Welcome to Wine Soundtrack USA. Listen to the passion with which producers narrate their winery and their world team thirty answers discover their stories, personalities and passions.
Hello, friends and listeners of Wine Soundtrack. This is Alison Levine and today I'm in the Livermore Valley at Couda Ridge Wines with winemaker proprietor Larry Dino. Larry, welcome to Wine Soundtrack and tell us about Couda Ridge Wines.
Well, thank you, Allison, and thank you for coming out and visiting Livermore Valley and our winery, Coon Ridge Wones. Yeah. So my wife and I started the winery back in two thousand and seven. I always call it a hobby gone wild. So we were into wine and we'd go to NAPA doing wine, tasting a lot and bringing friends and doing the whole wine lifestyle type thing. And then we started doing home wine making in our garage in nineteen ninety nine.
Were you living here in the Livermore Valley at that time?
We were in Fremont, so we were making wine in our garage next to our car, and then we moved to Livermore and then started continue to do wine a home wine making here, learned a lot about the business, and we moved here. The wine started getting better and better, and then in two thousand and seven we decided to start up the winery. So we rented a small space in Livermore and we got it bonded and started started as a small production boutique winery.
And fifteen years later you have a tasting room and a winery and everything.
So we're still small, but much bigger than we were back then.
So where does the name M. Kuda Ridge come from?
Oh that's a good question. So I mentioned my car earlier. So well there's a story. Should you want the long story or the short story?
The best story?
The best story? Okay, so I'll give you the medium story. So we were living at Fremont and we were looking to move out of Fremont, moved to Wine Country. We actually were looking at some property up in Windsor, which is up next to Sonoma. We actually put an offer on some property there and we drive all the way up there and the real estate agent wasn't very nice and they weren't willing to negotiate our price, and we just weren't happy with the old experience. So we decided
not to proceed with that. So we were driving home and I saw this car on the side of the road and it was nineteen seventy Barracuda and it was had a for sale sign on it and was parking front of this bar. And so I told my wife Margie, I said, well, if we can't get that property, I'd like to get this car. She was not thrilled with that idea, and we talked to her to go into the bar. We found the owner ended up buying the bar, So are the car.
I was gonna say about a bar.
Just the car. So then when we were doing our home wine making in our gag, we were rebuilding the car. It was a multi year process, and so then the barrels of wine were always next to the car. So then one day we're having a party at her house and we were trying to figure out what we were going to name this first vintage of wine. And our last name is Dino, and Margie goes, let's call this Dino's Veno. And I said, it's not a good rhyne, but it doesn't sound sound like very good wine. And
she goes, well, it's not. It tastes like the car, and I got admit, the first couple home, why making vintages weren't the best?
Well, that's the terwa right, it was just picking up what it was made.
Around, Yeah, gasoline. And so then my buddy was there and he's a car enthusiast, and he said, Larry, why don't we call this Couda Ridge Wines? And I said, oh, that's great. So when we did our home wine making, every time we bottled the wine, we had a picture of the car, and we just put the picture of the car on the label. So then when we started the winery back in two thousand and seven, we decided to carry that name forward. It has a story, so that's where.
We are, but no more car on the label that is there is yeah if you look closely.
So well the label is plumb crazy purple, which is the color of the car. And the subliminal ridge is really a subliminal drying of the car. So it's all subliminal message.
And I like the car, and I do like how he came up with the name Cootera Ridge, and I get the bearra kuda, but the ridge was probably just a fanciful made you sound just official. So we were saying that today you are in a in a proper win ring, not in a warehouse downtown or something. And do you own vineyards?
So we have a couple of vineyards. We do have a small vineyard in our house. We leased this space here, we're responsible for this vineyard. Year. We source from a lot of vineyards across the Livermore and we do one hundred percent little More Valley. So some of the vineyards that we source from our small family owned vineyards. So like some of our smaller ritals that we do, like carmon Air, which we can talk about later, comes from
these small vineyard blocks that are owned by individuals. I have my own vineyard manager, and so me and the vineyard manager managed Joe's blocks exactly how we want them. They might as well be our vineyards, right, And then we buy some of our larger blocks from various other growers throughout the valley.
And what you mentioned carmen Air.
What other great varieties do you work with?
