Ep. 977 Map 14 USA | Jumbo Shrimp Maps

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This has been a journey of development since Stevie Kim discovered Rosie Baker's hand drawn maps on Instagram through two years of work by our in house editorial and graphics team, and now the maps are available to purchase in beta form while they undergo the final briefing and editing by our expert advisory board. It's a three layered project because we know everyone learns differently. We now offer the complete box set of thirty nine maps, this series of podcasts with the maps narrated by our crack team of wine educators. And finally, the study guide book, which will be published later this year. Our map project is in no way a substitute for the material set out by other educational organizations, but we hope all the wine students out there will find our map project a new exciting and useful tool for learning. For more information and to buy the maps, please visit our website at mama jumbo shrimp dot com. Welcome to the jumbo shrimp wine study maps podcast. In this episode, we will be looking at the USA map. United States of America is the fourth largest producer and now the largest consumer of wine in the world. And while there is at least one winery in each of its fifty states, we will focus on the four largest states producing nearly all the quality but it's vanilla for a wine, California, Washington, Oregon, and New York. Since California is by far the largest and most important producer of wine in the US, it will be covered in more detail in a subsequent podcast. America is a vast country with regional climates ranging from arid desert tropical wetlands, from mountainous alpine to continental grasslands, but the best grapevine regions are in the temperate continental areas. There is a two pronged history of winemaking America. One, from the grapevine Spanish missionaries brought with them they colonized Mexico and the western areas of America. And, two, the native wild grape vines common to the eastern half of the country. But these native grapes meet generally unpleasant wine, so attempts were made to import and plant European and Venice finifera vines. It wasn't until the scourge of Phylloxera was solved by grafting onto Native American rootstock that the wine industry in the country started to grow in the beginning of the twentieth century, especially in the Eastern US. But the passage of prohibition laws in nineteen twenty outlawing, and I quote, the manufacturer, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors, unquote, cause most wineries to close or to switch to table grapes. And by its repeal in nineteen thirty three, most of the wine industry that survived was in California. It took several decades for the consumer demand for fine, dry wine to support the industry, definitely encouraged by the success of California wines at the famous nineteen seventy six Paris Blind tasting. Because the wine industry is fairly young, the labeling laws in the United States are more about truth in labeling for place of origin and do not contain the same restrictions as most of the wine laws of Europe. A winemaker may use any grape variety at any yield with just about any VINification technique if the federal and state rules for labeling are followed. The creation of the American Viticulture area or AVA system started in the early nineteen eighties as specified zones based on geography and climate. These first zones simply followed boundaries like state or county, then became more specific to define and protect unique wine growing areas regardless of map lines. The federal rules for wines listed with an AVA are as follows. One, if grape variety is listed, seventy five percent of the wine must be that grape. Although there are a couple exceptions in a few states do have stricter rules. Two, eighty five percent of those grapes must come from the stated AVA or only seventy five percent if the label uses just county, state, or country name, but ninety five percent if the wine is labeled as a single vineyard. And three, ninety five percent of the grapes must come from the stated vintage. Now not all wines qualify or use a specific AVA, but those that do must adhere to these seventy five, eighty five, ninety five percent rules. So from east to west, let's look at some of the important regions and AvAs. In the northeast, since the large state of New York, stretching between the great lakes in the west and the Atlantic Ocean in the East, most of New York has a humid continental to maritime climate. While there are pockets of fine wine production near the Great Lakes, area, Ontario, and on the coastal Long Island, about ninety percent of the state's wines come from the Finger Lakes. This area in the center of the state can have hot and humid summers bitterly cold winters, spring frosts, and harvest rains. But these extremes of weather are moderated by the eleven fingers. These deep glacial lakes and their surrounding hills that cool the area during the hottest summer months. Extending the growing season and storing enough heat through the winter to allow the vines to avoid winter freeze and spring frost. Hybrids of French American vines and Native American grapes still dominate the overall production of the area, but in the nineteen fifties, Doctor for