California Zinfandel: History and Wines

This blog is based on the Spirits of New Mexico radio show that aired on July 10, 2021. We do on-air tasting of one or two wines to illustrate what is available in a particular wine region, or as a contrast of what influence a wine region has on a grape or blend. We use suitable glasses for the type of wine and do a double-decant of red wines to insure they have opened sufficiently for accurate judging.

Last November we sampled two California Zinfandel wines and since this is barbecue season we’re treating ourselves again. There are several areas that excel with this grape, and many of them are in California where the grape originated on American soil. This grape like so many others arrived courtesy of grape growers and winemakers from the Old World.

Zinfandel Origins

DNA testing is not just devoted to human DNA as many things benefit from DNA analysis including plants. In many cases the only way to know for sure a plants origin is via DNA testing. Such was the case with Zinfandel, which in the late 1990s was able to identify Croatia as the origin of both Zinfandel and Primitivo, an Italian grape. Further refinements followed until the 2012 book Wine Grapes that lists 1,368 varieties included an entry detailing the search for Zinfandel’s origins. After years of research and DNA testing a single 90-year-old grape vine from the garden of an elderly lady in Split, Croatia, provided the evidence to show that Zinfandel was a Croatian grape that has been known as Tribidrag since at least the 15th century.

Cuttings of Zinfandel were brought to California during the 1850 Gold Rush and were soon making fine wines. It is possible J. W. Osborne may have made the first wine from Zinfandel in California. He planted Zinfandel at his Oak Knoll vineyard just north of Napa, and his wine was much praised in 1857. Planting of Zinfandel boomed soon after, and by the end of the 19th century it was the most widespread variety in California.

Prohibition all but killed Zinfandel and many vines were ripped out. The grape was subject to rot when transported long distances and was replaced with Alicante Bouschet for the home market.  In 1972 Bob Trinchero of Sutter Home Winery used the saignee technique to remove some of the first run juice to intensify his Deaver vineyard Zinfandel in Amador County. The dry, white juice was made into a Rose-style wine but generated little interest. That is until a stuck fermentation in 1975 produced a sweet runoff juice, which caught on and white Zinfandel now sells at six times the rate of red Zinfandel.

Whence cometh the grape

Currently both Zinfandel and the Primitivo clone grow well in many part of California. The earlier-ripening Primitivo is also gaining fans. Castoro Cellars in Paso Robles quadrupled their Primitivo holdings alongside their highly-rated Zinfandel. Currently Zinfandel is the third most planted grape after Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. The brix level determines the fruit flavors and ABV.

Zinfandel styles:

• White Zinfandel – no skin contact after crush, varying residual sugar
• Zinfandel Rose – minimal skin contact, finished dry
• Zinfandel Red – Normal extraction, dry, balanced, 13.5 to 14.5 % ABV
• Zinfandel Claret – Done like a Bordeaux claret, Grgich Hills and Milagro Vineyards
• Zinfandel Big – Jammy, heavy extraction, ripe or overripe grapes 15.0 to 17% ABV
• Late Harvest Zinfandel – Overripe grapes, residual sugar, under 15% Tobin James Liquid Love

California’s oldest vineyard

Prospect Cellars proprietor Jamie Colburn-Lubenko can talk first-hand about Shenandoah Valley’s 10-acre Zinfandel planting known as the Original Grandpère Vineyard – the oldest and most revered of California’s Old Vine Zinfandels – because, to her, it’s family history.

“What everyone knows is that there is a grant deed in Amador County records that shows a vineyard planted there in 1869,” says Colburn-Lubenko, “and that the original vines are still there.  This makes it the oldest documented Zinfandel vineyard in the state.

It is quite a sight to see these gnarly, thick-trunked vines that have been around for much of California’s history. Stoic, steadfast, they still bear fruit for the most revered Zinfandel in the world.

