I’d Rather Be on a Vineyard

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Katya Rucker: What are we calling this, like wine--- 

[00:00:04] Morgan Joseph: What is my title that you would use for the intro? Um, ah, I would say a wine enthusiast, with certifications. [Laughing]. Yeah I would say that’s the best descriptor of me at this moment.

[00:00:23] Katya Rucker: Welcome to another episode of I'd Rather Be, a podcast that explores the hobbies and passions that make life [00:00:30] fuller and richer.

[00:00:31] I'm your host, Katya Rucker. And after some of the deliberation you just heard, I decided to call this episode “I'd Rather Be on a Vineyard” because our guest, Morgan Joseph, is in her element when she's getting to talk to the people who grew the grapes in the glass of wine she's drinking. Morgan is an extra special guest because hers was the very first interview I recorded for the I'd Rather Be podcast, before the podcast even got its name. Morgan is both a [00:01:00] close friend and former colleague of mine and she and her husband, Daniel, live in Walla Walla, Washington. 

[00:01:06] Morgan Joseph: I would definitely say I live in wine country. I know most people are not familiar with Washington state as a wine mecca. I think most people are like “Seattle, rain, chilly, no sun.” That’s their vibe when they think about Washington state, but there's a whole other side of the state that is nothing like the west side. Um, on the other side of the mountains, I think that's where the majority of the growing regions in Washington state are. [00:01:30] So I live in Walla Walla, which is its own American viticulture area, or just, growing region for grapes that's recognized by whatever governing body makes those designations.

[00:01:40] Katya Rucker: A lover of wine is called an oenophile, and as an oenophile, Morgan is going to use a few wine terms that we should define upfront so you'll know what she means when she uses them in context. Let's call these the “three Vs.” First, viticulture, which Morgan just said in reference to winemaking in Washington.

[00:01:59] Viticulture [00:02:00] is the practice of growing grapevines. So anyone who runs a vineyard is practicing viticulture. Second, varietal. The varietal is the specific kind of grape used in a bottle of wine. So a bit more specific than simply red wine or white wine. Examples of varietals are Chardonnay or Riesling in white wines or Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot and red wines.

[00:02:22] And third, vintage. The vintage is the year the grapes were harvested for a specific bottle of wine. Even the same label can [00:02:30] taste different from vintage to vintage because the weather patterns like the amount of rain or the temperature variation throughout a season will affect how the grapes taste. Morgan is also going to refer to growing regions, and these are just the specific places a bottle was produced, like Napa in California or Burgundy in France. So let's find out what made Morgan go from casual wine drinker, which I mean is probably a hobby shared by many people, to full-blown viticulture aficionado.  

[00:02:58] Morgan Joseph: So, my origin story with wine -- [00:03:00] I think was like a seed that was planted and it was not watered, but it was like one of those 100-year dormant seeds where it got watered later. Um, but I first tried wine when I was 10 at my parents' dinner table. I know that is not a legal thing in the United States, but we were not living in the US at the time. And that was just kind of a thing. Um, my dad's like, “Oh yeah, you want some wine with dinner?” So I had a little, little tiny glass where I'd get 2 sips of wine and I felt very fancy. I had no idea what I was drinking at the [00:03:30] time, but it felt fun. Um, and it just made me feel like an adult, but I was freaking 10.

[00:03:36] Katya Rucker: Eventually, Morgan and her family moved back to the states. so her parents decided that meant no more wine with dinner. But then, in Morgan's twenties, she and her husband moved to Southern California because he had taken a job in the wine industry. And while attending a wine harvest festival in Santa Barbara in 2018, Morgan got to see a newly released documentary called Somm 3.

[00:03:58] And that’s Somm spelled S [00:04:00] O M M, not to be confused with Saw 3, the horror movie. Somm is short for sommelier, and a sommelier is a wine expert who helps you pick a bottle of wine at a fancy restaurant. So the documentary Somm 3 covers a highly controversial and groundbreaking event from the world of wine.