Constantine Frank, founded Veniferous sellers, and he proved that cool climate European grapes could thrive in this area with a climate that is quite similar to Germany's. So riesling is by far the most planted grape with producers making an average two to three different sweetness level wines a year. Thank you for listening to Italian wine podcast. We know there are many of you listening out there, so we just want to interrupt for a small ask. Italian wine podcast is in the running for an award. The best podcast listening platform through the podcast awards, the people's choice. Lister nominations is from July first to the thirty first, and we would really appreciate your vote. We are hoping our listeners will come through for us. So if you have a second and could do this small thing for us, just head to Italian wine podcast dot com from July first to the thirty first and click the link. We thank you and back to the show. But other cool climate grapes are gaining its popularity, chardonnay, Camry Frank, Peter noir, Giversgemeter, and Merlo. These eleven glacial lake gorges provides steep slopes that are ideal for growing grapes, one, by giving good sun aspect, and two, providing airflow thereby limiting the potential for frost in the vineyard. These vineyards generally sit on a mix of shale, silk stone, and limestone bedrock. These layers cover with varying depths of well draining loam topsoil. It sounds familiar. These are the same types of soils we discuss when speaking of the old world origins of these grapes. Moving across the country to the northwest corner, we get to Washington State, the second largest producer of Vineifera wine in the US. The western half of the state is dominated by the cascade mountain range. And as you see on the map, the imposing mountain rainier. When most people think of Washington and therefore, it's like a city in Seattle, they think of constant rain and lush evergreen forests. But the cascade range creates such a significant rain shadow that the eastern half of Washington only averages six to twelve inches of rain a year. This arid continental, almost desert like climate, has hot, dry summers, cold winters with heavy snowfall, the threat of spring frost and autumn freezes. Irrigation is not only allowed, but makes Viticulture possible in this region. And after harvest and fall pruning, farmers will actually shut off water to the vines, letting them go dormant, to avoid freeze damage during the winter, where the frozen moisture in the vine actually splits the trunk. But the long growing season is ideal for quality Viticulture. As the arid conditions almost eliminate pest and moisture disease problems, while the northerly latitude gives additional hours of sunlight and large diurnal temperature shifts ensure balanced grape development of sugar and acid and phenolics. The largest Appalachian is the Columbia Valley AVA. Which at four, almost four and a half million hectares is twice the size of Tuscany. The Columbia River gorge carved from multiple ancient glacial floods and its tributary rivers provide the irrigation and moderating temperature influences for most of the region. These floods swept away most of the top soil, leaving just thin layers of dirt over the basalt bedrock, and even in vineyard sites with deeper fertile soil, the lack of water and the arid climate create just enough vine stress for quality grapes. Typically, Vidiots are planted on south facing slopes to increase sun exposure and protect from northerly winds and provide good drainage for when there is rain. Most of the other important AVAs, like Yakima Valley, Wawa Walla Valley, and Red Mountain are nested within the larger Columbia Valley AVA. While grape growing in these areas dates to the eighteen fifties, that's when immigrants from places like Italy and Germany planted their vines, the modern wine industry is quite new. When Yacama Valley was named the first official Appalachian in nineteen eighty three, there were only twenty wineries in the entire state. Now there are over a thousand. Kevin Solvignon is the most planted variety now with vineyards on Red Mountain and Horse Heaven Hill AVA's considered among the best in the country. Warm, sunny, long growing seasons are ideal for this late ripening grape. While the windy air conditions and high pH soils of regions lead to thicker skin, smaller berries and more compact clusters for nearly all of the red grapes. Merlo is second in production and might be Washington's signature grape for the value in many of these fruity, but quite often age worthy wines. However, Sarah, especially from the rocky vineyards of Walla Walla AVA receives much critical acclaim and has drawn more than a few French winemakers. If you look at a globe, it does sit just above the forty six parallel, same as the Northern Rome. For white grapes in Washington, chardonnay and riesling are the dominant plantings, although both tend to be made into wines that simply aim to satisfy the American palette for easily quaffable whites. But the better chardonnays, given the long, warm growing season, are a winemaker delight. Having enough ripe tropical fruit flavors to easily melt with the addition of toasty oak, and the best rieslings can be in the full bodied truck and or dry style, easily achieving ripeness while early harvest can