Zinfandel has had more face lifts over the years than Joan Rivers. When I first stumbled onto the wine scene, in the late ‘70s-early ‘80s, Zin was enormously popular. This was partly because it was the only varietal that was thought to be indigenous to California, thereby pleasing the patriots, and also because the American critics of the time (and there weren’t many) loved it. Here are Charlie Olken, Norm Roby and Earl Singer on Zinfandel from their 1980 The Connoisseur’s Handbook of California Wines: “…the most versatile wine grape grown in California…” “full-bodied, intensely flavorful wines…” “…vigorous, berrylike, sometimes spicy…”. Critical darlings included Zins from Burgess, Caymus, Clos du Val and Buehler; Bob Thompson, the dean of California wine writers, described Ridge’s Geyserville Zin as “claret-like,” the greatest compliment a critic could bestow upon a non-Bordeaux red wine that wasn’t Pinot Noir. Even Hugh Johnson said, in 1977, that Zin was “Capable of ageing [sic] to great quality.”

But then, in the 1980s, Zinfandel seemed to drop out of the spotlight. Cabernet Sauvignon was all the rage, followed by Merlot. Since then, every few years Zinfandel makes a comeback (courtesy of content-addicted wine writers, who are always looking to anoint what’s in and what’s out), but for every comeback, there follows a demotion.

The first Zinfandel I took notes on was a 1976 from Wine and the People, which I wrote about a year ago. I’ve drank a lot of Zinfandel since then, although mostly for tasting purposes. I can’t remember the last time I opened a bottle for pure pleasure, although there must have been occasions. That’s perhaps a little unfair to Zinfandel. Made right, it’s a fine wine. But I think the title of Jon Bonné‘s blog last week, Is Zinfandel a Serious Wine?, suggests some of the difficulties Zinfandel faces. Jon doesn’t directly answer his own question, instead taking a repertorial approach. “[I]t’s nearly impossible to find Zin-focused conversations among what we’ll call wine influencers,” he writes. That is clearly true. To the extent I’m an influencer (and so is Jon), I cannot recall a time in years when I shot the breeze with my fellow writers or critics about Zinfandel.

We have to ask, though, what “a serious wine” means. I think we can all agree that Cabernet, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay are serious wines. If we broaden our scope beyond California, we can add other varieties to the list (Riesling, Syrah, Nebbiolo, Sangiovese, etc.). Why do we describe some varieties as “serious” while others aren’t? Jon writes “Dolcetto, for instance, will never be discussed as a major, influential wine,” and surely no one will disagree with that. But I think we have to look at more psychological aspects, or even philosophical ones, when it comes to how we determine if something is “serious” or “frivolous.”

Obviously, no grape variety or wine is anything in itself, other than what it is. But then along come we humans, ascribing all kinds of qualities to it, and we end up with varietal hierarchies, the vinous equivalent of royalty and peasantry. I’ve always been fascinated by the importance of authority in shaping how the broad masses think. Although I’m not an elitist, I do believe that many wine drinkers will readily assume a particular wine is great simply because a wine critic says so. That’s sad, albeit understandable, given the myths that have surrounded wine for thousands of years, not to mention the baffling complexity of having to decide amongst thousands of brands. But could it be that Zinfandel is not considered a “serious wine” because the majority of critics have so stated?

I think this is true. Perform a thought experiment. If, suddenly, the leading critics suddenly declared that Zinfandel was a very great wine (always with the proviso, applicable to every other variety, that it must be made right), don’t you think that the public would eventually come to the same conclusion? This is because people are so unsure of themselves, they’ll believe whatever the tastemakers tell them. Why do you think the Chinese are paying a zillion dollars for Lafite? It’s not because they like the way it tastes, that’s for sure. It’s the same reason why the collectors in this country started coveting Guigal’s Côtes-Rôties in the 1980s and 1990s, when they were told to do so. I have had those wines and, to be perfectly honest, they’re not all that different from a good California Petite Sirah. But Petite Sirah isn’t considered “a serious wine” because not enough critical consensus has built up that it is.

So I’m not ready to say that Zinfandel is or isn’t serious. In this year of 2011, I’m going to pay it more attention, give it another look-see. I’m not talking about those monstrous high alcohol bruisers that also contain residual sugar. I’m not talking about unevenly ripened Zins, whose berry flavors are bracketed by raisins and vegetables. I’m talking about the kind of Zinfandels I’ve given high scores to lately: De Loach, Deerfield, Zichichi, V. Sattui, Dry Creek, Seghesio, Rubicon, Tres Vinicultores, Dutcher Crossing, Magistrate. Funny how so many of them are from Dry Creek Valley. No coincidence, that; in Dry Creek, the vines, often very old, are happiest.

