dilemma: lots of great syrah being made, but not all of it being readily sold.
Which is why, I believe, that we wine lovers need to show some solidarity with these producers. Let’s not knock 'em. Sure, like Mr. Asimov or Mr. Comiskey, you might prefer syrahs grown on more extreme climatic edges, just barely brushing up against the 14% alcohol level. Two of my personal favorites are, in fact, the restrained, perfumed syrahs by Baker Lane and Failla from the Sonoma Coast. But I like to think that when I taste a 15% Jaffurs or Stolpman, I also have good enough sense to recognize the beauty of varietal intensity and terroir that those wines express, too. So again, let’s not knock 'em. Or if you do, I think you better have a pretty good reason why.
Just don’t come around with that lame stuff about “alcohol” determining the quality of wine, or I will swat it out of here…
We can speculate, but we can’t come up with reasons. What someon needs to do is talk to the customers. Go do surveys and focus group interviews - find out why people aren’t buying Syrah. Awareness? Confusion? Differing styles? Too much alcohol? If those of you who have a stake in selling Syrah want to know why people aren’t buying your wines as much anymore ASK THEM.
And to Todd W and everyone who posted after my note above - it’s hypocrisy to whine at Randy for attacking Asimov personally* and then to attack to attack him personally.
*The article doesn’t actually do this. He questions Asimov’s take on the Syrah sales issue, but never calls him out on a personal level
You say that as though it’s a scientific fact, but it’s just your opinion. Others of us think those wines are trash and that the majority of the top quality West Coast syrahs being made these days are lower in alcohol. And we are irked by the fact that the mainstream wine press treats this trash as the standard to which everything else should conform. As has been pointed out, wines like Sine Qua Non have an incredibly large and loyal following that’s willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a bottle of the stuff. Why should they feel threatened by one voice in the wilderness defending a different standard? When Edmunds St. John sells for $500 a bottle and is driving Sine Qua Non out of business, you’ll have a valid gripe.
It’s actually the truth.
But the truth is hard John…
No its not. Shutup.
I’ve used that line. It got me slapped.
At my challenge, by the ancient laws of combat, we are met at this chosen ground, to settle for good and all who holds sway over the Syrah: us natives, born rightwise to this fine land, or the foreign hordes defiling it.
Peter, I’m confused: who are the “foreign hordes”, Chave and Clape or Manfred and Mollydooker?
Does it matter?
Can’t tell the players without a program…
We should just have a Syrah offline and drink. Heavily.