Yeah, so we focus on doing Bordeaux wines, so Bordeaux style wines. We'll talk about that later, but so we do basically all the Bordeaux ridols. So we do well we only do sab Blanc. We used to do Semeon, but we don't do that anymore. And then we do the well I call them the six Reds of Bordeaux, so Murlow and cab cab Fronc, mall back Petit Verdeau, and then Carmen Air, which is our new one in the lineup.
You've gotten way back into the Bordeaux to pull up grapes they don't even make anymore exactly.
We do various blends as well, and we'll do some one off ridls of non Bordeaux, just a couple of those, but the focus is really on the on the Bordeaux lines.
And what's your total case production?
We do about twenty four hundred cases a year, so plus our minus a couple hundred depending on the And then.
Are you exclusively direct to consumer like online and here in the tasting room or do you have distribution you know, anywhere in across the country.
Right, So, yeah, we are primarily direct to consumer. So from the tasting room we have pretty sizable wine club. We do do have online so we can ship to most of the states through online, and then we're at a lot of local restaurants and wine bars and wine stores and such. But it's all direct from winery to the retail, so we don't have any brokers or distributors.
So grew up kind of around the Livermore Valley in neighborhoods, you know, twenty thirty minutes away, and obviously got into wine as an adult. But I'm curious what your first memory is relevant to wine.
Yeah, so I have a couple. So my first one is really just kind of growing up. And as I was a child, you know, my dad drank a lot of wine. And what I remember is he always drank these These were non varietal wines, but his favorite was Christian Brothers. Now I don't know that they make wine anymore. I know they do brandy, but back then they did a Christian Brother's wine and it was just goldish orange colored wine and he let me taste it and it
was like really sweet. And then of course he drank Lancers, you know, when he got fancy and that type of stuff. So then after that, I would say, where we really got into it was when my wife and I were dating back in the Oh, my god, a long time ago. Don't make sure she doesn't hear that part. The early early eighties, and we'd always we'd always get together with friends and we would watch Miami Vice. Kind of dating myself here with wine. Have you heard of Miami Vice?
So we'd watch. It was a weekly thing. We'd sit down and watch. Yeah, and then we uh so we The wines we started with was Green Hungarian, which is a sweet white wine from White White Bell Winery. And then when it was called Green Hungarian, I could not tell you what the britol is. And then when we got fancy and we were stepping up in life, we started with a Navarro. It was a Navarro a gritzminer, which was also a sweeter style wine, but definitely upscale from our green Hyperica.
Well, I know, you know, it's very common to when you start out with wine to have more of an appeal towards residual sugar. To sweetness is more appealing than sometimes the big tannic bombs or anything like that.
But obviously you.
Have graduated, you've graduated into making more do varieties, which is quite a departure from Green Hungarian sweet wines. But I'm curious, what was what was one of those aha moments for you and wine? What was a wine that you had that just sort of made you kind of shake your head and go wow.
And what was the occasion.
Yeah, So that would have been in probably the nineteen nineties. And we had some friends in Fremont and they owned a cabin up in Bear Valley. And the only way you could get to this cabin or a winter is on a sled, on a like a snow sled, so it was buried kind of in that in the snow.
And so we were at their house one day and he wasn't really into wine, but he was a lawyer, and he had all these wines lined up in his cabinet and we were snowed in, and of course we were drinking, and he goes, Larry, why don't you go pick a wine up there? And I start looking in his cabinet and he's got all these phenomenal wines. But he didn't have one clue on what these wines. They could have been Gallo, I mean, he had no clue.
Would have been green Hungarian, It would have been green Hungarian.
I would not have picked that one at this time. So he had a it was an opus one. So it was like a it was about I don't remember the exact vintage. It was like in the mid nineteen eighty, so it was like an it was like it was a ten to twelve year old opus one. And the mice were actually eaten into the cork because when the cabin was like locked up, I guess the mics were trying to get good wine.
I guess it was they knew what was there.
So I saw, I said, yeah, so I said, hey, we'd better open this bottle since the mice already started to get into the court. And this is a pretty should be a pretty decent bottle of wine. So we went ahead and opened it, and yeah, that was our hot moment. I mean that wine was just so so phenomenal, and it was bold, but it was softened with age and had complexity, and it was just at the time, the best wine we had ever had.
So I guess that's the one that set you on your Bordeaux path. A.
Yeah, I'm not really, you know that came later.
So now, if we were to come to your home, what would we find in your home, in your cellar, in your wine fridges, under your bed, wherever you keep wine. What kind of wines do you keep in there? Are they the wines you make, are they winds of your neighbors, they winds from another country? Is it mostly Bordeaux varieties?