[00:04:18] And this was the Paris Wine Tasting of 1976. This was a blind wine tasting, comparing California and French wines. And because California winemaking was so [00:04:30] new compared to the long and prestigious history of winemaking in France, no one expected the California wines to perform very well. There were 10 red wines and 10 white wines, five of each from each country.

[00:04:42] And the 11 judges, nine of whom were French, had to score the wines based on taste alone since the label and everything about how and where each wine is made is hidden in a blind tasting. It made international headlines when in both the red and white categories, a California bottle won. [00:05:00] And while this was a massively important event that helped California become the wine mecca it's known as today, the documentary kind of comes full circle by pointing out the limitations of blind tastings, because so much of the experience of wine is learning the story of the region, the producer, and how the wine was made.

[00:05:18] And this last point really hit home for Morgan, especially when she had the chance to meet some of the grape growers in the Santa Barbara region. So after the festival, Morgan began to see wine in a completely different light.

[00:05:30] Morgan Joseph: And, we went. And it completely changed my understanding of wine from like, a consumer-packaged good to an entire expression of a region - people, a place, an experience. Like we were there, we were going to different wineries. They were opening vintages from like 20, 30 years ago. It was like, we were talking to wine makers. We were seeing where the grapes were grown and just realizing there's this whole community and experience around grape-growing and the production of the wine that really doesn't always get [00:06:00] to you as a consumer in the grocery store or like Total Wine or wherever you buy your things. And so I think that's really the spark that lit this big fire and like, oh my god, I'd be trying some new wines. And so now every time I go somewhere, I'm like, is there wine here? Do they make wine? Could we go visit it? Um, and luckily my partner, my husband is really into that, but I'm sure sometimes my friends are like, mm, can we just not?

[00:06:23] Katya Rucker: When Morgan and I first met, we were working together at an ed tech startup, and Morgan was the company's entire marketing. [00:06:30] It was her job to tell the world why our company existed, and she was really good at it. And as we spoke about wine, I was starting to connect the dots between this visionary, storytelling side of her and the wine enthusiast she had become. So I asked if her interest in stories and in people and how things come to be was a part of the draw of wine for her. 

[00:06:49] Morgan Joseph: Honestly, I think for me, you really hit the nail on the head. Um, recognizing that it wasn't just like a thing, a product that you buy off the shelf. And like, some, like, let's be honest, some wines are [00:07:00] mass produced to be basically like, an alcohol beverage that is similar to how people buy like a Coke or a Pepsi. That is 100% real. Um, but I think for me, what you were saying, the storytelling, understanding where things are from, you know, I'm very, I'm a very curious person and just recognizing that every single glass of wine has something that can tell you if you know how to read it, how to listen to it. I think that's very, very cool.

[00:07:30] And once you like nerd out, you'll really start to see like, oh, every region has an archetype. There's a way they do things that makes wine this way. Um, and it's really interesting and cool to see that and to be able to recognize that the end product, if you read it correctly, if you, if you can taste it and you understand what to look for, it can tell you so much, like who made it, where it's from the climate, like how hot it was that year, maybe what the winemaker's [00:08:00] influence on the grape was. So I think that was super true for me, but I'd say for other people it can be really different.

[00:08:06] Some people like making things and wine is not the most accessible thing to make, but it is something where, you know there is a human influence. There is a craft, there is an artistry to it. Um, so I think people can be drawn to it in that way. 

[00:08:23] Katya Rucker: Now, it's true that the majority of wine drinking happens in homes and restaurants, not on vineyards.

[00:08:29] And when we're faced [00:08:30] with hundreds of choices of bottles in a wine store, there usually isn't much rhyme or reason to what we ended up walking out with. Sometimes it's a bottle we've tried before and other times something about the look of the label catches our eye. Here's how Morgan goes about choosing a new wine to try.

