Feiring's Fantasy: Alice Feiring Saves the World from Robert Parker

The Battle for Wine and Love
or How I Saved the World from Parkerization

Author: Alice Feiring

The font of the title is pleasantly wacky, and the title itself promises a dream-like escapade in which Feiring daydreams herself “saving the world” and falling in love with a superhero winemaker. Not a bad concept.

This is not a journalistic effort like other recently released wine books, To Cork or Not to Cork, The Billionaire’s Vinegar, First Big Crush, Wine and Philosophy. This is a personal essay on a personal point of view. The book is a small-format book—hardbound, 5 ½ “ by 8”, 258 pages exclusive of acknowledgments and index, and can easily be read in a few hours.

In the introduction she says, “I am hoping to intrigue those who want wines that truly have a story to tell. Once people experience these wines and winemakers, once they know that wine truly does have soul and character, it will be difficult for them to cozy up to wines made by the numbers and not from the heart.”

I hope that this book fulfills her mission.

Unfortunately . . .

Feiring’s odyssey doesn’t begin with a pleasant daydream—it’s more like a nightmare litany of everything wrong with the wines landing on her doorstep as she prepares to work on a project for Food & Wine—and she places the responsibility for these bland wines squarely on the doorstep of wine critic Robert Parker. Her negativity doesn’t exactly draw one into the story. I would have preferred that the book begin with a chapter introducing a favorite vintner or biodynamic grower—a glimpse of what Feiring loves, is passionate about, and is perhaps in fear of losing. This would have drawn me into her story and given me something as a reader to care about. Instead, she begins with her personal history, from sniffing her food as a child to becoming a self-declared vinous prodigy.

The subject of Robert Parker is not tangential to her book. In the first 25 pages (the introduction and part of the first chapter) Parker is mentioned by name 48 times, and referred to by pronoun just as frequently. Despite Feiring’s objections that she is not gunning for Parker, she definitely has an allergy to the wine critic, perhaps because of early formative experiences in a wine shop, which would have undoubtedly exposed her to the influence of ‘lemming’ purchasing based on scores.

Feiring is apt at describing winemaking processes in a way that wine novitiates will enjoy and understand. Her description of the function of yeast is enjoyable to read, although she includes gross oversimplifications, like claiming that “designer” yeasts create specific aromas and flavors, similar to adding single essences in a perfume.

Initially, the book appears to be a series of personal essay-adventures, in which learning and self-challenge would be explored, and a journalistic series, in which open-minded and fair coverage of an issue should be stressed. But Feiring relates only adventures which confirm her mindset, and her journalism is ill-informed and biased. I think she may have taken on a tiger by writing a provocative book that tackles processes she doesn’t understand and has not taken the time to research.

On the topic of zinfandel, Feiring repeatedly blames the demise of her favorite style of zinfandel on Parker’s 95-point “love poem” to Turley’s Hayne Vineyard Zinfandel. According to Feiring, winemaker Helen Turley’s long hangtime approach and resulting high scores single-handedly gave rise to a New World propensity for overripe, “stupid” wines. However, Turley Wine Cellars is owned by Larry Turley, and his sister Helen Turley only made the wines for the first year and a half of the winery’s existence. After that, the wines have been crafted by winemaker Ehren Jordan, and Helen went on to plant a vineyard and create her own brand, Marcassin, where she produces only cool climate chardonnay and pinot noir. I think it’s a bit of a stretch . . . okay, it’s basically a torn ligament, to lay the blame for big alcohol zinfandels at the door of one wine from one winemaker who is more attuned to working with varietals other than zinfandel.

Feiring never addresses a common consumer phenomenon—a distaste for ‘peppery’ zinfandels. Zinfandel has a characteristic spicy herb or peppercorn flavor. But a number of zinfandels are produced in such a way that the distinctive pepper is toned down, blended away, or manipulated out of existence. Surely Feiring must have experienced this in her wine shop experience and her travels. The move toward producing “cabalicious” zins which suit the unadventurous palate has been, in my opinion, far more damaging than zinfandel’s reputation for high alcohol.

Feiring’s premise, while not accurately supported, is still valid. It is true that high scores for the unusually big wines of the early 1990’s fostered a rush toward longer hangtimes. Wine is not immune to fashion, and Parker’s Wine Advocate was not the only critical influence in shaping trends. Paul Draper’s early experiments with massive tannins in zinfandel created a winemaking rush to produce highly extracted, tannic zins. When Draper announced that he had changed his mind about that style, it disappeared overnight (except in our cellars where the experiment is perhaps ongoing). High scores in the 1980’s for a handful of oaky, buttery chardonnays created a juggernaut of butter-bombs, which is not surprising given the acreage planted to this variety in California.