I upset a lot of beer drinkers yesterday on my blog post and for that I apologize. I guess they just didn’t see that I was having some fun at their expense. Do I really think beer drinkers are stupid while wine drinkers are smart? Of course not. Some people mistake parody for earnestness. I know that craft or artisanal beer is fantastic stuff and I occasionally crave it myself. I had an IPA from a Napa company recently that blew me away and I even told the proprietor it was as good as any wine I’d ever had. So, foamheads, put down those pitchforks and stop stalking me. You are good people.

Keep in mind that these Nielsen statistics represent scanning data from supermarkets and large superstores like Costco and Wal-Mart and so they do not capture the upscale market. Wine Market Council and Nielsen are the first ones to admit that they have little or no idea concerning trends in the above $40 wine tier, and I would guess that the small, local micro-brews also do not show up in scantrack data. So when I posited that wine drinkers are more adventurous than beer drinkers, what I meant was at the supermarket level. People who shop at supermarkets are considerably more limited in their choice of beers than their choice of wines. The beeries are more likely to grab what they had last week and last year than the wine people. I suppose there are those who always drink the same boxed wine or cheap magnum from the bottom shelf, but the real action is on the eye-level middle shelves, and it’s there that wine drinkers seem to be more adventurous, today grabbing, say, Souverain, tomorrow choosing Dancing Bull or Kenwood or Robert Mondavi, tomorrow opting for Peju or Cambria. Of course, a lot of their choice is dependent on sale prices, or the language on a shelf talker, so maybe the word “adventurous” is a little misleading. It’s not that wine drinkers have the personalities of bungee jumpers and rock climbers on excursions to Half Dome, it’s that the realities of the wine industry compel them to jump around when it comes to brands.

I don’t think there’s any real brand loyalty in wine. Maybe a little, but not the way there is in beer. If you’re a Coors guy, you’ll likely stay one. If you’re into Napa Smith Amber Ale, you probably buy it all the time. But I don’t think that people are wedded to any one particular wine brand in the popular price range. More likely, they switch around.

Wineries try to make people loyal to their brands, but that’s very difficult, almost impossible. It’s the Holy Grail of P.R. folks, but it’s really a hopeless task. Nearly 100% (96%) of core wine drinkers are not members of wine clubs, while only 82% of marginal wine drinkers are. If people were loyal to their brands, those numbers would be far lower (meaning that most drinkers would be members of wine clubs). (I’m back to using Nielsen data again.) This is because most wine drinkers “find the selection of wines where I regularly shop to be sufficient.” So we’re back to the infamous Wall of Wine, the Aisle of Angst, where shoppers make the best decision they can, cross their fingers and hope for the best.

So, beer drinkers, if I offended you, I offer my deepest regrets. But I do stand by my assertion that wine goes better with food than beer. Not with all food. I would much rather have beer with Chinese, Vietnamese and Thai food than wine. Ditto for standard Mexican (burritos, tacos), although at a place like Maya, I might spring for a cocktail or New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. But for upscale California-style cuisine, with French or Asian influences, which is the majority of the good dining I do, it’s always going to be wine. Ditto for barbecue and grilling, which is big year-round here in Cali. Ditto for almost every appetizer I can think of, and it’s been a long time–like never–that I went anyplace where somebody served beer for a cocktail or aperitif.

I’ll say this for wine drinkers and craft beer aficienados (and it’s something a few of the commenters pointed out). We certainly have a lot in common. I have a feeling if I lived someplace in Oregon’s brewski country I’d fit right in. I never met a brewmeister I didn’t instantly like. A young, visionary beer maker is like a young, visionary winemaker: both are artist-entrepreneurs seeking to wrest beauty from the plants of the earth, their feet on the ground and their heads in the clouds, not wanting to put on a suit and tie everyday and march off to some job simply for the money. Come to think of it, that describes most wine writers too.

Tuesday’s Wine Market Council presentation at New York’s Museum of Modern Art took place early in the morning following a night in which most of us got very little sleep. The WMC, working with The Nielsen Company, collects a vast amount of dry-as-dust data, from a multitude of sources, and then looks for patterns that make sense of all these shifting demographic and behavioral trends. The average person would fall asleep within three minutes of the Powerpoint show (and I saw several attendees who did), but for those of us hardcore industry geeks, it’s absolutely fascinating.

