Empty Glasses

Weather seems to be acting up strangely in North America this year.

Thanks to a summer definitely warmer than average, the grapes have ripened faster than usual. The New York Cork Report reported on August 21 that harves for pinot noir destined for the sparkling wines of Macari vineyards was starting to be picked. In the Finger Lakes (in upstate New York), data has shown that the season was almost 2 months earlier than last year and 28 days earlier with regards with an average year.

In Ontario, Tawse winery and Chateau des Charmes have already started picking (via The Wine Case). Summer in this part of the country has also been particularly generous and it will most likely produce wines of pretty good quality and (if it holds steady), there should be no problems of under-ripeness in these grapes.

On the west coast, things are not looking so bright. In California, it’s been cool, if not cold, and rainy for good parts of the summer. San Fransisco has recorded its colder summer since 1975. This procued devastating mold and mildew in the fields Recently, things have turned around and a heat wave has struck California, which give problems of sunbruns on the grapes. In order to combat the mildew, many producers exposed the fruits as much as possible to allow them to dry. “Everyone opened up their grapes to get as much sunlight as they could, then the sun came out and fried them.” said Kyle Cameron, winemaker Russian River. The situation is not quite different in Oregon or Washington.

Is it global warming acting up, or just an exceptional summer? We’ll judge from what we will find in our glasses, but we will have to keep an eye on the north american wines from 2010 as winemakers will have a much different playing field than usual, be it good or bad.

Starting next Friday, I will be in the Finger Lakes region of New York in order to participate to TasteCamp EAST 2010.

The concept for TasteCamp is a simple one: getting enthusiastic journalists and bloggers together in a region that is new to them to taste as much wine as possible and speak to as many winemakers as possible over the course of a weekend.

By looking at the list of wineries present for the event, we know that we’re going to have a great time. However, what I look forward to is to meet fellow bloggers which I’ve been reading for a while now, and getting to know many of them via Twitter. More on that later.

In the meantime, I’ll immerse myself in the archives of Ithacork, by Tom Mansell, and its lovely Science! section, of 1WineDude by Joe Roberts and the New York Cork Report by Lenn Thompson and his team. I’ll also make sure to bookmark any other blog which I haven’t had the chance to read yet, which will make for nice discoveries until we finally get there…!

For almost two years now, I’ve been blogging about wine in French, and discovering a lot along the way. I had the chance to taste good wines, travel in new regions (both in the glass and in person).

But most importantly, it has enabled me to meet fascinating and like-minded people. Also thanks to Twitter, I have been meeting more and more interesting English-speaking tweeps, which many will be met in a couple of weeks at TasteCamp EAST 2010. While, I’m not a particularly greedy person, I admit that I do want more of these kinds of discoveries.

In order to expand this discovery of new places, peoples and wines, I’m launching Empty Glasses. This blog will focus on wines that make people want to empty their glass, and ask for one more. No restrictions, as long as the wine is good.

It’s my way to show that there is waaay more to drinkability than just Bud Light.