[00:08:45] Morgan Joseph: I select wines based on what I anticipate or what I don't know. If I see a wine on the shelf and I'm like, I don't know what this is, or like, I've never heard of this region, or I don't know what, like, I don't know about this producer and I'm not going to lie, I'm still very new [00:09:00] to getting into producers or being at the producer level.

[00:09:03] Like I know I've seen that -- No, I only know certain producers. Um, but I think it's really hard for me to just like, pick a bottle off the shelf now and just like blindly be like I'm gonna just get this right quick. Really now I'm like, I want to make sure that I'm picking something that I'm either going to like, or I'm going to learn from.

[00:09:25] So those are kind of the two questions I asked myself when I'm looking at a wine [00:09:30] store. Right now, because I think I still am, like, I think I'll probably feel this way for the entirety of my life or for as long as I'm interested in wine, I feel like I'm a novice. I still don't know enough because I don't think there's ever enough you can learn about wine. There's like a thousand growing regions or grape varietals in Italy. So like, I'm definitely not going to know all of those. Um, but when I'm going to pick a wine for myself, I really am looking at the store I’m in, seeing what [00:10:00] the store is offering.

[00:10:02] If it's a big box store, then they're offering variety. And so it's like, oh, is there something here that I probably can't get at my home store? But if it's a more curated store, I'm really trying to lean in and ask the people who are at the store, which I know most people don't like asking people at the store questions, but I love it, because a lot of the time, if you're at a smaller wine store, a person there is incredibly knowledgeable.

[00:10:23] They know why the product is there. Like they know why that wine was selected and they can tell you a little bit of something about [00:10:30] it. They're probably not going to be an expert on all of the wines, depending on how many SKUs they have in the store. And by SKUs I mean how many labels or bottles, like labels they have available for purchase, but in those smaller stores, I'm really trying to lean into, what's the expertise of the people here and what are they interested in sharing with their community. So that's, that's kind of how I think about selecting wine for myself, which is way more thinking than I think most people do with selecting wine.[00:11:00] 

[00:11:00] I think most people go into the store like, is it red or is it white? And that's probably where they're at right now. 

[00:11:07] Katya Rucker: And is it your preference to look for those more curated wine stores over the big box stores? 

[00:11:16] Morgan Joseph: I think big box stores are awesome. Like a Total Wine or a BevMo if you're on the west coast, or Benny's in the Midwest.

[00:11:24] I think those are really great stores to just understand the breadth of wines that are available, [00:11:30] just to test and to try things because they probably have something from everywhere. It may not be like the most niche producer or maybe the highest expression of that, but they will definitely have something from almost every region.

[00:11:44] So you'll get to play and understand what you like and what you don't like. And then once you kind of understand those things, the more local stores are really great for niching and digging into styles and varietals that you really liked that you [00:12:00] might not be able to get more than one or two bottles at the big box store.

[00:12:03] Katya Rucker: Something Morgan said a couple minutes ago, really stuck out to me. And it was when she said that when she goes to the store to buy wine, she picks a bottle because she knows she's either going to like it or to learn from it. And it kind of took the pressure off the buying process in my mind. Like there's no wrong answer when it comes to wine.

[00:12:23] Morgan shared a little about her process and I was ready to hear how to put it into action. 

[00:12:30] Morgan Joseph: So I think my two tips -- One, if you have tasted wine before and you like certain wines, do a little bit of research about where it's from. Uh, you can just Google the name of the wine and see what region it's from and what grapes, and then I think you can go to the store and look for something that's similar. Like, go to that region’s section, because I know in -- well, this is unhelpful because in big box stores, I know in Total Wine, they have regional - if it's like a non-domestic produced wine, they'll have it by region. But then if it's a domestic wine, so a wine that’s made in the United States, they'll have it by grape varietal.

[00:13:10] So, helpful, somewhat unhelpful. So know the region and know what grape it is made of. And then, and then the second thing I would say is ask somebody. I feel like it can be really intimidating going into a wine store and asking questions, especially because I think people assume the [00:13:30] sales people are there to like, upsell you or sell you something that you don't really want.