Yes, yes, yes, and no. So yeah, I mean, we have a pretty sizeable wine cabinet. But the I mean, I would say the majority of the wines that we have in there are our local wines. It's mostly because we live in they're very accessible and we're always trying everyone's wine here locally and such. But we've been to many wine regions, so I would say some of the finer wines that we have are mostly from Bordeaux, Burgundy,
and a Napa. We have quite a few Napa, so probably Napa would be the largest, and then Bordeaux and then Burgundy. We also have wines from other Appalachians through California, so I would say, uh, Pasa Robos, we have quite a few, and then like Plymouth, Fiddleton area kind of areas that we you know, we visit that we tend to purchase wine and accumulate wine from those regions.
Is there anything you opened up recently that drank really well?
Hmmm, other than couter Ridge. I don't know.
Maybe that's what you opened most recently, but no, I mean, you know, sometimes we open up wines from our cellar that maybe we been holding on too, or maybe just because that's where they're stored. Was there anything recently you opened up that just gave you joy?
Yeah? That, I mean we're always drinking wine, and we always having friends over and doing blind tastings and wine tastings and stuff, so there's lots of opportunities and stuff. The one, I guess, the one that would come to mind is it was a white. I mean, we typically drink red, but it was a Marsal from Burgundy and it was a it was a it was a charnay, so it was in neutral oak charnay. But it was
just yeah, phenomenal. You know, I'm not a huge chardonnay drinker, but that style, with all the earthiness and the rocky granted minerality, just is just right up my alleys.
Do you remember what vintage it was?
It would have been it was when we went. We were in Burgundy last year, so then it would have been I would say a couple of years before that, so it wasn't real old. It was a premiere crew, but a grand crew, but it was let's see what we're in twenty twenty, I'd say around twenty probably twenty twenty, probably twenty twenty, twenty twenty one.
Nice. Nice, So you have a focus on what you make, as you said, Bordeaux varieties, and I'm curious if you think among the bordou varieties or maybe beyond, there's a such thing as a perfect variety.
I would say, no, you know, I mean, there's of course certain ritals that we drink more of and gravitate more towards than others. But in my mind, I mean, I have a very open mind on wine and the different varietals, and I think pretty much. I mean, any rityle that's grown in the right place, made by the right winemaker can be phenomenal. So to me, it's about the sense of place where that verrietal is grown, and then the winemaker doing a good job with that wine.
Of course, there's certain styles that I prefer than other styles, but that's personal preference exactly, But doesn't mean the wines there's anything wrong with the wine. It's not much time. But no, I mean, I mean, I can't think of a verietyl that I have had that I said, I've never drink that ritle again. I mean I might with from certain areas or certain wine makers. However that wine that varietyl made in the right place, with the right winemakers. I mean drinking all day long.
So if somebody were to, if somebody hasn't had the pleasure of tasting Couda Ridge wines, yet, what do you think they're missing out on?
You know? So, yeah, we do Bordeaux wines, but we like to say that we do Bordeaux style wines, with style being the keyword here, So we try to make wines more of the old World style. So my pre I mean, I really got a liking for wine going or different styles of wine taking classes at the local community college here. They had a really good viticulture and knowlogy program there, especially on sensory analysis, and that's whally I got my liking for French wines just old World
style wines in general. So that's what we strive for. So I would say our wines are typically less fruit forward than a lot of the wines, the local wines or even you know, California style wines. We try to get more earthiness, minerality, lower alcohol, well balanced wines so that you can have more than one glass and continue drinking on or they pair well with food, so fantastic.
You know. I see that you have, you know, a few articles up on your wall, and I'm going to assume a few metals around the way, And I'm curious what your opinion is on wine critics and scores. I mean, clearly, when you do well.
You showcase it.
But in general, I mean, what is the role of a wine critic and a score play in a winery, lakers, or for you as a wine drinker.
Yeah, I mean to me, they're critically important. You know some I think some have more recognition or I'm trying to get to the right word more. You know, they're more respected, I guess than others. But to me, it's not so much any one individual award because there's always error in the process, no matter if it's one person tasting them or whether it's a competition or whatever. But
to me, it's more looking at the accumulation of awards. So, you know, some wineries, you know, if they're consistently getting you know, eighty eight to ninety, you know we have that wine is going to be good. It's a good decent wine. If you know, if they're getting in the nineties, so let's say ninety four. Well, then they're going to be pretty solid, pretty decent wines if that's consistent over time.
