Welcome to Wine Soundtrack USA. Listen to the passion with which producers narrate their
winery and their world. Teen thirty answers discover their stories, personalities, and
passions. Hello, friends and listeners of Wine Soundtrack. This is Alison Levine
and today I'm with Luisa Sawyer Lindquist, the wonderful winemaker president of verdd Wines.
A real treat to be here of Luisa, because ver DoD Wines,
you know, specializes in Spanish varieties. But Luisa tell us a little bit
more about Verdad. Where you're located, and you know what you're doing.
Okay, Hi Allison, Hi everyone. So I started Verdad in two thousand
and My original vision was to make Spanish for Rietal wines here on the beautiful
Central Coast. I was inspired by my love of first Albarino and the lovely
aromatic, crisp white wines used in Reaspicious and Galicia in Spain, and second
by my love of well second and third love of rose. I was always
an avid rose drinker since I was in my late twenties, and I just
thought the wines were magical at capturing the whole feeling of summer and just a
breezy, beautiful wines that have so many different expressions. And then temporneo,
the wines of Rioja and ribert Vera del Duero have always been magical to me.
And there's so many different expressions of temporneo all over Spain, but particularly
in Rioja and Riberto del Duero that I thought it would be really fun to
make those wines. And I thought also that they were incredibly underrepresented in California,
especially considering California's close ties to Spain and Mexico and the Spanish culture and
being part of Spain at one point, and also the climate, the Mediterranean
geographical features of California looks a lot like certain areas of Spain. So just
always piqued my curiosity coming over to California from the my native New York on
wine visits, how there were no Spanish grapes to speak of planted here.
Yeah, it's always a dominance of French grapes, yes, French and Italian
to some extent, And yeah, it was just like, what's going on
here? So where do you source your fruit from? Do you own any
vineyards? Are you sourcing? And where did you find Spanish frities or did
you have to plant them? Initially we had to plant them. We at
the moment don't own any vineyards. We had originally a long term lease at
Ibarra Young Vineyard and Bob, my husband, Bob of Lindquist Family Wines formerly
of QPE, planted the Ibaria drafted over and planted a Bari Young vineyard in
the eighties. So he had been using that for Sarah morved Vionnier and Marson.
And then when we actually before we got married, we planted some Alberino
there, the cuttings which we got from Brian Babcock, one of the major
sources for Alberino were this these cuttings he took from Bodegas Morgadillo with the permission
of the winemaker at that time at Jose Antonio Lopez, and Brian brought back
a bundle of Alberino cuttings. His friend worked for TWA Airlines and his friend
to walk them through, which you could do in those days pre nine to
eleven. And I believe he planted them around in the early nineties, so
just a little planting. He made some wine which I think he so sold
a little bit in his tasting room, but it was never a commercial wine
for him. When we found out about that, we asked to buy cuttings
from him, and we bought a basically one hundred and fifty sticks in nineteen
ninety six and planted that at a bar Young and then in two thousand and
five took cuttings from a bar Young and planted that in the vineyard we had
edna valley called Sawyer Lindquist Vineyard and two we planted two acres there. Immediately
we saw the Alberino was I don't we can go on and on and on,
but Temporneo was a different story that called around to local nurseries, and
I believe it was Duarde Nursery supplied us with some Temporneo budwood which we planted,
and so this that was planted in nineteen ninety nine. And then a
friend of ours brought cuttings from Bodegas Pesquera and he got permission from Alejandro Fernandez
to take cuttings. His name is Steve Vancerello. He worked for Classical Wines
of Spain and then he started a winery called Paridor also devoted to Spanish grape
varieties, especially Temporneo. So I bought the cuttings. We bought the cuttings
from Steve from Pascuera and planted a little bit in atabar Young and then we
took cuttings from that planting and brought that into Edna Valley. So kind of
cooler climate areas to a degree. Well, I mean ibari Jung is in
Santinez, in Los Livo's district or near Yes, it's Santa ynez Is.
It's right on the border of Santinez and Los a Livo's next right adjacent to
where the Beckmann family winery is. So and what's your total case production?
It's about twenty two thousand, Between two thousand and twenty five hundred, I've
gone up a little bit above that. So that's what it is now.
And are you mostly like direct to consumer or are you in different markets?
I'm in different markets. And I should add that in addition to albarino rose
from Grenache or Garnatsha tem for Neo, I also make cabernet and that is
starting to become actually have larger production wine than Temperaneo. And that's something that
I'm planning on growing more. It's from organic grapes, certified grapes from Passa
Robles, and I also have some grapes that i've in Beryl wine in Beryl
that's from Santa Ynez near Happy Canyon, so really covering the central coast.
Yes, exactly exactly. Caeberne is a great grape and it's very sturdy and
it just likes a lot of new wood. But it's been really fun to
make it and work with it. So what is your first memory relevant to
wine? Oh? Gee, that's a good question. One of my first
memories, Well, when I got into wine, I was I took a
year off between high school and college and worked in Yosemite and a lot of
my friends were older than me, and they they were Californians and they drank
a lot of wine. So I remember hanging out and partnering, partying with
them and really enjoying wine. And probably the magical setting helped a lot as
well. But I was, you know, in that kind of I don't
know what I should study in this or that, and somehow it occurred to
me it would be really fun to study wine, and so you did that.