The WMC found that people who shop at supermarkets and superstores buy an average of $41 per visit (my number are approximate, as there was no complete handout of the slideshow, so I’m going by memory). But if they add a bottle of wine to the cart, the average purchase amount rises to about $74. This is why every store in the country, from mom-and-pop markets to Costco, wants to sell wine. However, the average price of that bottle of wine is $14, which leaves the extra $19 unaccounted for. I wonder what it goes to? The trimmings for a fancy home-cooked dinner? Flowers? Candles? Higher quality food?

The WMC people (and by the way, Wine Enthusiast helps underwrite the company) also pointed out that, while most of today’s marketing and PR energy seems geared toward Millennials, the fastest growing segment of the population actually continues to be Baby Boomers and seniors. But who is marketing to seniors, the man from Nielsen, Danny Brager, asked. Good question. Companies are marketing Depends, cholesterol meds and Medicare supplementals to seniors, but you never see ad campaigns for wine directed at them. And yet the white-haired crowd still drinks a lot of wine. Seniors would be a good target for wineries small and large (although I could envision a marketing or PR maven arguing, “But we don’t want to be perceived as a wine for old people”). Many wineries are pursuing Millennials and Xers with such gimmicks as animal labels, loud colors, vehicles, crazy designs and pun-like names, but seniors don’t care about that and may in fact be turned off by them. Seniors care about price and quality and they want to feel that the producer thought about them. So, wine marketing managers, don’t write off senior citizens.

This relates to the survery’s most fascinating finding. According to WMC and Nielsen:

WINE       BEER

I like well-known brands:                              1             34

I like to explore new brands:                       42              5

In other words, beer drinkers stick with their tried-and-true favorites (Bud Lite, Coors, whatever) and rarely venture outside their comfort zone. Wine drinkers by contrast are 8 times more likely to be adventurous and try something new.

Why? The WMC guys didn’t know, but we can hazard some guesses. It’s because:

1. wine is inherently more interesting than beer.
2. wine changes with each vintage and people know that whereas beer always tastes the same.
3. wine drinkers listen more to gatekeepers, such as critics, than do beer drinkers.
4. wine is so much better with food than beer.
5. there are so many more wine brands than beer brands to choose from.
6. most importantly, wine drinkers are more adventurous than beer drinkers because we’re risk takers, curious, liberal, open to improving ourselves and our lives, smarter (but don’t think we know everything), and more hopeful than beer drinkers, who, for all their charms, are (let’s face it) happiest with a kegger and an ample supply of beer nuts.

Anyway, that’s what I think! It’s great to be back in (relatively) warm Northern California.

Corrections: Michael Mondavi did not attend the recent Wine Star Awards, as I reported. The correct name of the President and CEO of Southern Wine & Spirits is Harvey Chaplin.

Went to bed late last night, woke up late this morning, jammed into our car from the hotel to Wine Enthusiast HQ for meetings, now on the way back to JFK in a snowstorm. First time in 2-1/2 years I haven’t had a daily posting up. Feel guilty, but can’t do anything about it. Normal, well, routine broadcasting will resume tomorrow, assuming my flight makes it.

Last night’s gala event at the 42nd. St. Public Library here in snowy, cold NYC went off perfectly. Seen and enjoyed: Vic Motto, the Lohr family, the one and only J-C Boisset (alone, alas; the Missus is enceinte), Chris Indelicato, Nicholas Catena, Josh Wesson (funny guy), the Mondavi bros, Michael and Tim, Margrit Mondavi, Bill Foley (our person of the year), Baron Eric de Rothschild (pouring, what else, Lafite), David Taub, Harry Chapman, Leonardo Locascio, Ray Chadwick, Mel Dick, Jeff Meier (my dinner partner, superb company), the wonderous Genevieve Janssens (whom I introduced–my first date with a Tele-Prompt-R), Rob Cooper, of St. Germain (and I’d had tea earlier with their chief mixologist, my friend Philip Pepperdine), Tyler Florence, and others too numerous to mention.

In other words, we were the Center of the Wine World last night.

Lots of great wine, of course. The food wasn’t bad, as far as big banquets go. Outside it was FYAO weather (figure it out) but inside the spotlit and beflowered ballroom all was cozy. Baron de Rothschild described a nice conceit in making wine: “It is like a parabola. If you don’t do enough, you don’t get to the top. If you do too much, you’re on the way down.”

This morning (Tuesday) more snow, but at least the temperature mercifully is in the twenties. Now, off to MOMA for the Wine Market Council report, then to Wine Enthusiast World Headquarters, then back in sunny, warm Cali tomorrow. So this is a really quick post. Have a nice day!