I was personally aghast when I started reading chapter two. Feiring rolls her luggage off the plane in Paso Robles, and before she has left the tarmac she mentions controlling winemakers and Clark Smith at Vinovation in Sonoma—a controversial man and a controversial firm that promote making wine by the numbers, a concept that riles more than a few winemakers in Paso Robles. Feiring apparently visits only one winery, which she describes as a megacommerical, ultramodern winery that uses acid additions, tannin additions, wood chips, enzymes, and pretty much everything Feiring considers evil. And then . . . apparently . . . she gets back on the plane and leaves. She then visits UC Davis, where she learns more about topics of which she disapproves.

At UC Davis, Feiring asks, “The taste of biodynamic and organic and natural is one that appeals to a whole slew of people. The taste of the other kind of wine, one that I view more as a beverage than an art, appeals to another group. Shouldn’t both kinds of winemaking be taught?” A UC Davis professor tries to explain that they teach the science and mechanics of winemaking, with the clear implication (at least to me) that once the technique has been mastered, the student may return to the Tao of simplicity. But Feiring insists that natural winemaking should be “taught.” After her observation that we often enjoy the taste of a natural product more, I can’t help but wonder . . . if it were strawberries or tomatoes or donuts . . . which would we enjoy more? The worm-infested product of a pot-smoking earth muffin who took a class in natural baking and gardening, or the product of a student who mastered the science and techniques of baking or gardening and made an informed choice to produce a pure, healthy product?

She criticizes UC Davis for not “teaching” natural winemaking and for not offering classes in “Old World” solutions. She doesn’t understand why only the science is taught. “You can’t be accepted to the Yale drama school if you don’t have some sort of inner artistic fire.” Feiring studied for a masters degree in dance and movement therapy. So perhaps she has a point. If there are dance courses in ancient rhythms and natural movement (which to me, would mean no shoes, no clothes, and no music . . . nothing added other than the body and a floor), why not winemaking classes in inner fire, how to be talented, and natural winemaking?

Feiring is at her best when she relates her adventures and tasting tromps through Europe, primarily France. Of course, she whole-heartedly believes everything she is told there, but her adventures are charming and convincing. And in Europe, she features both the large commercial productions and the small, single-vineyard producers who farm organically or biodynamically. For the most part Europe is portrayed as a haven for multigenerational harmony with the land.

Throughout, Feiring makes sweeping proclamations regarding the craft of winemaking and how it should be done.

On one page she says, “sustainable agriculture is based on chemical farming,” which is categorically untrue.

Among her disapproved additions she includes “yeast food (based on urea)”. But not all yeast nutrients are urea-based. Many small wineries use yeast nutrients that are simply yeast hulls, which are high in vitamin B and absorb autotoxic byproducts (which would only be toxic to the yeastie-beasties by the way, not to humans). It’s the equivalent of vinous dry compost. She did not explore the concept of urea at all—she only shudders—and is therefore apparently unaware, and her readers uninformed—that urea is a product of carbon dioxide, water, aspartate, and ammonia. Although it occurs in the human body, it is also a naturally occurring product of inorganic combinations, and it is also produced by invertebrates, insects, plants, yeast, fungi, and even microorganisms. So she praises biodynamic vineyards, which plant dung-filled cowhorns at the end of vineyard rows under a full moon, and inflate deer penises. But a small California winery that adds a little yeast and fungus poop to their fermentation is somehow selling out to the gods of corporate manipulation?

In the chapter on Rioja, “Every other winery I had visited had finished [fermentation] but here fermentation stopped when the wine wanted it to, not when the winemaker stopped it.” What a befuddling statement. Every other winery in Europe? Or every other winery in Rioja? How do the winemakers stop the fermentations? And why? How do the finished wines differ?

“Modern wine folk like fast ferments—a week, maybe two weeks at most,” she says. Which kind of fermentation? Which modern wine folk? Everyone? We are all pretty much under the age of 60, as it gets harder and harder to move barrels around with age. Why do winemakers prefer faster fermentation? Is she aware that many California productions frequently ferment for six months or more, if you include malolactic conversions and finishing those last few points of primary? Does she even understand the properties of fermentation well enough to comment?

Among the evils of modern wine processes, she includes fining with gelatin, or as she calls it, “finishing.” But she doesn’t mention that in France, as elsewhere in Europe, the use of bull’s blood, eggs, milk and Irish moss have been used as finishing agents for centuries. Nor does she mention that gelatin is produced from bones and is completely natural.

On the subject of barrels, she says, “ I am no winemaker, but I wondered: Didn’t they know that those barrels could also make wine extremely bitter?” Feiring loves “authentic” old wood tuns, and continually disparages wineries that have brought in “new, small barriques”. She also adores thick, black mold growing on the cellar walls and surfaces and considers it a sign of an “authentic” wine cave. But there is no mention of brettanomyces in the book, and no mention of anisoles infecting the wineries and barrels. At all.

