This old-vine zinfandel delivers complex flavor at a bargain
As vines age, their fruit becomes more and more valuable because it is more concentrated, yielding richer wine.
At the delta where the Sacramento River makes its way into the San Francisco Bay is Clarksburg, Calif., where you can still find fields of mature “head-trained” zinfandel vines like the one depicted on this wine’s label.
Unlike the prestige vines that grow neatly coiffed on their wire trellises in nearby Napa Valley, these so-called “bush vines” look scruffy and downright unruly when tufted with vegetation in summer. Vines have a lifespan much like ours and are similarly most vigorous in their youth. Once they hit their fourth or fifth decade, they produce less and less fruit, but that fruit becomes more and more valuable because it is more concentrated, yielding richer wine.
In Napa and Sonoma, most top vineyards have been replanted at least once since the fine wine revolution began in the 1970s, but in Clarksburg, family farmers like the Bogles have preserved acres of older vines. The fruit for this wine comes from mature vineyards planted in the ‘40s, ‘50s, and ‘60s, and gives the wine layers of complexity that would otherwise require careful blending. Concentrated flavors of stewed red fruits, like raspberry jam or cherry pie, provide the wine’s juicy core with accents of heady spices like nutmeg and black pepper.
Bogle Old Vine Zinfandel, California
$10.99 14.5% alcohol
PLCB Item #5043
Sale price through 3/27 – regularly $12.99
Also available at:
Kreston Wine & Spirits in Wilmington, $8.88, krestonwines.com; Canal’s Liquors in Pennsauken, $9.09, canalsliquors.com; Joe Canal’s in Lawrenceville, N.J., $9.29, lawrenceville.jcanals.com.