Similarly with the wine competitions, right if if people are consisting it in golds and higher, you know, that speaks to me versus you know, silvers and one gold hair type thing. So to me, it's consistency of the awards from the competitions, which matters.
Yeah, absolutely so of your wines, assuming they were all consistent.
I'm pretty equal.
If space aliens were to land on your property right now, knock on the door, and you had to choose one of the wines to welcome them with, which one would it be?
Yeah, that was a hard question because I'm biased, But I think all of our wines are good. And then of course it varies from year to year, but I mean, I mean in general, I mean I would say I do Caberny fronc. That's what we're known for, is our Cabernet franc So I like to share that whenever I can. But also, you know, it's a nice wine. It's got good it's got good complexity to it, it's got a softness to it. It's not over bold. It's a wine that I think you know, appeals to a large consumer base.
So it's the wine you.
Gave me when I arrived. So I guess you know perhaps now you mentioned obviously you make predominantly red wines. You do have sauvignon blanc, but as a wine drinker, red white or rose red still or sparkling still. And you also mentioned that you make wines that are a little lower in alcohol, a little less fruit forward, a little more mineral driven, balance something to pair with food. So how do you approach food and wine pairing? Do you believe in the rules of you know, white wine
and fish, red wine and meat. When you have a selection of predominantly red wines, you make it work with everything, right.
So we have so I guess you can answer that a couple of ways. So you know, we pretty much always have wine open at the house. A lot of times we just have wine left over from our tasting room that we have you on the counter for a couple of days. So pretty much almost every meal that we have at the house we're paired with wines. But when we're doing more formal pairings like with restaurant, we do a lot of winemaker dinners or formal wine pairing
competitions that type of stuff. You know, the protein to me takes a back seat. So I mean, there are certain things in the protein I think that that are important for the wine, like the vattiness, the body, and the weight of the protein. However, to me, it's the spices, the sauces and all the other companiments that go with that protein that influences as much as anything else. I guess my AHA experience there was we were doing a winemaker dinner at a nice local restaurant here uncle Use.
It's an Asian restaurant and the owner is a Sawmine and I brought my Cabernet fronc. Well he had had my cabernate fronc, but I had brought it. We was gonna be on the menu, and he goes, Larry, we're gonna pair this little white fish. I go, I go, Nick, here crazy, not because you followed the rules. I was
trying to follow the rules. And he goes, no, really, So anyway, we had He brought it out with a It was with a peaking sauce, so kind of a spicy red sauce with a little bit of sweetness to it, and it just it was just a parry made in heaven. So when I worked with like chefs and stuff like, we have our big wine tasting event come up here and live more later this year. It's called Taste Ar Tear War. We've actually done quite well at that competition.
More awards on the other side of my wall. I didn't notice those, but no, yes.
So we work with you know, high end chefs and coming up with those pairings, and what we always like to do is I always like to have them decompose the dishes. So you know, when we go to do this, don't bring the full you know, your full stack food
and your your full pairing. Can we just can we decompose that and bring out the components of that and taste each individual component and how that component is doing with the wine that we're thinking of parent with it, and then let's started putting those pieces together, you know, and then the cheft is you know that the chefs are great and then putting it together to present it nice and everything, but let's get what the core ingredients are,
you know, in this pairing with that wine. So that's kind of how I like to approach it.
So you let you adjust the food to fit the wine.
Yes, yes, and you know in the back on the protein component of that. You know, last year we did our taste Arte War with Elbie Steak, which is a high end steakhouse here locally, and we initially were going to do it with the wago be right, how can you go wrong with the wagu beef. We ended up scaling that back and we ended up doing it with
the ribbi, which was like half the price of this wago. However, in that case, the the ribbi had more fat, so we really wanted to get the wago was like just so lean, so we wanted to get some of the fattiness from the protein. But then at the end of the day, it was the sauces and the spices and stuff that really made you know, really made the dish absolutely.
So you started as a garages wine maker in your home, you are you source fruit from different vineyards. How much time do you spend in the vineyard A lot?
