Kermit Lynch in his Berkeley, CA shop.

First, a shameless plug for this book. It reads like an adventure novel, plays like a road movie. It’s full of characters and travel and mysteries and pleasures. And I love Kermit Lynch because, in spite of the fact that he has one of the great palates on the planet, he’s down to earth about enjoying wine, at table, with people you like. And he thinks of wine as a living, breathing thing, the best of which are handmade, interact with local soils and breezes and plants.

So, in K. Lynch’s delightful travels, he reflects repeatedly on the great mysteries of wine. For instance, how does terroir imprint itself on wine? Why does wine so often express “extra-vinous” flavors: berries, flowers, spices?

Enter one of the great characters in the history of wine culture, Rene Loyau. Loyau was a negociant (negociants buy grapes or bulk wine–rather than harvesting solely from their own vineyards–and bottle under their names). Loyau was born in 1896, got into the wine business as a teenager, fought in World War I, made a living during the second war by transporting his wine by bicycle.

Mr. Lynch met Rene Loyau in a dripping, limestone cave above the Loire River…

Rene Loyau knew more about wine than any hundred of us put together

…where the latter was seated at an ancient, hand-cranked labeling machine. In the ensuing days, Lynch listened to stories of traveling, tasting, selecting, and making. Loyau lived and breathed the wine business, all with childlike wonder and full-blooded passion. He was determined to live and work until he was 100 (he just missed it). And he had a theory about why wine tastes like more than just grapes. He had tested this theory over and over again for nearly 80 years and was absolutely satisfied that it was solid. He gave this example.

Pere Loyau was tasting in the cellar of a Gevrey-Chambertin grower and noticed that the older vintages carried a flavor of wild currants, but the newer ones didn’t. He had never seen the vineyard, but took a shot in the dark and asked the grower when he had taken out his currant bushes. Bingo.

“There is only one possible explanation for this mysterious transfer of aromatic quality from one type of vegetation to another,” Pere Loyau exclaimed to Lynch. “Bees! The bees gather the nectar from blossoms–in this case, wild currant blossoms–then they alight on the grape blossoms, their little legs fuzzy with pollen from the currants.”

Kermit Lynch, bless him, is in no hurry to expose Rene Loyau’s theory of bees to scientific scrutiny because he doesn’t want to see this romantic notion dissected. The mystery is beautiful, the theory delicious.

I’m with Kermit Lynch. I love that universities like Davis are working to understand the science of wine, but from my perch, at the table, I love the mysteries and the stories even more.

My week had been hectic:  The restaurant’s atmosphere relaxed me.

Lynette and I both needed a little TLC:  Our server, John, ably balanced impeccable service with genuine interest that we truly enjoy our dinner and time together.  (I ask a lot of questions.  John’s patience far outpaced my curiosity about the entrees and the wines.)

I wanted to drink a glass of wine that I would remember:  a little Willamette Valley Pinot Noir more than delivered (it was a 2007 Ponzi “Tavola”).

That’s it.  A memorable evening out with my wife.  A simple pleasure.

1.  They take real risks for what they really believe.

2.  They practice what they preach (among other things, careful stewardship of both their land and their clientele).

3.  Their minimalist wine-making practices.

4.  Their Rhone blends.

5.  Their respect for their neighbors.

6.  Their love of story.

7.  Lou Preston’s blog.

32 formerly French families

This weekend, we’ll make our annual weekend visit to the Trentadue Winery in Geyserille, California (for pleasure, not work. Phew).  Look out for lots of delicious reports about the fruits of the weekend.

That's me in front of the winery in 2004, way too early in the morning

I’ve always loved a particular story that Victor Trentadue told me in 2005.  The Trentadues, he said one day as he handed me a massive pair of bolt-cutters (a whole ‘nuther story), are French.  French?  What’s with the Italian name, I asked?  Turns out that Victor’s family, who were Huguenot Protestants,  fled France along with 31 other families in the 16th Century.  They ended up in Bari, way down in what is now southern Italy–there was no Italy in the 1500s.

None of the locals in Bari could pronounce these pesky French names.  So they called them the 32, as in 32 families.  Trentadue, in Italian.  Eventually these formerly French families just adopted the name.

So, like Chateau St. Jean (yet another story), don’t pronounce this winery’s name with a faux-French accent.

See you all next week!

21 miles to go. On the left, a rest stop with Gatorade. On your right, the Hop Kiln tasting room. What to do? What to do?

