Wine: A synergy of site, imagination and food.
Anthony Terlato’s thoughts on the subject.
November 9, 2007
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With the recent purchase of the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard by the Terlato Wine Group (TWG, also Terlato Wines International: TWI), many in the industry and in the area are curious about the TWG's direction in the Sta. Rita Hills. redwinebuzz.com founder, Arthur Z. Przebinda, spoke with Anthony J. Terlato, Chairman of TWG regarding the recent transaction as well as TWG's plans for the property. Anthony J. Terlato has been in the wine industry for over 53 years. He has been credited with making Pinot grigio a household name and affecting the face of the American wine industry (full Bio). The family company he now leads holds winery and vineyard interests in Napa Valley, Santa Barbara County, Sonoma County, Oregon, Australia; the Rhone Valley in France and in Spain. Terlato first became involved with Sanford Winery as a distributor and minority partner in 2002. |
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In 2005, The Sanfords and TWG parted ways, with TWG assuming majority partnership of the winery and La Rinconada Vineyard. Shortly thereafter, TWG brought in Steve Fennell as wine maker to replace Bruno D'Alfonso. Fennell works with Doug Fletcher who serves as Vice President of Winemaking of TWG and oversees the company's California wine production. Robert and Janice Atkin, two of several minor shareholders in Sanford Winery after its transfer to Terlato in 2005, and long-standing partners in the winery sold the property to Terlato for an undisclosed sum.
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The recent purchase of the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard completes TWG's acquisition of the properties which originally were developed by Richard and Thekla Sanford. The vineyard is located across Santa Rosa Road from the Fiddlestix Vineyard and on the upslope of the Santa Rosa Hills. Adjacent to Sanford Winery’s La Rinconada Vineyard, it is currently planted to 66 acres of Pinot noir, 51 acres of Chardonnay as well as smaller blocks of Viognier, Riesling and Pinot gris. The barn, still on the property, housed the original Sanford winery. |
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| Sanford & Benedict Vineyard, looking south with Santa Rosa Hills as backdrop. Enlarge |
Speaking over the telephone with a distinct Chicago dialect delivered in a snappy cadence, Anthony Terlato was direct and forthcoming about his vision for the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard as well as the contiguous La Rinconada Vineyard. It was also inevitable, given Terlato's legendary love for food that the conversation would turn to wine and food pairing.
AZP: Congratulations on your recent acquisition of the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard.
AJT: Well, thank you very much!
AZP: Can you talk about what motivated TWI and the Atkins towards this sale?
AJT: I can’t exactly speak to Robert’s [Atkin] motivation. You could say he’s of retirement age and the vineyard, right now, needs some resources put into it. A great deal of the vineyard needs to be re-planted. The vines are really quite old. Perhaps he didn’t want to go through that - he’s spending a lot of time out of the country. I think that he just might have felt that: “if it’s not going to be this year, it’ll be next year or the year after” and he had somebody that was interested - us. We’ve been using fruit from there. We get along very well with him. He has a partnership with us at Sanford [Winery]. He probably might have looked at it as an opportunity and it was time for him to kind of sit back and enjoy what has been going on for the last eight or ten years or twelve years.
AZP: What was the appeal for you in acquiring the property?
AJT: Well, it’s absolutely a great vineyard. It’s proved that greatness can come from that soil. Clearly. We have a Stag’s Leap Cabernet, we have a Chardonnay coming from Russian River and a Zinfandel from Dry Creek [Valley] and having a Pinot noir coming from Santa Barbara kind of makes the palette for us. It makes a nice geographical map.
In the beginning, when we were distributors, we represented, probably, everyone who was important in Burgundy. I have a very strong feeling for Burgundies and what Burgundies stand for. And I do believe that Sanford and Benedict, based on the 40-some pages of testimonials to the vineyard I’ve read, that a lot of people feel like our people feel: if anybody’s going to make wine similar to some of the Burgundies Sanford & Benedict has the possibility [and] perhaps Rinconada also has that possibility. The idea of the Sanford vineyards to make great Burgundies, for me, was a tremendous challenge”
AZP: Now that vineyard, besides those two Burgundian varieties, also has Viognier…
AJT; Love it!