[00:13:34] And I'm not going to lie. That is possible. But I would say if you can ask questions, and you feel like this person is authentically trying to help you, trust that they are, and try. And I think, you know, everyone isn't perfect. Everyone has not tried every single wine. I work at a wine store like a couple of days a week, so I can keep learning.

[00:13:55] I know I've probably given kind of like, not the best recommendations at times. [00:14:00] So, have grace. Ask questions and do a little bit of research before, because every bottle, even if it does fit the profile that you're looking for may not be something that you like, but then you'll know. And I think the interesting part of wine is understanding why you liked one versus the other.

[00:14:18] Katya Rucker: With this guidance from Morgan, I set out for Ball Square Fine Wines in Somerville, Massachusetts. This is a shop pretty close to the Tufts University campus and it won Boston magazine's Best Wine [00:14:30] Shop in 2013. I figured it was the kind of place that would be intentional about the kinds of wines they choose to stock on their shelves, which should give me the chance to try something unique.

[00:14:41] One of my fallback wines is a $14 bottle called Liberty School. And I honestly forget how I discovered it, but I always come back to it instead of choosing a more expensive bottle that I'm not sure I'll like as much. Doing the research Morgan suggested, I learned that Liberty School is produced in the Paso Robles region [00:15:00] in California, halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and the grape varietal is Cabernet Sauvignon. According to Morgan, there was a good chance I'd like any Cabernet from this region, since it would probably taste similarly to Liberty School. And then I planned to ask for a recommendation of something new -- something I definitely wouldn't have picked out on my own. And one of the wine store employees was very willing to help. 

[00:15:25] Wine Store Employee: If you're looking to try something that is not just like all of the California red wines that you've had so often, I [00:15:30] think Italy is a good place to go. I prefer French wine, typically myself, because I love them, but Italy's really hard to wrap your head around. There are many, many grapes that only grow there. 

[00:15:38] Katya Rucker: I heard there are over 1,000.

[00:15:41] Wine Store Employee: It’s insane. It's way too much for any one person to take on. Um, but they're really cool. I like them. They're more food friendly. They're usually a little bit higher acid. Sometimes the acid is a little bit better for pairing with cuisine. Um, this is something I tried recently that has Croatina as the majority grape in it and I’ve [00:16:00] never heard of that. So I trusted the wine manager and I took it home and I enjoyed it and it was absolutely lovely.

[00:16:04] Katya Rucker: I didn't catch the name of this first wine he chose, but it was $44, which felt a little high to me. So I asked if he had anything in the 15 to $20 range. 

[00:16:15] Wine Store Employee: Do you want something that's approachable and kind of training wheels for a California drinker?

[00:16:18] Katya Rucker: No, I think I want to jump in, like I want to go, you know, total left field.

[00:16:24] Wine Store Employee: So this is actually significantly cheaper. 

[00:16:28] Katya Rucker: He had selected a [00:16:30] $13 bottle called Copertino Reserva, which I later learned was produced in the Puglia region of Italy. That's in the south. So if you think of Italy as one big boot, Puglia is the heel.

[00:16:41] Wine Store Employee: But what I like about this one that you don't get out of a lot of new world growers is that this is very wild. It is not a clean wine. It does not just use saccharomyces for fermentation. There's a lot of natural-born fermentors that are used to make this wine. So it smells and tastes of brettanomyces. 

[00:16:59] Katya Rucker: Okay, trying to [00:17:00] keep up with some of the advanced wine vocabulary. Saccharomyces is basically Brewer's yeast. It's a kind of fungi with various species that are used in making everything from bread to wine. Brettanomyces is a different kind of yeast that is usually considered a wine spoiler as it contaminates and ruins wine that is aging in barrels.