Google “wine and bicycles” and, as of this writing, precisely 88,500 results come up.  So, I am clearly not the discoverer of this beautiful pairing.  But the mutual attraction is undeniable, in spite of the fact that wine can make you sleepy right before it makes you sloppy, neither of which is a good state to be in when riding a bike.

But the glories usually outweigh the disadvantages.  You can start with the fact that wine country tends to be beautiful, rural, and enjoys a certain amount of sun.  Then there is that whole sense of leisure that surrounds the two habits.  Pedaling slowly, with people you like, through rolling hills and sun-drenched vineyards on your way to sipping a crisp white wine on a warm afternoon is right up there with lying on a beach in Tahiti.  For people who love bikes, that’s as good as wheeling up to the winery in a ’73 Jaguar XKE with the top down.

My love of bikes runs almost as deep as my love of wines.  The aforementioned leisurely pedal is one of my favorite ways to spend a day.  The leisurely part isn’t exactly in my nature, but when I can be induced by friends or family I can take my foot off the gas.

Since 2003 I’ve been a supporter of a fund raising event that deftly mixes wine and bikes, and allows me to put my foot back on the gas–and for a great cause.

Cheri Blauwet, a Paralympic gold medalist, wheels her handcycle toward Graton, in Sonoma County

The Revolution in the Vineyards sends a couple of hundred people a year out into Sonoma’s most beautiful wine country to raise money for athletes with disabilities.  About a third of the people who do the ride are disabled: people with functional limitations ride hand cycles or adapted bikes, folks with vision impairments stoke tandem bicycles.  The common denominator is that we all ride just about to our limit.  I do the hundred-miler hanging onto the wheels of whatever elite or professional racers show up.  Ouch.

But at the end of it all, you pull into the Trentedue Winery, just outside Geyserville (more on this wine family later) where someone hands you a glass of wine and leads you to a massage table.

Then you loll on the grass, in the sun, eating well, surrounded by good people and vineyards heavy with late-season fruit, and drink wine for the rest of the afternoon.  Then they bring out the sparkling wine.  Ohhhh baby.  Then your wife drives you home.  Because she’s smarter than you are.  And a better planner.  But not a better driver.  Ok, maybe a better driver too.

Next up, my favorite bike and wine trip ever.

The oldest zinfandel vines in the appelation

Among wine insiders, the Biale name is legend.  Some people say they make the best Zins in the world.  My folks go back with Aldo and Clementina Biale.  Their son Bob and I have been friends since we were in diapers.  If I’d known he was going to be such a wine big-wig, I’d have…uh, I don’t know what I’d have done differently.  It’s just funny to hear the Biales talked about with such reverence, when I’ve always known them as such down-to-earth, humble, decent folk.  But that’s the thing about wine.  For every critic citing “mouth feel,” there are a hundred people with dirt under their fingernails.

Aldo Biale was farming in Napa way back in 1937.  Some chickens, grapes, tree fruits.  Like my dad, Aldo  reached  back to the old country when it came time to marry.  My mom and Mrs. Biale were childhood friends in Italy.  They both married Americans and moved here to California in the 1950s.  We all grew up eating together.  I cut my teeth on Aldo Biale’s wine.

Like most immigrants, my mom had to live through some major adjustments.  None of them were as comical as Mrs. Biale’s, so far as I’m aware.

The Black Chicken has gone legit

During her first few weeks in America as a newly-wed, Clementina Biale received a call from an Italian neighbor looking to buy “two dozen eggs and a Black Chicken.”  Mrs. Biale responded that they didn’t sell chickens.  The guy became irate and in his Genovese accent–Mrs. Biale was a village girl– again said, “tell Aldo I want two dozen eggs and a Black Chicken.”  When she recounted this conversation to her husband later that evening, Aldo just laughed.

The Biales didn’t have a lot of dough back in the 50′s.  Another thing they didn’t have was a permit to produce wine commercially.  Thing is, Aldo’s zinfandel brought in a lot more money than his grapes did, and making ends meet wasn’t easy.

Aldo and Roberty Biale

This was one of my mom’s favorite stories.  A real insider’s story.  But Bob took the Black Chicken legit in 1999 and in that short time has built Robert Biale Vineyards into the beloved house it’s become.  This story is getting around too.

But the Biales have hundreds more.  That’s the beauty of stories.  They’re out there waiting to be uncovered.