still capture its signature acidity. Two of Washington's wine laws to remember. Any wine labeled with one of the state's AVAs must contain ninety five percent of Washington grapes, and it was the first state to regulate the label designation of reserve. Thereby limiting those bottlings to a winery's best wine and less than ten percent of its total production. Much of the US reserve is simply a choice that goes on a label. Crossing south over the Columbia River, we enter Oregon, which is the fourth largest wine producing state. Here on the northern border, it does share some of Washington's AVAs. But the focus of Oregon wine is the Wlamet valley with pinot grapes. And it's pronounced Wlamet, damn it. Now you can't forget. A one hundred fifty mile long valley in the western third of the state runs south from the largest city of Portland. Blamet Valley accounts for over seventy five percent of Oregon's wine production. Yet that's only one percent of the total US. It is bordered to the east by the large cascade range and protected from the coal Pacific Ocean by the smaller coastal range on the west. This gives will laminate a cool Mediterranean climate, cool to cold wet winters, but warm, sunny, and rarely hot summers. This growing season is most often long and dry, with the biggest concern being, If winter rains will arrive off the ocean before harvest. Remember those ice age floods that scoured the hills of Eastern Washington? This is where most of that spill was deposited, three hundred miles away. So the valley floor of the Wlamet River Basin is quite fertile. And in some areas, the soil is over a kilometer deep. But the gently rolling hills on the valley sides make for ideal vineyard sites with good aspect, usually south, drainage, flow, and myriad soil types depending on the AVAs. There are six smaller appletations that are nested within the Walamet Valley AVA. Now the oldest bedrock on these hills is either uplifted marine sediment, which includes fleece, topped in many areas by volcanic basalt from the formation of the cascade range. That volcanic basalt comes from lava flows that were under the ocean when this was part of the Pacific Ocean. A break in the coastal range, which is called the Vanduzer Corridor, brings cooling fog into the valley during the summer mornings, which lessens the vineyard sun exposure and lengthens the growing season, which is especially important for pinot noir. That grape is king here. It is more than seventy percent of the vineyard plantings in Willow Valley. Oregon wine laws require that any wine labeled as pinot noir or for other grapes such as pinot gris, chardonnay, and riesling must contain ninety five percent of the varietal, which is much stricter than the seventy five percent required in most other parts of the country. And an AVA wine must contain ninety five percent of grapes from that region rather than the federal level of eighty five percent. The dominance of Puna war started with a handful of wine pioneers coming from California in the nineteen sixties and seventies. Here, they found a cooler and more temperate region more akin to the vineyards of the coat door in France, and by nineteen eighty eight, even the famous Geron family of Burgundy was fully invested in a new Willow winery. As you learned or will learn from other wine map podcasts, Peter noir is quite sensitive to place. It needs sunshine to ripen, but not too much, or its dense skins will burn. It needs a long growing season to reach full phenolic ripeness, is susceptible to moisture diseases like mildews, and that thin skin makes it necessary to farm and harvest by hand, generally from smaller vineyards. The Willow Valley offers all of these advantages. Because Peter noir expresses terroir so well, it is difficult to generalize the flavor profiles, But often the wines here are considered lighter, more delicate, and more perfumed than those in California, while at the same time, be considered riper and more fruit forward than their burgundy counterparts. What is certain is that Peter noir is Oregon's signature grape. Pino Gree is Oregon's most planted white varietal, followed distantly by chardonnay and riesling. Now most of the Pino Gree made here, it's not labeled as Pino Gresio because it follows the alzation style. More full bodied, ripe stone and tropical fruits, even when usually identified without oak influence. Chardonnay that's gained attention in the Wlamet Valley and in Oregon has often been used in high quality sparkling wine in the method Chapenwas or Matoto classical style. Following the map to Southern Oregon, the large Southern Oregon AVA, where the narrower Umpqua and rogue river valleys flow east to west into the Pacific, has a wider range of grapes planted as the area tends to be warmer and drier with less cooling ocean influence. That is our tour of the United States. Join me again for a deeper look into the wine regions of California. Thanks for listening to this episode of Italian wine podcast brought to you by Italian wine Academy. Offering WSET levels one, two, and three in English. Visit our website at Italian wine academy dot org for more information and sign up today to start your personal adventure in global wine education right here in the heart of verona. 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