The Wine Makers on Radio Misfits

This week we sit down with Korbin Ming from Korbin Kameron Winery, the highest elevation vineyard in the Moon Mountain District. His family produces world-class Bordeaux varietals in some extreme mountain conditions. We have waited a long time to get Korbin on the show because we are huge fans of the wines and think they are a rare gem in Sonoma. We also have Danny and Katie Fay from Hill of Tara, they source their grapes from Korbin’s vineyard. Listeners may remember them from their inaugural release last year around St. Patricks Day. These wines are among the most coveted in Sonoma County and we felt honored to go through the whole portfolio. Danny and Katie will be offering their second release for Hill of Tara in the coming week, we highly encourage you to get in on the ground floor. Enjoy this show as much as we did… korbinkameron.com @korbinkameron hilloftarawines.com @hilloftarawines

This week we sit down with legends Philippe Cambie and Phil Coturri and discuss their new collaboration “A Deux Tetes”. A project that focuses on New World Grenache with Old World sensibility and depth of knowledge. The Rose has been released and the Grenache Noir from two different sources, Miller Vineyard and Oakville Vineyard in Napa, is still in barrel but soon to be bottled. Isabel Gassier is the wine maker and translator of Philippe’s ideas about the wines. She is the daughter of Michel Gassier, one of our favorite wine makers in France and she is an up and coming star in the California wine world. We discuss philosophy of wine making and Philippe’s history and rise as the “God of Grenache” in Southern France. This is a really good show and we had fun recording it, I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. Cheers……

This week we sit down with Taylor Berkley Boydstun, owner/winemaker of T. Berkley Wines. He makes wines inspired by the great wines of the Loire Valley. His journey started with a trip to Spain and France, a love affair was formed and he soon found himself making wine in New Zealand, Austria and Australia. Taylor currently makes small batches of Cabernet Franc, Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc Rose. This is a great story and the wines are fantastic. [EP133] tberkleywines.com @tberkleywines

Veteran of the California wine industry, Bettina Sichel, purchased this vineyard in 2011 from founder Patrick Campbell. Her first move was to hire legendary vineyard manager Phil Coturri, who had first worked this property when he was 13. She then brought in wine maker Randall Watkins, former General Manager at Moon Mountain Vineyard. The idea was not to change anything but to improve on the farming and raise the bar on the wines from this iconic vineyard. Bettina’s father M.F. Sichel was the man responsible for making Blue Nun wines a household name in America. Great history here and the wines set the standard for Sonoma Mountain Cabernet. [EP132] Laurel Glen Vineyard www.laurelglen.com @laurelglen 707-933-9877

The guys sit down with Ruben Morancy, Wine Director at Two Star Michelin restaurant Coi, pronounced “kwa”, in San Francisco. Ruben is also a renowned artist with a passion for selling domestic and international wines. He started Les-sommeliers to start promoting unique fine wine events to an “under-served” community in the Bay Area and beyond. Ruben’s next event is on February 15th at the Alice Collective in Oakland, featuring food by Chef Keith Corbin of Alta W. Adams in LA and jazz musician Marcus Shelby. This event will celebrate Valentines Day and Black History Month with a perfect pairing of fried chicken and tiny bubbles. Great history and stories here to share. [EP131] Coirestaurant.com Les-sommeliers.com Ruben@les-sommeliers.com 415-425-8466

This week the guys, and Jasmine, sit down and talk about French wine tariffs, travel, North Carolina, taking the sommelier exam and the state of the wine business for 2020. We cover a lot of topics and get into almost ten wines in this episode, enjoy…  [EP130]