AZP: …some Pinot gris and Riesling.
AJT: I’m absolutely passionate for Viognier and I love what [Morgan] Clendenen is doing. I admire her – what’s she’s doing.
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I love the grape. I love what it does. I love the dried fruit flavors. I like to sometimes open a bottle and leave it open half [-full] and drink it again the next day. It was our plan to do some Viognier. We had looked at Sonoma, perhaps, to do it. We’ve kind of fooled around there a little bit but we’ll see if we can do it. But now, in Santa Barbara, in that area I mean, we’re going to plant some more Viognier. I hope that this Clendenen lady keeps on doing what she’s doing because I think that that’s a marvelous grape to make wines for gastronomy. |
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Looking north over the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard, and past the Santa Ynez River, at Sea Smoke Vineyard on the Santa Rita Hills. Enlarge |
AZP: Are you going to plant the additional Viognier at Sanford & Benedict, or somewhere else?
AJT: Well, Sanford & Benedict or perhaps Rinconanda. We’re only like two weeks or even only a week, I guess [into ownership of the vineyard]. We signed the papers last Friday. Doug Fletcher [Director of Winemaking for TWI in California] and Steve [Fennell, Wine maker at Sanford Winery] and our group will be going block by block because Sanford & Benedict is contiguous with Rinconada. So between the both of them we’ll look at it and see if within the next couple of months we can make a master plan for the next seven to ten years. I want to give myself some space to replant the entire vineyard.
AZP: A number of people source from Sanford & Benedict. I’m sure it’s on their mind: are they going to be able to keep getting fruit from that vineyard in the future?
AJT: Absolutely! Greed is not part of my structure. If they can make great wines off that vineyard, that’s terrific. I cant’ think of anything better. A lot of the great vineyards of Burgundy are shared by a number of different people and they’re all making great wines of the vineyards.
The people that are buying [fruit] from the vineyard, we’re charting what they bought last year and the year before, and the plan is that next year, they’re welcome to repeat. Then we’re going to start replanting of the vineyards. I don’t know which vineyard we’re going to replant first. The plan is, and our people well understand, that anyone that’s buying from the vineyard, we’ll continue to sell to them.
AZP: Those people use a smaller portion of the vineyard’s total production. What will happen to the remaining majority?
AJT: It will be used for Sanford, for sure. And, perhaps, there might be a Terlato Family Vineyards Pinot noir coming from that property.
AZP: And that would be made by Steve [Fennell]?
AJT: Yes. Steve’s the General Manager of Sanford [Winery] and he’s going to manage the Sanford & Benedict Vineyard. I have a great deal of faith and admiration [for Steve Fennell and Doug Fletcher]. I’m like the chief surgeon who decides how the appendix should be taken out and than I give the knife to someone else.
AZP: Nice analogy. Can you talk a little bit about the legacy of Sanford & Benedict Vineyard, what that means to you and your plans for the vineyard, for the brand, for the portfolio. How do you feel about the legacy, overall.
AJT: Well, the legacy is, of course, marvelous. We’ve been marketing wines for fifty some odd years, the last ten we’ve also been wine makers. The Sanford & Benedict vineyard has been pointed [out], by a number of people, to be one of the top five vineyards in California. So it’s a great honor for us to “inherit” such a great vineyard with such tremendous potential and take the imagination that wee have and apply it to that vineyard.
We have not lacked in doing that since we’ve become wine producers. We’ve produced boutique wines which have been a good success: we’ve produced Episode, which was a good success. We have now a wine called Galaxy that’ll be coming out in March, which is a heavy Syrah-Cabernet-Merlot blend from Sonoma. We’ve designed a Russian River Chardonnay that, in double-blind tastings, is normally picked as the French Chardonnay in the group. So I don’t lack imagination for what we want to do and being able to have such a renowned vineyard to work in, you know, is like a kid with a hundred-dollar bill in a candy store.
