Dover Canyon Winery

The Pepper Rebellion

Zinfandel—a mysterious vine, a flirtatious wine, versatile with food and satisfying on its own. For too long, zinfandel has been the poster child for pizza, a wine regarded by critics as less than noble, a peasant primitivo good only for Tuesday night burgers, a wine lacking in chateaus, royal bloodlines and moldy caves.

In its struggle for market share, it has been overcropped and overextracted, diluted of spice, and hyped as an everyday drinker. It rarely commands the prices of even the most plebeian California merlots. So why do producers bother with it?

Zinfandel is a challenging wine to grow, to produce and to enjoy. It is an intellectual wine, layered and complex, with a fruit and spice dichotomy. It is a winemaker’s wine, full of mystery, challenge and rebellion. It is the James Dean of wine.

If you would like to join our viral rebellion, just write a brief treatise on why zinfandel is deserving of respect, or in support of its peppercorn qualities, publish it on your website, blog, or an online forum and we will list you as a member of the Pepper Rebellion.

Zinfandel: King of the Gypsies

Syrah is a barbarian king. It offers roasted game, smoke, dense blue berries, sweat and saddle leather, hay, blood and iron—like a meal around a Hun campfire.

Cabernet is a queenly wine. Royal purple flavors, essences of social and political ink, jeweled daggers and kid leather tannins, a background of carved oak furniture and a rustle of silk.

Zinfandel is a gypsy king. Brightly colored and layered, using peppercorn, wild red berries and herbs to divert one’s attention from studying it closely. A wine of complexity and contradiction—brash yet deep; a wine that seems simple and rustic, but reveals aromas of white flowers and yellow fruits; a vine considered a peasant and a wanderer, yet its bloodline flows from the mists of time; and a thief of many hearts.

For years, zinfandel has been considered the bastard child of the wine world, a pretender to the throne, incapable of elegance or intrigue.  Zinfandel is recommended as a marriage acceptable for pizza, tomato sauces and rustically charred meat.   Wine critic Robert Parker recently said online that blending zinfandel with syrah gives zinfandel a "nobility" it wouldn't otherwise have.

I would like to introduce you to the "new" nobility—wines that are a favorite of chefs and gourmands, wines which are intellectually stimulating, vibrant, and satisfying.  Wines with charisma, balance and intrigue.

In our next post, we will launch The Pepper Rebellion, and we invite you to join us.