California Zinfandel AVAs

• Central Valley has heavy production, but used for jug wine, blends and white Zinfandel.
• Sierra Foothills: Amador has a reputation for big, full-bodied Zinfandel. These extra-ripe wines have been called jammy, briary, and brambly, having aromas of sweet berries.
  • Within Amador County lies the Shenandoah Valley where Barbera, Sangiovese and Zinfandel reign supreme and home to the state’s oldest Zinfandel vines.
• Sierra Foothills: El Dorado one of the oldest wine-producing areas has 64 wineries and is located between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe at elevations of 1200 to 3500 feet. The region is warm and sunny, and El Dorado red wines are typically ripe and full-bodied.
• Santa Cruz Mountains AVA produces Zinfandel from just 9 acres that are known for their complexity and depth.
• Sonoma county has Zinfandel-plantings second only to the Central Valley.
  • Dry Creek Valley is known for its juicy Zinfandel with bright fruit, balanced acidity and notes of blackberry, anise and pepper.
  • Alexander Valley is the warmest region for Zin and home to Sin Zin of Alexander Valley Vineyards an iconic Zinfandel
  • Sonoma Valley around the town of Sonoma can be earthy and complex; Kenwood and Ravenswood. The Kenwood Jack London Zinfandel is one of my faves.
  • Russian River Valley does have a warm area where Zinfandel, often with intense Boysenberry is favored. There are a number of old vines making spicy, moderate alcohol wines.
• Paso Robles AVA with its hot days and cool maritime evenings and a long growing season produces Zinfandel known for being soft and round, but also big and jammy.
• Napa Valley AVA produces Zinfandel wines described as plum-like and intense, tasting of red berry fruits with cedar and vanilla. Some Zinfandel in Napa tends to be made in a claret style like red Bordeaux. Mike Grgich, a Croatian, helped popularize this style. The Napa mountain subregions are generally more complex.
• Mendocino County Zinfandel wines are less known than their Chardonnay and Pinot Noir counterparts, but offer rich fruit, high tannins and higher alcohol.
• Lake County Although each area within Lake County has unique viticultural attributes, all are influenced by Clear Lake, the largest inland body of water in the state of California. The moderating influence of the lake results in a climate with less variation in temperature than surrounding areas and with the majority of the vineyards planted above 1,500 feet, this creates a higher and drier growing environment that reduces the threat of mildew and pests. Red volcanic soils can be found on the hillsides below Mount Konocti, while alluvial benches on the valley floor provide well-drained beds for the vines.
• Lodi has some of the oldest Zinfandel vines in California. While often used for White Zinfandel production, in the red style, Lodi Zinfandels have a reputation for being juicy and approachable. Michael David reserve Zinfandel is superb: Rapture, Lust, Rage, Sloth and Gluttony are about sixty bills, but you can knock off 5 of the seven deadly sins with them.

Amador County

If there is one wine region in the foothills that most wine lovers would recognize it would be Amador County; known for their robust Zinfandel wines. Within the county are some of the oldest Zinfandel vineyards of California. As a Zinfandel lover my eyes would light up when I read Amador County on a Zinfandel wine label. That was before I’d ever explored the area and found a captivating wine region to explore and lasting memories of fun and fellowship with their winemakers.

Most of the Sierra Foothills wineries are family-owned and operated with small vineyards and a unique personal style of winemaking that has disappeared from many other regions like Napa and Sonoma. In fact the closest similarity I’ve found is to our own New Mexico wineries that are also family-owned with small vineyards and unique wines one will find nowhere else.

Amador County is located just west of the Lodi wine region, which is south of Sacramento. It has a Mediterranean climate, in part from the Delta, a series of rivers that feed San Francisco Bay. The land is bathed in light with warm days that rarely exceed 100 degrees and cool nights where the Sierra winds drop temperatures 30 to 35 degrees allowing the grapes to retain the acidity essential for well-balanced wines.

Amador County Vines

The majority of Amador’s vines are head-trained, spur-pruned and either own-rooted or on low vigor rootstocks like St. George, which provide a natural check on yields.

• Trained vines are primarily on bi-lateral cordons with vertical trellising.
• Severe pruning, cluster thinning, and dropping crop when necessary keep yields small, generally four tons per acre or less.
• The highest percentages of organically farmed vineyards in California
• Dry-farming, also inhibits phylloxera infestation.
• 600 acres are 65 years or older, some dating to the 19th century.
• These deeply rooted, head-trained vines in vineyards such as Deaver, Esola, Fox, Ferrero, Grandpere and Lubenko, yield tiny crops of small-berried grapes, produce premium zinfandel
• The Grandpere Zinfandel I got at Vino Noceto OGP Zin was the best I ever tasted.
  • Oldest Zinfandel vineyard from 1860s, State Fair vineyard of the year 2016

Other grapes of Amador

• Barbera, the famous red grape of Piedmonte, Italy thrive in Amador and rival the best of Italy
• Sangiovese is as good in Amador County as anywhere else it is planted, better than most locales
• Syrah and Viognier, two Rhone Valley grapes also do very well here.
• Contains the lush Shenandoah Valley, with striking similarity to Tuscany
• Many historic Gold Rush towns are also here to explore

What we are tasting: Sobon Estate 2019 Zinfandel – Cougar Hill 14.5% ABV $22.00

Their website Sobonwine.com provides good background of the Sobon family. Shenandoah Vineyards in Plymouth, CA, was founded in 1977 by Shirley and Leon Sobon. They moved from Los Altos, California, where Leon was a Senior Scientist with the Lockheed Research Lab. Leon’s gift for home winemaking led him to leave Lockheed and begin a new career as a Winemaker. His son Paul took over winemaking duties after a stint at UC Davis and travels abroad studying with winemakers in Burgundy, Bordeaux and Australia. What a dream job that is!

