Of course, that's last minute for some people. For me, I think skating close to the gift-giving edge of disaster adds spice to life. Especially when it involves fighting through mobs of other time-challenged shoppers. Hey—hands off that bottle of Viognier, pal, or I'll show you Christmas season! 

For the more demure, or else the more unwilling to leave their homes, though, you could do worse than to give a donation in your giftee's name to Changing the Present, which consolidates various worthy charities into a web-based gift-giving structure (more or less). It's pertinent here because of their affiliation of Roots of Peace, a charity that clears war-torn regions of landmines and replaces them with grapevines. Tax-deductible and honorable, I'd say.

On the other hand, there's an abundance of new wine- and/or spirits-related books out there, some of which are worth a panicked trip to your local book emporium (or to Amazon, though you'll be paying some hefty shipping charges at this point if you want it there by Dec. 24).

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Palmina's Italian Variety Whites

On sort of an extended trip at the moment, one leg of which took me down to the Santa Rita Hills, currently the source of some of CA's best Pinots and Syrahs, and, as it turns out, unquestionably CA's best Malvasia Bianca.  Admittedly a bit of a harder sell, but winemaking passion doesn't always take heed of market forces.

Anyway, what this particular blog entry comes out of is a tasting I had the other day with Steve Clifton of Palmina (and Brewer-Clifton) at his winery, which is located in the Lompoc wine ghetto. The ghetto is one of the more concentrated zones of California garagiste winemaking I've run across, a mini-industrial park of small warehouse spaces packed with thirty-odd bonded wineries, among them Stolpman, Piedrasassi, Holus Bolus, Palmina, Longoria, Sea Smoke, DiBruno...the list goes on. Strangely impressive, given the non-scenic-ness of it all.

Palmina specializes in Italian varietals. Not only that, but part of Clifton's focus is the white varieties of northern Italy. Not many California wineries are willing to devote much effort to producing Traminer, Arneis or the aforementioned Malvasia Bianca; would that they were. These are all appealing, bright, focused whites (Palmina makes reds, too, but I'm mostly bowled over by the whites), ideal with food, well worth hunting down. My two favorites were the following, but don't overlook Palmina's Pinot Grigios, which are a good way of reacquainting yourself with the fact that this often dreary grape actually can make impressive wine.

2006 Palmina Tocai ($28) This had classic lightly bitter tree fruit notes in the aroma, great acidity, citrus zest and light peach flavors and a fine, minerally end. Spot-on varietal character for Tocai, I thought. I would've mistaken it for a good Northern Italian Tocai, tasted blind.

2006 Malvasia Bianca ($24) Fermented in 10-year-old very neutral barrels, as Clifton put it—he recycles barrels from Brewer Clifton after all the oak character is completely gone. Pretty blood orange scent and flavor with a bit of lime, and a tongue-awakening, almost prickly texture.

KRISTV, a news station in Corpus Christi, TX, has reported on a growing conflict between ranchers and grape growers near the town of Driftwood, in the Texas Hill Country. Seems the ranchers are fond of zapping their grazing land at the end of the season with the disquietingly named herbicide 2,4-D. This 2,4-D—apparently the most widely used herbicide worldwide—isn't particularly harmful...um...except that the EPA points out that it can, er, cause nervous system damage after short-term exposure above the maximum contaminant level, at least in drinking water. 

They haven't tested it in wine.

Anyway, the burgeoning wine business in the area is all hetted up because the 2,4-D might blow over on the wind and kill the vines (it's good at killing broad-leaf weeds and woody plants). They seem to be less worried about it killing the drinkers of the wines made from the vines, but hey, maybe I'm just a paranoid guy.

It occurs to me that a good, old-fashioned range war might be just the thing to get a little more publicity for Texas wines. Speaking as a native Texan myself.  

I'll add that, while I haven't been to any of the wineries right around Driftwood, both Sister Creek Vineyards and Flat Creek Estate are making a range of good wines (I'm particularly fond of Flat Creek's luscious Supertexan Sangiovese, and not just for its clever name). And if you're in the area, you'd be nuts not to stop off and have dinner at Café 909 in Marble Falls. I wrote in the magazine a while back about how absurdly delicious I thought chef Mark Schmidt's Frozen Pistachio Parfait was when I went there last year; what I didn't have room to add in that little feature was how good the rest of his food is, too.

Continuing on this odd all-Pinot all-the-time run I seem to be on, I met yesterday with Tony Soter, the founder and for many years main winemaker of Etude, and Jon Priest, who's now taken over the winemaking duties at the brand.

The interesting recent aspect of Etude's Pinots, to me, is that as of the 2004 vintage they are estate wines. The brand's reputation (considerable) was founded on sourced fruit from throughout Carneros, but since purchasing an old cattle ranch in the northeast corner of Carneros, near the Petaluma Gap, and planting it to Pinot in 2000 (easier to do with the financial backing of Foster's Wine Estates, which now owns the company), Etude has been moving toward an all-estate-fruit model.

Priest said that he prefers to think of the Etude estate vineyard as "twenty little vineyards rather than one big one," a point of view born of Etude's decision to start releasing parcel-specific bottlings as well as the basic estate Pinot; the first, the '04 Deer Camp, is out now. There will be two more joining it in future vintages. Soter added that Etude's estate vineyard is on "volcanic, rocky soils-an animal of a different color than the usual Carneros clay soils," noting that in his view this results in Pinot Noir with darker fruit and firmer structure. (He avowed a marked dislike for confectionary, candied Pinot Noir and, after tasting way too much Pinot along those lines for the column, I'm in hearty agreement.)

2004 Etude Deer Camp Pinot Noir ($60) When I tasted this four months back for the column, the oak was sitting on the wine in an unappealing way; now it's much more integrated, mostly present as an aromatic spice note in the lovely aroma, which also shows violets and sweet black raspberry notes; the palate is seamless, dark-berried and focused. Deer Camp is a rocky, sloping portion of the vineyard; the vines here are on the old Martini clone—"the much-maligned Martini clone," Priest says, "but when you grow it on rocks and keep the vigor down it makes a very complete wine."

2004 Etude Heirloom Pinot Noir ($80) A light cola aroma plays off the deeper black cherry and raspberry liqueur scents here, then opens into exotic wild berry flavors and a hint of smokiness; very complete, very delicious, and structurally balanced enough to age well for at least a decade, I'd say.

Every vintage I've had of this wine has impressed me, but I've always thought the available info on this wine hedged its "heirloom" aspects a bit, so I asked Soter what the deal was. His answer, in effect, is that he feels it's a bit déclassé to go around saying something like, "oh, this is grown on La Tâche cuttings that so-and-so brought over in a suitcase"—that to do so would constitute a sort of riding-on-the-coattails of La Tâche's fame. (He also makes the entirely legitimate point that if La Tâche, or Richebourg, or what have you, happens to be a massale selection, then by taking only a few cuttings and propagating them, you haven't necessarily recreated the mix of that vineyard at all, making your claim that you've planted on La Tâche's vine material more than a little specious.)

Anyway. What it comes down to is that those are the sort of selections that go into this wine, though no names are going to be named (for all I know, Foster's may also be wary on legal grounds of proclaiming that they're growing Pinot on vines propagated from illegally imported vine material from ultra-famous French vineyards—most large corporations would be). Also, the selections used for the wine—which until now has been made with sourced fruit—also constitute the nine different clones that are planted in a specific seven-acre section of the Etude estate vineyard which will be dedicated to propagating them.