A Rare California Riesling Milestone

Twenty years is a good chunk of time by any standard. All the more when it represents the kind of dedication and hard work it takes to make a small agriculture-based business successful. That’s why the 20th vintage is considered a real milestone for a small wine producer.

At this point few California wineries can claim 20 vintages. The number will swell rapidly in the next few years, reflecting the wine industry’s explosive growth in the early 1980s. Right now, however, California’s 20-vintage club is pretty exclusive--especially for Riesling producers.

Most New World wine regions have embraced Riesling as part of the European wine heritage, but it’s never quite caught on in California. Only a handful of West Coast producers (Greenwood Ridge, Trefethen, Smith-Madrone, Stony Hill, Navarro and Firestone are the only ones that come readily to mind) have made a long-term commitment to Riesling.

That’s why it was a special--make that unique--occasion to sit down with winemaker Allan Green in early March for a retrospective vertical tasting of his Greenwood Ridge Vineyards Rieslings going back to 1980. A 20-year vertical of California Rieslings from a single vineyard is rare, if not unprecedented.

The first wine--the brilliant, golden ‘80--was a lovely example of aged Riesling. The complex perfume mingled dried fruits such as apricot with toasted nuts and honey, yet it was also remarkably fresh, with brisk acidity and a long, radiant finish. I’ve never tasted a California white wine so evolved yet youthful, not to say delicious, two decades after the harvest.

And so it went, wine after wine, right up to the yet-unreleased 2001. And as we tasted, Green told the story of Greenwood Ridge, which in many ways is the story of the modern small-winery movement in California’s coastal valleys.

The Green family bought an old homestead in the coastal mountains of Mendocino County, on a forested ridge overlooking Anderson Valley, in 1973. The previous owner, Anderson Valley vintner Tony Husch, had planted a small vineyard of Cabernet, Merlot and Riesling in 1972. But before his first crop came in, he decided to abandon grape growing to concentrate on running Husch winery.

The purchase made the Greens instant grape growers. Through the 1970s they sold their grapes to Husch and other wineries in the area. Inevitably Allan caught the winemaking bug and in 1980 he inaugurated the Greenwood Ridge label, featuring a stylized alligator head inspired by the shape of a ridge just south of the property.

The first wine out the door was an off-dry Riesling, all of 200 cases. “It was the only thing we had to sell for the first three years,” he says. “The Cabernet was still aging in barrels. So we got a reputation as a Riesling winery right from the beginning. At that time there was already good Gewurztraminer coming out of Anderson Valley, so it seemed natural to keep making Riesling in the off-dry style that Gewurztraminer had established.”

“Off-dry” means about 1.5% residual sugar, but the cool climate and shallow clay soil gives grapes with such intensity and bold acidity that the wines seem plump and luscious, rather than sweet. Each year gives a slightly different rendition but, vintage after vintage, the Greenwood Ridge Rieslings have fresh peach and apricot perfume and clear Riesling flavors with a fine mineral quality at the core.

That mineral savor has increased as the vines have matured and sent their roots deep into the rocky subsoil. Recent vintages, particularly ’99 and ‘00, show the kind of steely authority that characterizes German Rieslings from the slate soils of the Mosel Valley.

When conditions are right for the sugar-concentrating mold Botrytis cinerea (eight vintages to date), the winery makes late-harvest Rieslings. Their combination of pure, sweet flavor and succulent acidity puts them among California’s finest dessert wines. The ’83 and ’89 are still vibrant, with deep tea and honey flavors. The ’90 is still fresh beneath developing layers of honey and dried fruit.

Green made the wines himself until 1984, assisted by occasional free advice from his friend Jed Steele, a prominent North Coast winemaker. Then he hired Fred Scherrer as full-time winemaker. When Scherrer moved to Dehlinger after the 1987 harvest, Green hired local winemaker Van Williamson. In ’93 Kendall-Jackson purchased Edmeades Vineyards and hired Williamson away from Greenwood Ridge, and Green resumed winemaking duties as of ’94 vintage. The wines from each period reflect the winemaker’s style: Scherrer’s structured and elegant, Williamson’s bold and powerful and Green’s purely sensual.

Greenwood Ridge labels have reflected the region’s viticultural evolution. The 1980 and ’81 Rieslings were bottled as Mendocino County wines. From ’82 through ’89 the label simply said Mendocino, a broad American Viticultural Area (AVA) that included Anderson Valley. Then the origin was Anderson Valley from ’90 until ‘97, when it switched to the new Mendocino Ridge AVA. “For most people that doesn’t make much difference,” Green notes. “But now, I could use any of those four AVAs. I could bottle the same Riesling with four labels, each with a different AVA. I wonder if anyone would notice?”

Greenwood Ridge also produces an impressive roster of other varietals, including Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel (from Fred Scherrer’s vineyard in Alexander Valley). Still, Green seems to be a typically laid-back guy--until you start looking at all the other things he does besides making wine. Then you might think he’s been channeling Martha Stewart.

It’s not just that he worked as an award-winning graphic designer while tending the vines and turned an abandoned cabin on the property into a stylish house. There’s more to it than that. In addition to wine, Greenwood Ridge produces Eye of the Dragon olive oil and chocolate. The chocolate package, designed by Green, won a 2000 Print Magazine design award.

His passions for art and music have been expressed in different ways. As a DJ, his “Straight Ahead Rock ‘n’ Roll Show” was for 11 years one of the most popular shows on Anderson Valley radio station KZYX-FM (he recently turned the slot over to another DJ).

In the late 1980s he commissioned several musicians and painters to interpret Greenwood Ridge wines. The mixed-media results have been presented several times along with lavish meals in art galleries and other venues, including Stanford University.

One of the components is an abstract painting called “White Riesling” by Napa Valley artist Nancy Willis. Its swirl of green, gold and off-red oils and pastels captures the fleeting sensual essence of Riesling better than words.

Oh, and he plays baseball--with uniforms and everything--in a nationwide league. He sponsors a team, the Greenwood Ridge Dragons.

This year also marks the 20th vintage of another ongoing Greenwood Ridge program, the California Wine Tasting Championships (July 27 and 28)--a unique event in which tasters compete to identify wines by grape variety, region, vintage and producer. It includes music and tastings of chocolate, cheese and olive oil. Green says it typically draws around 500 “contestants, friends and spectators, groupies and hangers-on.”

Green admits to being “slightly addicted” to his Riesling. “It goes really well with basketball,” he says. “You can watch basketball playoffs for hours and go through a couple of bottles, with guacamole and chips.”

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Smith is writer-at-large for Wine & Spirits magazine.