AZP: Can you discuss how the decision by TWG to discontinue organic farming practices at Sanford & Benedict fits in with your vision of preserving that legacy?
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AJT:
I prefer not to engage in what the previous practices were, and how and
if they were observed. It’s irrelevant and it’s a trap that will lead to
people saying he’s changing. What we want people to say is: “He is
improving.” Our goal is to make great wines, for gastronomy, in a style
I refer to as Burgundian, as wine is the result of the soil from which
it comes. We will manage the vineyards so we will produce fruit that
will make the goal possible. The orchestra has two new conductors: Doug
and Steve, who will assess the qualities of the vineyard and then we
intend to manage the vineyard, so as to keep the blessed soil healthy,
and create an environment for the plants to produce the fruit necessary
to produce great wines. |
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| Starting with the 2006 vintage, Sanford wines will have a new label. |
AZP: Do you have any further plans for growth of your portfolio in Santa Barbara County or the Central Coast?
AJT: No. At this moment, I think, between Sanford & Benedict and La Rinconada, we have a lot of good work to do there. And we’re dealing with proven soil which, as Doug says has good exposures, and one of the things we’re looking forward to doing is to make a classic Pinot noir.
The goal is: if we’re in the top five of the vineyards of the area, why can’t we be the number one. Somebody wants to be. Somebody’s going to be. Somebody’s going to do everything he can to be. It certainly is going to be one of them.
AZP: You talked about Morgan Clendenen’s Cold Heaven Cellars Viogniers as having gastronomical appeal. You are no doubt aware of the wide and avid discussion of the style of California wines as shifting to what many call: “too ripe”, “too alcoholic”, “too food unfriendly”, etc. What do you consider a well food-matched wine?
AJT: Well, I’m not very impressed with high alcoholic wines. I like wines with good acidity and I do believe that your palate tells you when there is a seamless match. It’s the same way when you’re at an Italian restaurant: you know there’s garlic in it, but you shouldn’t be tasting it. [If you do], the Chef was incorrect [in his/her use of garlic] if you can tell that it’s in there.
For me, when you’re drinking wine, it should be like the sound of a symphony playing a piece and it shouldn’t be like the sound when they’re warming up – where you hear all dissonant sounds. It should match up immediately with the food.
When we taste wines, we’ll do double-blinds and then we’ll bring food into it to see how does that change everything, because wine is for food. If you’re going to just sit around and drink just to do numbers, that’s one thing. But when we’d do winemaker dinners, I used to get bored with making the wine choices and then pontificating about them, so we’d have the four or five wines out, blind, and have the people pick them. And they would. They would do a tasting and rate the wines. Then I’d put the wines in a different order and we would have dinner and I’d tell them to do a tasting again. And they were amazed how differently the felt about the wine while they were eating.
AZP: Their preferences changed?
AJT: Yes! Look, I’m not a critic. You know, you get dealt a card, you’ve got to play the card you’re dealt, the way we look at how does wine match up with food. If people come to my house, and perhaps to yours, they always leave saying: “I’ve never drank so much wine with dinner!” And the reason they were able to drink more was because it worked. If there’s no match, the wine stays in the glass and you continue eating. If the wine and the food match, their glass is empty.
When we used to do tastings of four or five different wines with a customer, I never had to ask him which wine he liked. I could only tell by the one he would keep on drinking and the one we had to keep filling the glass. And we’d stop filling that glass to see which one he liked second. I never had to say: “Which one did you like?” It was clear! He showed me which one he liked by continuing to drink the one that worked with that particular dish. I could change all the herbs in the dish and have him like a different wine.
AZP: It’s all about the synergy.
AJT: Yes!
Arthur Z. Przebinda is the Founder and Publisher of redwinebuzz.com. e-mail Arthur
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