Cab people want to speak about it and Pinot people keep it under covers.

The dichotomy is glaring to me. I have seen this as well as been guilty of screaming of the newest discovery in Cabernet from the highest roof to anyone that will listen; My Fedex guy is sick of it. Now that I have two toes in this Pinot thing I still want to scream my humble finds, even if they are not real discoveries. Pinot guys have known about these wines all along. They just want to keep it to themselves. I think, and I am probably wrong mind you, it is in fear of pricing and inventory problems. Maybe it’s just a personality thing on my part? Maybe loudmouths on this board that scream big and wide about wines like Becklyn just have personality issues? Maybe my mom never actually caught me in time when I dove from the fridge with a towel-cape thinking I was superman when I was 4?

When I say ‘guys’, I certainly do not want to keep you ladies out of the mix. I know you are out there.

If it seems like my head has been in the ground when it comes to Pinot, bear with me, it has been. I am starting from ZERO POINT TWO. It’s all new to me!! The only thing I actually bring to it is knowing (hopefully) good wine. Anyway, I am having a BLAST! Now, where’s my cape…

A few years ago, folks started talking about Henri Jouan wines here. Before that I was able to get case quantities of his Clos St Denis at reasonable prices. No longer. So, I don’t talk about the burgs I like of which only a barrel or two are made.

Many great pinots are made in tiny quantities. Talking about them makes them harder to get. Is this true for Cabernet?

Yes. Becklyn is a good example. I believe Matt only has a few left.

I see that quite similar. It does not make sense to advertise wines that are sold out anyway. I have no problem sharing them with my friends but making them not available for me anymore because I have to brag is plain stupid.
Loose lips sink ships.

You’re more of a Cab guy, Mike. So break bad here. What’s your favorite pinot?

Supply and demand. The best Pinots from any region are nearly always in small quantities and certainly in relativistic terms small quantities. Cabs come in whopping quantities in lots of cases. They big names also already have plenty of free PR built in so talking about it is no big deal. It’s already been and being done. Finding the cool dinkity-dank Pinot that may well never be reviewed is nifty.

Just don’t start talking about Grenache my friend . . .

I don’t know that people are secretive about the domestic PNs they love. The wines are relatively plentiful. Red Burgs, OTOH, are a different story. People are sort of generous here exposing their sources and favorite Burgs but usually only after they’ve secured an allocation and even then, maybe not. Burgs are made in very small case lots. The store you buy from might be the most tightly held info as you can buy a lot producers if you’re willing to overpay from the wrong store. A store with great pricing is likely kept relatively quiet unless they have exposure on wine searcher. Even then, stores allocate their hard to find Burgs to their best customers first. If you see a hard to find Burg at a price you like, you better pounce.

I will happily trade my PN secrets/sources for Burg secrets/sources. Send me a PM!

Honestly, Mike, it seems like there is plenty of discussion here of PNs. I’ve learned about a lot of producers on this board, and a handful get discussed repeatedly.

The trick with great domestic PN is that most of it is readily available by joining the producer’s list. Nothing like that exists for Burgundy that I know of. All but one of the PN lists I joined, for example, in 2014, offered me an allocation in 2014.

OTOH, ‘cult’ CA cabernet is much harder to get access to. My joining-to-allocation rate is much much lower there. Multi-year waits are more the norm. And that’s despite already skyrocketed prices.

My POV is that this board is extremely trendy (and in a good way) and up to date. The rest of the world is slower to catch up. My guess is that in 5-10 years the top PN producers will be impossible to get access to, with prices ratcheting up and up.

I think there’s more conversation about PN than about anything else. The largest number of posts on this board seem to be about Burgundy. Then factor in all those about domestic PN and they kind of have the Cab notes swamped.

People talk about it all the time Mike - maybe you just haven’t noticed. Sometimes when you develop an interest in something you start noticing it all over the place. It was always there, just not of any importance to you.

Happens with diseases all the time. You or someone you know gets something you never heard of and suddenly it turns out that someone’s mother-in-law has it, someone’s neighbor, a co-worker, all kinds of people have it and you never knew.

Larry - the problem with Grenache is that there’s a lot of really good Grenache made all over the world and it’s not over-priced either. So there’s no real newsworthy issue with the “discovery” of another good, enjoyable wine. If the prices were five times higher, I think there would be more discussion because then it would be a “trophy” kind of thing and suddenly very important. To wit: SQN.

Mike is having a good time right now.

Everyone always complains that wines they’re not particularly interested in are dominating the board. Here’s a tally of the topics on the first page of Wine Talk at the moment, excluding threads not on a particular wine type. It’s not so pinot-skewed.

California releases and other threads on California producers covering more than one grape 5
Burgundy 4
Pinots 4
Cal cabs 3
Bordeaux 2
Barolo 3
German 1
Zin 1
Rhone 1

Not a complaint - just an observation. Borne out by the above. Eight for Burgundy/Pinot and that’s pretty consistent. I’ve counted a few times and there’d generally be 8 or 9 or 10 for those two and the rest of the posts would be distributed kind of randomly, but CA non-Pinot generally making up the next largest single category.

The point was only that it’s not like Pinot lovers don’t talk about their faves.

Of course, nobody cares about the crappy wine I drink, so I never post about those!

I probably care about the crappy wine you drink.

Greg – There were times in the last couple of weeks when the first page was dominated by new California offerings. It’s a little Burgundy/pinot-centric today. I’ve posted tallies many times and they generally refute the assertion of domination.

If you’re an Old World fan, you’d look at the tally today and see 11 California threads today versus 3 for Burgundy, 2 for Bordeaux, 1 Rhone, 1 German and 3 Barolo and feel in the minority (slightly).

And who really thinks Burgundy and New World pinot are the same thing?

Indeed. And yet this week alone I have read of over 30 names in Pinot I have not even seen written anywhere or have had anyone speak of while I was in earshot. I even tasted one which got this idea into my head.

I don’t think anyone is keeping california producers under cover. Just there are so many it’s hard to talk about all of them

Stop whining already. I can handle giving up on cabs and going over to the dark side, but this whining is just not like you. Must be some wussy chemical in the pinot grape causing a dilution of your blood. We need to get together for a Saxum/Thomas Rivers Brown dinner to rebuild your resolve.

This could be slightly skewed due to the large amount of mailers that were released in January

Awesome.

I hate the way some folks try to limit discussion of certain producers. Shhhhh, don’t mention Henri Jouan, Francois Bertheau, Bruno Clavelier, blah blah blah.

Over the years, I’ve enjoyed discussing and learning about wines and producers that were new to me. I’ve often benefited from these discussions, which were freely and generously posted. And if I discover a gem, how selfish it would be to keep that to myself, while also soaking up all the knowledge I can from others. I feel pretty strongly about this.