I mean I'm very very active in the vineyards. And I mean the cliche goes it starts in the vineyards, but you know, I've been doing this now, I've had seventeen harvests. Eighteen harvests, and you know, at the end of the day, it really does. I mean it really The fruit that comes in is defining the wine that you make right from the beginning. So I have a
lot of experience and formal education in viticulture. And part of the reason why we source from Livermore Valley is because that way I can be out in the vineyards a lot more and have those close relationships with the growers or the vineyard managers and you know, give them input if I don't think the vineyards being done right or needs leaf pooling, or whether you know the irrigation strategy is problematic or I think it's problematic. We pick
the harvest dates and all the vineyards. You know, I was talking about the Bordeaux style earlier. One of the key things for us, and how I think I get the Bordeaux style as we tend to pick our grapes earlier than most of the other local wineries. So we will actually project when those grapes are ripe and then line up the pickers based on the projection.
Are there are there any sort of signs or predictors that you look for that are going to tell you what a harves is going to give you so that you can plan this way in advance, or does it not allow you to plan so early?
Well, I mean I would say yes and no. I mean as a wine maker, I mean I've been sourcing from the same vineyards for years, so you know, I have my history of what bridal gets picked at what time, so we have you know, when I put my initial plans together, I base it on that. However, you know, mother nature always has her way of doing things, so no, things get all mixed up as we get into it. But no, I mean we're picking based on ripeness and you know where where the fruit is to our liking.
So in the time that you've spent here in the seventeen years you've been making wine and being in the vineyard all the time. We know every vintage tells a different story. But my question for you is in a place like Livermore with the fruit that you source, do you see more variation year to year? Do you see more you know commonality?
Yeah, it's that's an interesting question, so it depends. You know. First, the first thing I would say is that you know, things are very consistent in Livermore valleys. So our growing seasons tend to be fairly consistent. Our weather patterns, for
the most part, tend to be pretty consistent. So and typically, I mean, the fruit that comes off the vineyards is phenomenal and unless we have you know, I don't know when it was it twenty twenty when we had the one hundred and fifteen degree temperatures for a week or two, which I guess we just had here, but that was right during harvest time. That screwed up the fruit. But but in general, there's it's pretty consistent. So where alas a going what was the question again?
If you see it, do you see more variation from year to year? More consistency? And you're saying consistency. So I'm experienced in.
Seed, but I guess what I would add to that is, you know, when my first commercial harvest was in two thousand and seven, you know, and back then in seven eighth nine, the harvest was later and we were processing fruit up to Thanksgiving and I remember it was freezing out there. There was ice on the on the bins and it was just you know, and that was a
normal thing back then. You know. I think we got spoiled here in the twenty tens through twenty twenty where everything just started coming in right around labor day and we were pretty much finishing up by end of October
for the most part. I mean, some stuff might trickle in, but now recently it's kind of been all over the place last three or four years, so I think we're having more variations in the temperatures, so we are tending to harvest stuff a little bit earlier, and then it does seem like stuff is trickling in a little bit later as well.
Yeah, an extended picking season as opposed to extended growing season exactly. So, because you spend time in the vineyards and you know you're sourcing from so many different places, do you feel that you have sort of a relationship with each vineyard? Do you talk to the vines? Do you know each of them kind of individually? And do they communicate to you as much as you communicate to them?
You know, a big communicator with non verbal objects. But you know, I do you know in these vineyards and the bigger blocks. I mean, yeah, I'm very familiar with most of these vineyard blocks, and you know, we have our favorite rows, you know that will will source from, so you know, we'll go out there, I'll look at them. I'm tasting them frequently and deciding whether i want to do those same rows or move to a different section. But as far as talking to them, I would.
Say no, although maybe you know they know you play favorites, so they don't.
Talk to you.
That's right.
When do you have any sort of good luck rituals that you do at the start of harvest for yourself or for your team, any sort of traditions that you've established.
I mean, other than just getting the equipment out and cleaning it and make sure it's ready. That's a good start. But no, not really. We do have our end of harvest ritual. We all go we go to a local Mexican restaurant and do shots.
But no, not before well, I mean a tradition at the end is equally important to a tradition at the start. Exactly at least one of them you know you're finished. The other one is sort of the anticipation. So you came to wine a little bit later in your career. I assume this is as you said, Hobby gone Wild, gone to Haywire, and maybe it's a second career when you were little, What did you want to be when you grew up? And what did you end up doing before you came to wine?
So, growing up, I wanted to be either an architect or an airline pilot.
And what did you become? Neither of those?