The two Sobon locations are Shenandoah Vineyards and Sobon Estate, both in Plymouth.

Winemaker comments: With its own special microclimate near our large pond, this 67 year-old sustainably grown vineyard has a unique northern exposed hillside.  This gives us the sleekest and most elegant of all our single vineyard offerings. This plot is named for the cougar that travels through the vineyard making its way to the pond for water.  Full bodied with superbly integrated flavors of dried fruit and herbal aromatics leading to a silky smooth texture with mid palate hints of huckleberry, cocoa, dried cranberries and a signature mountain brambly character. Features a long lingering finish.

Paul Sobon also makes a wide range of wines, some from Rhone varietals, Barbera and a Zingiovese blend of Sangiovese and Zinfandel. He also has a series of ReZerve wines, using a Z rather than an S in the spelling which he trademarked. One of those ReZerve wines is a Primitivo. They do over 30 different wines, many very innovative. I definitely plan to visit them on my next California trip. Meanwhile, they are well represented at Total Wines.

Wines of Lodi

Sitting at the top of the Central Valley with 100,000 acres of vines, many old vine Zinfandel and lesser-known varieties, is the wine region of Lodi with seven subregions. Many Lodi wines only identify Lodi and even that is a recent change. Before then many grapes were sourced from here for blends made somewhere else. At one time well over 60% of California Zinfandel came from here. That mark is still pretty high.

Map courtesy of www.lodiwine.com

Zinfandel is the most widely planted grape in the region, but is also responsible for putting Lodi on the map. When the farmers here noticed that their fruit was winning lots of medals they created their own wineries, which started a trend as wineries began popping up everywhere.

It was around the year 2000 that brands like Klinker Brick and 7 Deadly Zins by Michael David Winery released wines with the Lodi AVA on the label. The wines were rich, fruity, sweet, and somewhat smoky. People loved them for their bold fruit and also because the winemakers didn’t take themselves too seriously.

Wine Folly identifies the Lodi Zinfandel profile as raspberry sauce, tamarind, blackberry, dried apricot and sweet tobacco. At times I find the tobacco element a bit much.

The main grapes planted are Zinfandel, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Gris and Sauvignon Blanc, but several other notable grapes are grown here.

What we are tasting: The Specialist 2018 Zinfandel Lodi, 14.1 % ABV, $22

This wine is a blend of 95% Zinfandel and 5% Petite Sirah from Lodi.

Wine Express write-up:

This Zin pays homage to the legend of The Specialist who some swear they’ve seen riding in Lodi’s fabled vineyards late at night, bending the moonlight and serenading the grapes. With some of the oldest Zinfandel vines in California—some dating back to 1888—Lodi is world-renowned for this varietal. In fact, there’s nowhere else in the world that produces Zinfandel with such a deep sense of place.

Which brings us to this new release Zinfandel. Grapes sourced from Lodi’s best vineyards were harvested late in the season, setting the stage for a richer, more expressive wine. 95% Zinfandel is blended with 5% Petite Sirah to enhance depth and balance. The wine was fermented to dry in stainless steel tanks. After 6-day maceration, the wine was pressed off the skins before undergoing full malolactic fermentation and aging in a combination of French and American oak barrels.

Tasting Panel Magazine scored this 93 points saying “Picking grapes late in the season, Winemaker Jim Roblee has succeeded with impressing us with this most elegant old-vine Zinfandel. It also proves the remarkable assets of this variety and the region. This bright, vivid-fruited and well-structured red leaves jammy behind and enters into a category that connects Old World refinement with California’s sunshine-in-a-glass effect. Tart pomegranate is softened by vanilla cedar, just-ripened cherry and deep plum notes bring out its outstanding flavor characteristics.”

Analysis

I knew the Sobon Zinfandel would be excellent, but I was surprised by the Specialist. It had excellent balance and the tobacco accent was muted. It was one of the more refined Lodi Zinfandels I’ve tasted and I mean that in a positive way. While drinking both I was humming and paraphrasing the Beach Boys, “I wish they all were California Zins.” With apologies to Brian Wilson.