A bit of perspective

Brother Josh here again with a dose from Oz:
Tonight in WSET Level 3 Class, we were starting to tie up the loose ends, pick up the parts of the world we hadn't gotten to and be ready for our final test coming up in 3 weeks. Tonight focused on the minor wine "high quality" regions such as Greece, Israel, Jordan, and the US. Yup, we summarized the entire wine production of the US in half of a two-hour class. Grouped with such heavy hitters as kosher wine from Israel, it really made for some strange tasting notes.

In this class we've seen detailed maps of Bulgaria, Hungary, Yugoslavia and Greece all showing multiple wine regions, areas, climates, and cities. For the US, we got a broad view of the country, and then a detail of California - mainly focused on the bulk wine area of the Central Valley (think Paul Mason, old Earnest and Julio Gallo). Luckily the wines really proved themselves when up against the big wines of Greece. A great Chardonnay from Russian River, an absolutely MASSIVE Pinot Noir from Oregon, a Merlot and a fairly understated Zin (surprised me actually). Most of the class was impressed and surprised but I think it'll be a long time before they'd put some of the wines on the same par as first growth chateau from Bordeaux.

Somehow though, my formative wine years (aka - first years in a "real" job) were spent mainly in California and US wine and its my basis of comparison. I appreciate the structure of the "old world" wines, but there is something nice about the fruit and approachability of the US wines. Tonight it was a reminder of home and how there are so many wines available and many are quite good. It was also a reminder that to the rest of the world (ok, maybe just the UK), the US still has a ways to go before we get our own 2hr section of the WSET course.