Although some days I wish I became an architect. I did. I do like architecture, but no, I went into software engineering, so I was in computer programming software engineering for twenty seven years. So we started making wine at the end of my software engineering career as a hobby. This is where the hobby gone Wild comes in, but in the garage.
And then we had moved to Livermore and in two thousand and seven started that commercial winery in the garage as very small, small wine production as I was still working in Silica Valley. And then I got laid off in eight and then we decided to ramp up the production. We moved to a new facility, not this one, an intermediate intermediary one, and and increased our production, opened our tasting room there.
You're it's almost like you were forced into letting your hobby take over.
We were, yeah, it's interesting because we may have never done it otherwise because we did. We were doing the home why making and then you know, we always were going to do it as a hobby, and then a hobby a retirement business, I guess, is a way to put it. What we did not realize at the time is how much work this business is.
So it's almost better you didn't do it for retirement exactly.
So it was kind of it was a blessing that we actually, I got laid off, we got forced into doing it and making that my my sole career and then building upon that. So otherwise we would have never been got to where we are today.
And here you are today making wine and having a tasting room and selling it and doing all the things you have to do in addition to just spending time. I'm in the vineyard. And when you're not doing all of that, how do you like to spend your free time?
Huh?
Do you remember what free time is? No?
I forgot what that is.
Yeah, So if you had free time, how would you like to spend it?
I like music, I like going to concerts, so we like good food and friends and family. So I would say those things, you know, the outdoors, you know, camping and snow skiing and that type stuff, although we seem to be doing less and less of that nowadays, but we still like to get outdoors when we can so, but I say mostly yeah, music, music, food and friends.
Do you have a favorite band?
I do?
And who are they?
Neil Young is my favorite, ourst of all time?
Yes?
Nice?
And if you could, you know, share a bottle of wine with Neil Young, which one would you pick?
Ah, that's a good question. He would he would want the I think he would want these bolder one, petit d I think I would do petitva. You know, Pati Da is our It's my go to wine when we're smoking cigars with my buddy's out in the backyard.
What does that?
Yes? And then he'll may be smoking cigars or other things. But I think that would be a good daring.
So if you're planning a romantic evening for you and your wife, what kind of wines get open? Then? Now I'm really curious because if we got the cigar wine, we got the But what sets a romantic tone on the table with wine? What makes your wife happy?
I should say, right, yeah, usually we will. You know, we do have a sizable wine cabinet, so we have quite a few wines in there from I would say, from Napa, Bordeaux and Burgundy that are you know, ten fifteen year old wines. And we kind of use those for those special occasions, either just us going out to dinner, or if we have I'm loving friends over that enjoy
and appreciate wine, we'll crack them open. But I would say, typically we would open a cab, probably a you know, a Napa cab, a ten to fifteen year old Napa cab, or a Bordeau ten fifteen year old Bordeau, I would say, and.
Set the mood.
So you had an illustrious career prior to this, you know, very illustrious, well, you know, working in the tech sector, and now you're working on wine. And of course no one had ever told you, as you had said, how much work having a winery is. But I'm curious, is there something someone did tell you along the way, a piece of advice that someone gave you, a parent, a mentor a teacher somewhere, that that did stick with you as opposed to the person who never warned you about getting into wine.
Yeah, So I guess my story on that one is I would say it's David Everett, who is an instruct at the Lost Pacidas Community College, which I referred to earlier, and before we had started the winery, I was probably doing homeline making at the time. I was taken a lot of classes at the community college, mostly in viticulture and in in Winston's re analysis and in the wine
stensory analysis class. He started the class by doing a blind tasty and there was a couple of people in the class who were very vocal and thought they were wine experts.
And always one more two, oh yes, they.
Let everyone know it, and et cetera. So then so then we go to taste these wines and they were sherries, and so we're in some of there were sherries from all over the world. So we taste these wines and this, and then he was and David asked, well, which one do you like the best? Well, this guy stands up and oh it's this one here, this one is the best one out of all of these lineup hands down. So David is okay, very interesting, and so then ask other people. Everyone gets in and putting. So then he
unveils these wines. Well, that wine was a setter Home White Zipadel at about six dollars a bottle.
Not really a sherry style line exactly.
And you know, and then he had some of those that were, you know, wines from Warez Spain and some real true sherrys which a lot of people don't have experience with and such. And so what I learned on that experience was number one, keep your mouth shut, so you know, be objective and not subjective. So when you're describing wines, you know, talk about more what you get in those wines, not what your feelings are about those wines.