[00:17:21] And it's hard to eradicate once it's present in a winery, but low levels of brettanomyces are supposedly not as offensive. They're even desirable as [00:17:30] is the case with this wine. And depending on the amount of brettanomyces and a bottle of wine, you might get a metallic or even mousy flavor, according to the Oxford Companion to Wine.

[00:17:41] Wine Store Employee: A lot of times people associate that with like, proper lambics or things like that. This is a wild fermentation, so it's very barnyard-y. It's funky. Um, some people say, kind of horse blankety. All of that stuff aside, very very concentrated dark fruits, very firm tannic structure. So it's kind of drying on the sides of your mouth, and it's cool because it's [00:18:00] a cooperative of different wine growers around the same region as the name, that all kind of put their grapes together. So a lot of times it's a blend of grapes and then just spontaneous fermentation. 

[00:18:10] Katya Rucker: And spontaneous fermentation - Is that just like-- 

[00:18:12] Wine Store Employee: Once you make the sugar available to the atmosphere, the things that are already living there that can respire sugars will start to go for it. So basically, up to 350 different things that are single-celled fungi or bacteria or things like that are going to get to it and start to ferment those sugars and 

[00:18:28] Katya Rucker: So, barnyard-y. 

[00:18:30] Wine Store Employee: Exactly. That's where that wildness comes from. 

[00:18:32] Katya Rucker: And is it middle of the state or?

[00:18:34] Wine Store Employee: This is quite south Italy. Um, not far from Naples, but not quite that far south.

[00:18:38] Katya Rucker: So I had secured a wine that had been described to me as wild, funky and horse blankety. In the words of this wine enthusiast, the training wheels were coming off. The only thing left to do was try the two wines.

[00:18:53] The one that I was probably going to like since it was the same grape varietal from the same region in California as Liberty School was called Justin. [00:19:00] The wild card was the $13 Copertino Reserva from the heel of Italy's boot. For advice on how best to try a wine for the first time I turned back to Morgan.

[00:19:10] Morgan Joseph: There are ways that people teach you to taste wine, but I think if you break down those steps into just something that's like, more normal, I would say, look at the wine. What are you noticing about it? What is the color? Um, and I know if you were like, oh, it’s red. But look a little bit past that and say, are the edges clear, or is it like more of a reddish red or is it a blue red?

[00:19:39] And, and I think the more wines you drink, the more you'll see that it's different. And so, what does it look like? And then I think, what does it smell like? And this is where it can be really hard to discern flavors, especially in certain wines that are really high alcohol, you’re like, I smell nail polish, because alcohol.

[00:20:00] So I do recognize that, but just like, see if you're smelling anything and then when you taste it, like, what do you notice? I think people are often looking for fruit flavors to stand out to them. And I feel like the fruit flavors in a lot of wines are kind of the hardest things to learn. So I would actually think about, How does it feel on your palette? Is there a lot of-- is it heavy? Is it light on your palette? Like, does it coat your palette? Um, is, [00:20:30] is it really acidic? Do you feel like you're getting a lot of saliva in your mouth afterwards? Or is it super tannic? Is, is your mouth really dry? Um, and does it taste a little bitter when you finish? And then I think you can also think about like, is the fruit there tasting fresh, like, oh, this is like a cherry that I got out of a tree or is it stewed or is it cooked? And then, and then I think from there, like comparing wines. 

For me, where I [00:21:00] kind of started realizing all wines have a different flavor profile is by tasting them next to each other. Because I'm not going to lie, I don't have a photographic memory. I can't remember every single wine that I tasted and every single tasting note that existed there.

[00:21:15] But when I'm having two wines next to each other and they're different varietals from different regions, and I taste one and then I take the other, I'm like, oh, those are different. And then I try to figure out what is different about those to me. So-- [00:21:30] 

[00:21:31] Katya Rucker: Yeah, it just sounds very mindful. Like you are, you're looking, you're smelling, you're like, present with your senses. You can't be doing something else and tasting wine. You have to like, really focus on it. 

