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CA Wine in NY (was "TW" reefer designation)
Jeff English
Richard Hendrickson <rhendrickson@opendoor.com> wrote:
Small quantities of Calif. wine are stillAFAIK, the only NY wineries that bring in CA wine are the larger corporate operations such as Taylor. There is a considerable wine industry in four regions* of NY which consists primarily of small, family-operated wineries that produce estate- bottled wines of varieties that lend themselves to the climatic conditions. If you can look that far down your nose, Richard, you might actually find some of these acceptable if not wildly fabulous. Unfortunately for freight car content, probably none of this NY wine ever moves by rail, unless in individual shipments in UPS trailers on intermodal flat cars. * In addition to the Finger Lakes (where Taylor got their start, and Walter S. #$&^*^ still makes wine in his interpretation of that family's tradition, under the Bully Hill label), the other regions of NY that are known for producing good, award-winning wines are Long Island, the Hudson Valley and Chautauqua (shore of Lake Erie). --------------------------------------------------------------- Jeff English Troy, New York Proto:64 Classic Era Railroad Modeling englij@rpi.edu | R U T L A N D R A I L R O A D | Route of the Whippet ---------------------------------------------------------------
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Garth G. Groff <ggg9y@...>
Jeff,
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Perhaps New York wine no longer moves by rail today (or even much California wine for that matter, except perhaps from mega-producers like Gallo), but at one time Taylor and Great Western did a lot of business by rail. The Bath & Hammondsport wasn't known as "The Champagne Trail" for nothing. Long ago MODEL RAILROADER did a feature on the B&H for one of their "railroads you can model" books. It makes interesting reading, and has some data that would be useful in understanding how wineries in general used railroads to make and ship their products in the past. And after all, this group is largely about the past, isn't it? We're getting pretty far afield here, but at one time Brookside Winery (in Southern California's Cucamonga area) had an extensive rail system between their vineyards and the winery. They owned a really charming Baldwin 0-4-0T in the 10-ton range. The locomotive is long gone, as is the railroad, but they used to proudly display a photo of it in their tasting room. Kind regards, Garth G. Groff Jeff English wrote:
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Dave & Libby Nelson <muskoka@...>
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-----Original Message-----Jeff writes in defense of NY state wine: [snip]FWIW, within the wine industry it is normal practice to hold the threshold for issuing an award down at the level of getting the liquid into the bottle. The Orange County fair for instance, used to have over 1000 wines present and the wines that did not receive at least a bronze medal award could be counted on one hand [shudder]. As for freight car content, I am reminded of something in a Farrington book about wine grapes being shipped to NY vinters, ca. late 40's. Hungarian Tokays. Why would one ship the grapes and not just the juice? Dave Nelson
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Richard Hendrickson
Jeff English wrote (defensively):
AFAIK, the only NY wineries that bring in CA wine are theBeen there, done that. Some are, indeed, acceptable (barely). And, as I certainly haven't had the opportunity to try all of them, it's entirely possible that there are a few real gems I don't know about. In my admittedly limited experience, however, I have been singularly unimpressed with New York State wines. Though fine wines are produced in many regions of the world (e.g., Australia, New Zealand, Chile, as well as Europe and parts of California and the Pacific Northwest), the fact that wine grapes will grow in upstate New York, Southern Ontario, Virginia, etc. doesn't mean that it's possible to make good wines with them. I might add that some very bad wines are made in California, and not all of them are cheap wines in boxes or jugs. But the fact remains that, owing to certain combinations of soil and climate, some growing areas on the West Coast produce wines that are vastly superior to those made anywhere else in North America. That could certainly change. Twenty years ago, I wouldn't have expected much from eastern Washington or the Willamette Valley, but they are now producing some excellent wines of several varieties. However, they've been making wine in New York for several generations with results that don't live up to their sometimes rather pretentious hype. No reflection on the Empire State, which has a great many other virtues to recommend it, but wine is really not, in my opinion, one of them - though I'm open to being proven wrong. Richard H. Hendrickson Ashland, Oregon 97520
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Garth G. Groff <ggg9y@...>
Dave,
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The short answer about shipping whole grapes versus just the juice is that most red wines require fermentation on the skins and seeds to produce the correct acidity and color. Even from deep red grapes, the free-run juice is practically clear, only moderately acidic, and very sweet. You can't make a good claret (or whatever) without the skins and seeds. Instead you get a very, very light "blush". Kind regards, Garth G. Groff Dave Nelson wrote:
As for freight car content, I am reminded of something in a Farrington book
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thompson@...
Dave Nelson said:
FWIW, within the wine industry it is normal practice to hold the thresholdThis is very true. My father-in-law used to work for Italian Swiss Colonies' ad agency, and the Calif. State Fair gave awards based on volume categories; the top volume included only Gallo and Italian Swiss, so they divided all the awards, and could claim to be "award winning" with complete truth. As a wine fancier himself, he found this highly amusing. But at least those giant wine concerns shipped by rail. Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA 2942 Linden Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 http://www.signaturepress.com (510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com Publishers of books on railroads and on Western history
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