They've pressed against the wall. And you can do that, but you know, be aware that it may not be what you think it is.
Wine is pretty deceiving that way, correct. It's probably one of the few industries that can keep you humble, yes.
Exactly, once you think you got to figure it out here back to square wine.
Well, so when you look back at your career, your entire career, what would you say is one of your proudest achievements to date?
Yeah, I mean, I mean, I would say it's the winery starting the winery, And I would say it has to do with the just kind of what we have built and built a place for people to come and enjoy wine and socialize and meet people. And you know, to us, looking back on this, I never dreamed that that's what would be created. It was more of we want to make good wine, the best wine we can
possibly make. How do we build this business? Is blah blah blah, But never thought about it from the perspective of this is really an experience and a place of that people come to enjoying and meet people and enjoy wine and enjoy wine and food. And we met some of our best friends in the world through the Wiry.
So that's wonderful.
It's yeah, you know, it's it's it's you know, it's not just an achievement, but it's something that that is.
It affects your whole lifestyle, so.
Correct, correct, and it will be with us, you know, forever. So yeah, well, now I'm.
Going to have you fill in a question, finish the sentence. For me, a table without wine is like.
How about a car without wheels. I'll stick with the car theme.
Beautifully done.
I love the full circle of thing.
Perfect. But I guess the reason I say that, For us, wine is an integral part of our meals, So you know, it feels like something is missing if we don't have wine with our meals. So that's why I would say that.
Well, so now I have a question, and maybe maybe you answered it already, but maybe they're there's another name that'll come to mind. But we're sitting at a table. You're pouring a little wine in my glass, little cabinet from a little cabernet, fronk a little in your glass.
There's another glass, another empty seat next to you.
And I'm curious, who, from any walk of life, living or deceased do you wish that you could sit next to and share a bottle of your wine that you made.
Yeah, I don't have any person in individually, I would say, you know, I guess I guess I would say a renowned kind of wine critic. So I mean, we've tasted wine with a lot of sawmy a's and you know, and people educated in the wine business, but not really a I guess I would say a real world class
wine critic. And you could name your favorites, but really we'd like to just sit down with them and because of the you know, I'd like to get just get the real input, constructive input on the wines and how they think they would compare to some of the finest wines that they've tasted, because they've tasted a lot more
fine wines than I have. I've had some good ones, but not like the So anyway, you know what, you know what differentiates you know, this style of wine from you know, Romanee Conte or from Petrus or from Obrio or whatever. So what is the you know what, what is the differentiating factor?
You want some critical feedback, yes, not a philosophical talk, but critical feedback. Yes, yes, so and Neil Young will be at the other table. Be a different discussion. Yes, I don't know that.
We've been talking about the finer points of one.
So you know, you're talking about some of the wines you collect, and I know the wines that you make and that you drink. And if you had to select three wines, any three wines to take to a deserted island, what are the three wines?
You would pick three wines? Usually people ask what the one wine?
Ah see, I'm more generous.
You are well, Cavity franc would be one like yours?
Or would it be from a particular producer, a particular region.
I have to pick one of those?
You thought I was being nice with three, but.
I would say probably a franc blend from Palmeerol or Saint Similian, That's what I would say there. That would be one number two. I would get a Marsas from Burgundy. Just I don't drink a lot of white, but if you're on a deserted island, you're gonna want some variation. And it can be very warm and hot, and there might be days for some white wines, so you.
Gotta gotta mix it up a little bit. It's okay, So you got you got to be cab.
I mean, we drink cab all the time. We feel life would be empty without a Caberny semyon.
So we have a Bordeaux cab franc. We have a Burgundy so Chardonnay, and then the cabinet Sauvignon is.
Oh my goodness, from where Bordeaux would be Bordeaux. Yeah, yeah, you know the you know Napa, I mean, I love Napa cabs. I have a lot of them, but you know, a lot of them to me tend to be overly bold and overly tannic for my liking. So I tend to like the softer style cabs. And then I don't like extremely fruit forward style wine, so I think my safest bet would be a Bordeaux cab I love it. Well.
Now we have four of your wine sitting here, and you've talked a little bit about the Cabinet franc and you mentioned the petite verdeaux as wines who are given out to people that would come here and Neil Young or the aliens or myself. But I'm curious now if you can sort of pair these wines with music or you're going to kind of end on this lovely note of wine centric. I know you you don't sing to your vines, but let's see if wine conjures up in
emotion the way the wine does. Uh yeah, music conjures up in emotion the way wine does. So let's start with your Cabernet Frank that I've been sipping on.