[00:21:44] Morgan Joseph: And I realize that that's not necessarily the experience people want to have. Some people just want to sit down with their show and guzzle a whole bottle of Pinot Grigio, or just be at a cookout, and drink the wine with the food.

[00:21:56] And that is totally okay. But I think [00:22:00] sometimes when you drink the wine with the food and you're like, I don't like this, that's really when you should be paying attention, because it's not necessarily that the wine is bad. It's just, there's something about this grape variety or the way this grape was made that is not, that is not something you like. And so I think that's what you should pay attention to. More the wines that you don't like, than ones that you do like, because if you do like it, you're probably not going to be super conscious of what's happening. You're just going to be, like, I like this. This is feeling very good to me.

[00:22:27] Um, Versus the other ones [00:22:30] when you don't like it, you’re going to be like, why? I thought this was a red wine, why don’t I like it? So I think those misses are more opportunities to learn, kind of like in anything, like when you make a mistake or you don't do something perfectly, there's an option to learn from it more so than if you did something really well and there’s not a ton of feedback.

[00:22:46] Katya Rucker: When I got home from the wine store, I recruited my spouse Beckett to taste the two wines with me. As expected, the Justin bottle was pretty appealing to both of us. And I could taste the similarity to Liberty School [00:23:00] since it was from the same region and the same varietal of grape. For the Copertino, all I shared with Beckett was that it was from Italy and that I had specifically requested something new and different. Here's what Beckett had to say upon trying it. 

[00:23:13] Beckett Rucker: The smell is really weird. It doesn't taste like it smells at all. 

[00:23:18] Katya Rucker: How would you describe the smell? 

[00:23:20] Beckett Rucker: It’s almost like, I mean, I don't like it. I'll say that. It almost has that like, you know, that smell when your electronics are working too hard, like a [00:23:30] blender or a mixer working too hard. 

[00:23:31] Katya Rucker: Really? Hmm. 

[00:23:34] Beckett Rucker: That's what it reminds me of. 

[00:23:37] Katya Rucker: Interesting. But when you drink it, it's not bad, huh? 

[00:23:40] Beckett Rucker: No, yeah, the taste is good. 

[00:23:41] Katya Rucker: So, would drink again? 

[00:23:45] Beckett Rucker: 10 out of 10 would drink again.

[00:23:47] Katya Rucker: 10 out of 10, wow. 

[00:23:48] And just like that we had discovered a wine that we probably never would have tried if I hadn't approached the wine store employee for a recommendation. Sure, it smelled like an overworked blender to Beckett, but now we [00:24:00] know that that was just those brettanomyces at work. But, that was probably the most fun wine buying experience I've had. And now I'm sold on Morgan’s suggestion to ask questions and take the time to learn, given the amazing variety of wine that exists.

[00:24:18] Passions and hobbies are the things that add color and spark to our lives. And as Morgan’s story taught me, we can discover new passions or areas of interest simply by opening ourselves up to new [00:24:30] experiences. I'd like to thank Morgan for sharing her love of wine here on the I'd Rather Be podcast. If you're enjoying I’d Rather Be, the best way you can help the show grow is by sharing it with one or two friends, because personal recommendations are how most people discover new podcasts. And hitting that follow or subscribe button on Spotify or Apple Podcasts is also really, really helpful. Next week, we're diving into the ancient art of making pottery.

[00:24:57] Guest for Next Episode: It's a fight [00:25:00] between you and the clay. Who's gonna win? Who’s gonna, you know, tame the clay, or is the clay gonna tame you? 

[00:25:07] Katya Rucker: Tune in on January 4th to listen to the episode. If you or someone you know has a hobby to share with the world, head to the I’d Rather Be guest form at idratherbepodcast.com. This podcast was hosted, produced, and edited by me, Katya Rucker. You can find show notes and the full transcript for this episode at idratherbepodcast.com. Have a great week, and [00:25:30] thanks for listening.