This week on the podcast we sit down with Donald Patz, known for making “world-class” Pinot and Chardonnay at Patz & Hall Winery in Sonoma. He left this iconic winery when it was purchased in 2016 and has since started 3 small projects, Maritana, Terminim and Secret Door. He sparked our interest when he joined forces with Francois Villard, a master in Northern Rhone, to make some top notch Syrah and white blends from Mendocino. Lots of history here, great show. [EP129] donaldpatzwinegroup.com   Donald Patz Owner/Winemaker 707-337-2310 donald@donaldpatzwinegroup.com @drpinot   Jung Min Lee Owner/Muse/LKG lkg@donaldpatzwinegroup.com   Jennifer Kelly Vice President of Sales 707-478-5152 jb@donaldpatzwinegroup.com   François Villard Domaine François Villard – Northern Rhône Valley, France Partner – Terminim villardfrancois@aol.com   DONALD PATZ WINE GROUP P.O. Box 2096 Yountville, CA 94599 USA

This week on the Wine Makers we sit down with Brenae Royal, vineyard manager at the historic Monte Rosso Vineyards. Brenae grew up in the Central Valley of California and was originally interested in animals, in part due to her exposure to F.F.A., future farmers of America. Weeks into college she decided to pivot, focusing on vines and taking a job with Gallo right out of school. [EP128] She now runs one of the most historic vineyards in California, growing Cabernet, Zinfandel and Semillon since 1886. She lives on the property with her dog and some pretty scary wildlife, it’s not unusual to see mountain lions and bobcats roaming the 250 acre property. We get into it all, style, techniques and relationships, Brenae is an African-American woman under 30 working for a large corporation in a primarily white, older, male world. The landscape is changing, and she is a part of that movement, inclusion is key to the wine industries success and it’s important to see yourself represented. Sam had some great wines open from a party the night before so we taste a little bit of everything. Great show….

In our continuing effort to de-mystify wine, we introduce you to Leo McCloskey and Douglas  McKesson from Enologix, they can predict some things about wine that you may not have thought possible. What if someone told you to forget everything you know about wine in Northern California, like we need to rip out all of the Cabernet Sauvignon. We are going down the “rabbit hole”… From Wikipedia… Enologix is a privately held California corporation that designs predictive analytics for luxury winegrowing. The company sells grape and wine quality indices, models, software and consulting products. Enologix created the first algorithms that predict grape harvest dates, grading new wines, digital blends, and future market price, volume and taste scores. The most important metric among winemakers are digital blends and a taste index which predicts 100-point scores of consumer critics such as Robert Parker. It claims that the quality of wine can be measured chemically, and a score assessed, much like a wine critic.Clients include Beaulieu, Cakebread Cellars, Diamond Creek, Ridge Vineyards. Enologix’s metrics have been correlated with market performance metrics, including 100-points critics’ scores. doug@enologix.com 707-938-9463

Paul Mabray has been a powerful change agent in the wine industry for over twenty years. He began his career working in traditional three-tier sales and marketing with Napa Ale Works and later innovating direct-to-consumer sales and marketing models with Niebaum Coppola. Since then, he has been at the forefront of all major digital trends for the wine industry, working with WineShopper.com and Wine.com when they entered the wine-digital space. He founded two companies that have significantly changed the US wine landscape for digital. First by introducing winery e-commerce with Inertia Beverage Group that transformed into WineDirect.com pioneering winery e-commerce and then again introducing social media and social customer relationship management with VinTank.com. He is considered the wine industry’s foremost futurist and thought leader, harnessing the power and potential of digital tools and methodologies to move the industry into the future. A four-time American Wine Blog Awards finalist, he has been a guest lecturer at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, UC Davis, Sonoma State as well as keynoting conferences, symposiums, and seminars. He maintains a blog and frequently contributes articles to business periodicals for his leadership in the wine industry. Paul formerly sat on the Board of Directors for the wine business social network Openwineconsortium.org which was sold to FOHBOH, and the Board of Advisors for Snooth.com, Taste.com, and Cruvee.com (which was purchased by VinTank). He currently sits on the Board of Directors for the theappreciationengine.com and emetry.io and on the Board of Advisors for Proof Analytics.