Okay, that would be so that's kind of, you know, soft, elegant, relaxing, you know, just kind of sets the mood. That would be Neil Young Harvest.
Okay, your Petite for dough.
Yes, so that I'm gonna go Neil Young with that one too. I'll change it up on the next one, but on the Petit for doe It would be Neil Young like a hurricane, So you can do.
The same artist but different songs.
Okay, So like a hurricane because it's a rockin' loud. Jamming's song, which Petit for Doeau is kind of bold and in your face, but then it's about it's about. The song is a about a love story and loving this uh, this girl who is wild like a hurricane, but there's true love. So that would be my petibrido.
Okay.
And what about Cabernet Savignon.
M gonna do Carmen Air instead, maybe Cabernet Sevignon. That would be uh, putting me on the spot here on this one. So we do different styles of cab. This one is more of our fruit forward kind of style cab. So I would go with maybe Tom Petty with how about breakdown?
Okay, okay, look at you see, we got the rock thing. I'm going to throw you another, you know, left field one because you only make one white wine, but we should do white wine. What about your savignon blanc?
Yeah, the Saviyon blanc is our soft blanc, is done in stainless steel. It's very aromic, nose, very a lot of aromic flavors, very citrusy, kind of that style of sabbyon blanc. So maybe Jimmy Buffett, maybe like a Jimmy Buffett song, you know, because it reminds me of the beach and being outdoors and that kind of lifestyle.
I love it.
Okay, I'll throw you a softball for the last one. So you're doing really well in this and I like your rock theme. I would normally stop at three wines, but you're on a roll here, so let's do your Kerman year.
Okay, that would be Steppenwolf Born to be Wild. You were just.
Waiting to give that to me.
So that is out of all of our wines, the carmonr is the most different out of all of them. I tell people it's the most really boredo style we make. It's a very herbaceous. It's got that green pepper, that herbaceousness to it. The fruit is hard to find. I mean, it's really layered underneath the wine. So it's kind of the wild wine out of the bunch.
Well, fantastic, See Larry, you survived, you did it, you got your music. I'm ready to rock out with some of your wines. But I have one more question to end it. The first part of it is you've traveled around. You said you've collected wines from different places, but what wine region in the world is at the top of your bucket list to explore?
Yeah, I think right now, my wife and I've been talking about South America, so Chili and Argentina. So we've done a lot of the wine regions in Europe, and you know, we'd like to try there, you know, I think, Mike, I'm thinking Chili wines might have some carmon air well that too, but the Chili wines might be somewhat similar to California and as far as climate and stuff goes. But then, yeah, you got the carmon air and mall back.
We're very well known for our all back so yeah, so I think Chile and Argentina would be a fun place to go to, but a fun place to go to for wine as well.
Absolutely, And let's just finish up and you tell me, if people want to come visit here and they want to taste Cooda Ridge wines, how can they find you? Where can they find you? And what can they experience when they come here?
Yeah, So we're pretty easy to find, so we're you go to our website so www dot Kudah ridgewines dot com all one word. You can make find information about our wines there, purchase wines there. We do ship most states. You can make reservations for the winery. We also take walk ins. And then you know, as far as our experience, I'm very family oriented. We're very low key here. Our staff is low key. Our family is typically here and if not, our staff is like family, so you'll feel
that way. We have a beautiful outdoor patio area, so you know, during you know, the nice days here, sitting out and the vineyards having wine is a very enjoyable experience.
Just come and relax. Maybe you'll get Larry to put on some rock and roll in the background and you can sip along with the petite Fordeau or cap Fronk or any of the Bordeaux grapes with a little rock music, of course, and.
On a very rare day, I may even bring the kudah.
You still have it, We still have.
It, Yes, there's the pictures of it around here somewhow, and it's what year, it's nineteen seventy, wow, So we still have it. And I don't drive a lot. Everyone that comes here ass where's the car. It's well, it's at home.
I'm just surprised that none of your wines conjured up the song Barracuda. I know, well no, let's go find on but Larry, thank you for joining us today on Wine Soundtrack. It's been a joyed talking with you. Really fun and cheers.
Thank you Elson, Thanks for listening to a new episode of Wine Soundtrack USA. For details and updates, visit our website windsoundtracks dot com.