Back to the futures

 Wine collector Richard Hoffman used to do research at his home in Wisconsin, then fly 2,000 miles every year to attend Barrel Tasting Along the Wine Road, one of the premier annual wine events of Sonoma County.

Now the retired pharmacist lives in Santa Rosa and is able to conduct his research year-round. But he never misses the annual barrel tasting, because there are always new winemakers, new weather effects and new varietals to explore.

“You’ll learn more in this two or three days than you will all year,” Hoffman said. “It’s always about going out there and seeing if you can gather little secrets.”

The 31st annual barrel tasting, which draws serious collectors like Hoffman hoping to buy wine futures at a discount, will be held on March 6-8 and 13-15 along the Alexander, Dry Creek and Russian River valleys.

Here’s how it works. A few weeks before the event, winemakers choose which barrels they will pour from during the tasting. Collectors can peruse the list online (wineroad.com), then decide where they want to taste and purchase futures. In exchange for cash upfront, consumers receive a discount on cases.

“If you’re going to buy a $25 bottle of wine, and you can get it for $15 at the barrel tasting, then you can smile,” Hoffman said. “It’s the best of both worlds.”

Over the years, the annual barrel tasting has exploded in popularity, growing from 6 wineries the first year to a total of 120 this year. But its premise has remained the same: to give consumers a snapshot of how wine evolves, from grape to glass.

For that, you don’t need to be a serious collector or a even a wine geek. All you need is a dash of curiosity.

“It’s a great education for people who are just getting into wine,” said Beth Costa, executive director of Wine Road Northern Sonoma County, which sponsors the event. (Until this year the group was called the Russian River Wine Road). “The winemaker can talk you through the flavors they taste in the wine right now, and they can explain how it’s going to change.”

Winemakers such as Rod Berglund of Joseph Swan Winery in the Russian River Valley bend over backwards to educate consumers, bringing in growers and other experts to talk about the winemaking process. This year, he has invited a geologist from Sonoma State University to talk about dirt.

“It’s fun for people to go someplace and see something in process,” Berglund said. “It’s like people who take a cooking class and see how a dish comes out. They have a better appreciation of it.”

During this year’s barrel tasting, Berglund plans to pour wines at his Forestville winery that are about a month away from bottling, but years away from official release. Then he will encourage tasters to try a young wine in the bottle, as a comparison.

“If you taste the wine in close enough increments, you can see the progression,” he said. “And you can predict what other wines might do. It’s a lot more fun.”

Tasting out of the barrel, Berglund said, is a little like looking at “a snapshot of someone who is 12, and trying to figure out what they’ll look like at 80.”

At Joseph Swan, Berglund will pour three vineyard-designated zinfandels, two syrahs grown two miles apart and tannat, a fiercely tannic varietal normally used as a blending grape.

Not even the most experienced winemakers are certain what their wines will become after years of aging in both the barrel and the bottle, but there are some basic guidelines for judging a young, gangly wine.

Berglund first looks for the absence of flaws (for example, huge amounts of oak or alcohol, or not enough acidity), then for overall balance.

“If it’s a big, rich fruit, there should be enough acidity to balance that,” he said. “It should be a pleasant wine.”

Dave Rafanelli, winemaker at Healdsburg’s A. Rafanelli Winery in the Dry Creek Valley, also looks for a good balance of fruit, tannin and acid in a barrel wine.

“My greatest wines always surprised me in their youth as tasting very good,” Rafanelli said. “Those end up being your greatest vintages.”

At the winery, known for its ageworthy zins and cabs, tasters will be encouraged to try 2008 wines out of the barrel first, then young wines out of the bottle.

“In the barrel, the tannins soften and the edges smooth out,” Rafanelli explained. “Usually, you can pick up the new oak. It’s almost sitting on top of the wine, and then it becomes integrated into the wine.”

The beauty of tasting wines from the barrel is that there are no critics or reviews to rely on — just your own tastes and preferences. And that’s a good thing, Berglund said.

“You can read all the experts you like, but you’re the one putting it in your mouth,” he said. “In the end, all that really matters is what you think.”

It is important, however, to understand what you are tasting and how long it has been in the barrel.

“Some wineries will have futures that will be bottled within 4 to 6 months,” Hoffman said. “Some will have futures that they put in there 4 or 5 months before.”

The benefits of buying wines before they are bottled are twofold: You not only save money, but ensure that you can procure a particular wine.

“A lot of the the smaller producers will sell out of their wine with futures,” Costa said. “If you don’t buy it as a future, it’s going to be gone.”

Hoffman plans to pick up 4 or 5 cases of wine during the upcoming barrel tasting, and he tries to mix it up between whites and reds. Wineries often offer mixed cases, with six bottles of one wine and six of another, he said.

“I’m a zin man,” he said. “But every good zin drinker has a bottle of pinot noir under the table. So the ultimate, in my mind, is the pinot ... they have increased in quality so much in the last 5 to 10 years.”

Not all wineries participating in barrel tasting will sell futures. At Copain Wine Cellars in the Russian River Valley, winemaker Wells Guthrie will be pouring some 2008 pinot and syrah from the barrel, but it won’t be for sale and it’s not even the main attraction.

Inside the tasting room, the winery will showcase a few cases of library wines that they have put aside. Consumers can taste and purchase these hard-to-fine wines during barrel weekend.

After making wine in an industrial warehouse in Santa Rosa for 8 years, the little winery with a big reputation moved to Eastside Road in Healdsburg just a few years ago.

“Ideally, I want people to know where we are,” Guthrie said. “When we made wine in a warehouse next to Kmart, we had no bucolic setting.”