Growing up like a lot of kids I played plenty of team sports; baseball, football, soccer, basketball, track, softball and volleyball, and with the exception of track, one cliché always held true, there is no “I” in team. I was also lucky to have played on several championship teams where one or two gifted players carried the rest of us with average skills, but in order to gain the trophy (no participation trophies in the 1980s) everyone had to contribute. This is expressed in Gestalt theory, which puts forth the idea that the “whole is greater than the sum of the parts.”
In wine this is evident throughout the history of viticulture, as prior to WWII in Europe, and the 1970s in California, almost all wines were blends. Farmers planted a mix of grapes in their vineyards to insure against climate issues and with attributes to complement each other, and balance any deficiencies, in the production of the wine. This quarter we will explore how blended wines are made, either in the vineyard or the cellar, where the winemaker seeks to emphasize terroir and style through the use of multiple grapes.
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