Regarding a 1987 Tondonia, “[Parker] said the wine had ‘early maturity,’ meaning it got old before its time.” But the Wine Advocate indicator ‘early maturity’ means the wine is in a stage of early maturity. This error invalidates her criticisms of Parker’s views on this wine, and shows a gross ignorance of her nemesis’ scoring system.

At one point she lambastes the “super-duper” Parker scores on young Barolos, calling them hard, flat, and chewy although she had been told they were made in a “modern” style to drink young. These, she laments, were a far cry from her “beloved 1968 Giovanni Scanavino.” However, she had drunk the ’68 Scanavino with friends in 1980—when the wine was twelve years old. Did she assume that a “young” Barolo should be perfectly balanced in its first year of release?

In the next to last chapter, “My Date with Bob,” Feiring gets all prickly when Parker simply won’t converge to her point of view. Parker points out that more wine is actually being made naturally today, and that there are many more organic and biodynamic vineyards than when he began reviewing wine. But Feiring will have none of that, referring back to the Paso Robles winery that claimed on its website all grapes were hand-harvested and handled as little as possible, but according to Feiring then corrupts their production with tannins and acids, as if this is proof that all Paso Robles wineries, and by extension the entire New World, are liars and cheats.

If there is romance in this book, I couldn’t find it. She refers to her string of relationships with names like Mr. Straightlaced, and her earth-shattering breakup with The Owl Man warranted one or two paragraphs.

If Alice Feiring ever shows up on my winery doorstep . . .

I will fire up the 1965 baby blue Mustang convertible with its rumbling Flowmaster pipes, roll down the top, and force her to visit small Paso Robles wineries with me as her guide. She will visit Caparone, where the wines are so natural they have hair in their armpits. Pipestone, where Jeff Pipes farms biodynamically and tills his vineyard with a horsedrawn plow. Fratelli Perata and other small, generational vineyards where you trip over the tricycles on your way to the door and wonder if you are in Deliverance-meets-Disneyland.

And perhaps she will meet a swaggering vineyard owner in cowboy boots, hat and silver buckle who will find her irascible, red-headed, outspoken charm irresistible. The kind of man who will never tolerate a nickname . . .

Comments

[Alice Feiring]

Dear Mary,

I appreciate your reading my book, even if you found it easy to dismiss.

Perhaps it was that you read it all too quickly, but I would appreciate it if you would keep your attack to the facts.

For the record, I talk about Turley in the 1993 vintage--Helen made that wine.

There was no 'early wine store experience' with Parker scores. I have no idea what you're talking about there. It is not in the book.

And, never in a million years would I use the term "super-duper.' That is an Andrea Immer Robinson term, not mine.

You are correct, I should have been clearer with the 'early maturity' section---something definitely got lost in that translation and I should have added my tasting notes for some authentic new vintage barolos to make my claim more iron clad.

Also, I am also sorry that you took this as a slash and burn to ALL Paso wineries. This is not the case and it shows a limited reading on your part. Speaking of Jeff Pipes, I like the wines as well as some others out your way.

This is a polarizing topic, as evidenced by your reading. And all I can say is vive la difference.

All the best,

Alice

[AC]

That was a long review...One might just as well go ahead and read the book now, which I enjoyed very much.

[John]

Geeeez! That's not AT ALL what I got out of the book! Did you actually sit down and read it? Hard to believe.

To evoke this response Alice sure must be making a dent in things! A fine (and fun) read, well worth absorbing.

I highly recommend it and plan purchace more to give as gifts to friends.

[Mary Baker]

UPDATE: This article and Alice's response are also posted on our main blog at:

http://dovercanyon.typepad.com/dover_canyon/2008/05/feirings-fantas.html

Readers are also welcome to post their comments on the Dover Canyon blog.

[Mary Baker]

John, I'm sure the book is a very delightful read for neophytes and the casual collector. And hopefully it will steer readers toward a more classic style of wine, and encourage them to seek diversity and history in their wine choices.

This is an 1,800 word book review. I assure you, I read the book. I had even hoped to like it and promote it on my discussion site, Cellar Rats. However, I am having trouble getting behind the unsupported claims, factual errors, and frequent misinformation in the manuscript.

If you enjoy the same kinds of wines that Alice praises in her book, I recommend Appellation America (www.appellationamerica.com) where wine writers like Dan Berger, Alan Goldfarb and Thom Elkjer (all of whom have published books on wine) seek out the small, artisanal producers in the U.S. who are producing classically-styled wines. You will find a wealth of positive, terroir-focused information there.

[Julie Brosterman]

I just interviewed Alice for our show Women & Wine radio on www.voiceamerica.com airing this coming Thursday at 2 p.m. PST and then available for download on www.womenandwineradio.com. There's lots of good conversation coming out of this book - my comments were in the direction of the tendency towards higher alcohol (is that manipulation?) as well as similar mouth feel of some of these wines. Having just returned from Spain, I must say that I slept better after an evening of 13% vintages....