I did that to a certain extent. I ended up going to Long
Island University there used to be an undergraduate campus in Southampton, and as I
was in my senior year, I realized that there was a budding wine industry
there and I explored that and I asked the administration at LU if I could
work at the first winery on Long Island, hard Grave Vineyard and be kind
of an intern there and for an exchange for college credit, and they agreed,
So I got a semester that I did that full time. And I
know you got your start in Long Island working in wineries there before you came
out west, and you've obviously been in wine for a long time and probably
well, I know you've had the pleasure and privilege to drink a lot of
great wines in those years. Is there one wine that stands out? I'm
sure there are many, But is there one that comes to mind as one
of those aha moments at some point? I don't know what the aha was.
Maybe it was about a grape or a place, or just a food
pairing or who knows, or maybe it was just the setting of the people
in place. Well, there's been a few moments like that. I have
to say, gosh, that's tough because I've been so lucky and so fortunate
to be exposed to some of the greatest wines in the world throughout my varied
career. I worked for a distributor importer in New York. I worked for
a very fine wine shop in New York where we did Bordeaux futures, so
I got to taste first growth Bordeaux and I went to early after I moved
to San Francisco in ninety two, I decided to go to the wine experience
in New York for the first time. And I've been in the business at
that point for a while how many years, but I went. So the
New York wine experience at that time was really exciting and I'm sure it still
is. I haven't been for a number of years, but one around diligently
tasting, if not to every table, certainly a lot of tables, especially
the imported wines. And I tasted up seventy six JJ Prune Auschleizer, and
that was a revelation of absolute beautiful beauty and incredible wines. There was also,
I think it was at that point, maybe in eighty six, but
a good you know, of Louis Latour Corton Charlemagne, which was a beautiful
wine that stood out to me very nicely. A few years before that,
I had been at one of the Lobberd tastings. They used to do it
at the Marriott Marquis in New York, and I was working for them,
and and I was a new sales rep. And the instructions were go around
to each table and introduce yourself and taste one or two wines, you know,
so you know our portfolio, and you say hello. And I'd been
tasting probably and mingling for over an hour, maybe an hour and a half,
and I tasted Vietti Barbaresco and it was I think again in like the
eighty six vintage probably and it's a vineyard that source would be tough terre.
But it was a revelation in Italian wines from Pimante that it just was absolutely
mind blowing. It's like all these revelations, like every time we know,
I mean to taste wines of those caliber and then yeah, I can't imagine
you'd probably go on and on it. I'm like all the great wines,
I guess ridiculous, and I think covered Spanish wines yet, So if we
were to come to your home. I mean, you make a lot of
wine, your husband makes a lot of wine. You're exposed to a lot.
What would we find in your home? Is it a lot of your
own wines or local wines? Is it wines from around the world? Are
there certain grapes? I mean, what's in your house? Oh, a
little bit of everything. We tend to drink more white wine because we'll have
that as an approoti and depending on what we're cooking, will either have a
white or red or pink. So right now, one of the wines we
had recently while traveling was Cracker Pino gree And we were in Hawaii visiting friends
and working the market, and we stopped at a restaurant for an appetizer and
a friend of ours lived there in Maui and said, you have to try
this wine. I love it. And it was the Crocker Pino Green and
it was delicious. So when I came home, I was just cruising the
internet and there was a special at wine dot com by six bottles blah blah
blah. So I'm like, I'm buying that. But yeah, a lot
of European wines if although it's hard, there's not a lot of shops here
that carry a great selection. Necessarily, usually we tried to zero in on
something and get it through a wholesaler friend of ours or two or you know,
having exactly but tried some We love that wines from Alsace. We love
of Albarino. Of course, we went on recently a godeo kick where we
had a lot. We tried a lot of different godeo We also try and
we drink a lot of wines from our colleagues here on the Central Coast.
And I have to say, I'm always impressed with the balance and finesse that
the vineyards, the wines made from the vineyards on the Central Coast produce anything
you opened up this week that drink really well. Gosh, I have to
think you have to give me a minute to think about that. You know,
here at the winery, every day you'll see we have us staff lunch
where we sit down and we open anywhere from six to ten to fifteen wines,
depending if we have guests or not. And so we're and you know
there's always some of ours there just to kind of check in and see how
they're showing. And then we usually you have other things, so it all
blurs now it does, and I need to Anyways, one of the things
that we had recently that it was really delicious was the Pino Gray pino blanc
from our oat from Aubon Clamont, which is lovely. We had a recently,
I'm just thinking something that really struck my mind, a lovely Surrah from
El Ugar and he's a friend of ours and really delicious. Yeah, I
could go on and on. Well, so with all these different grapes,
do you think there's a such thing as a perfect variety? I think there's
perfect spots for different grape varieties depending on the vineyard situation. So yeah,
yeah. And then another thing is you're drinking all these grape wines from around
the world, a lot of very famouss and well regarded wines that have been
critically lauded. And I'm curious what your opinion is online critics and scores.
Obviously, you know you're drinking wines that have gotten great scores. I'm sure
you've submitted your wines over the years. How do they work for you as
a brand and also as a consumer. That's a tough question, you know,
it's over the years you realize that there's some critics who might have a
similar palette to yours, or who might like like and understand more nuanced wines,
which I feel that we make here just because of the climate and the
weather and the grapes that we use, so you know, those are copathetic.
I remember meeting Clive Coats years ago at a dinner in Burgundy, and
I love the way he reviewed his wines because it was good, very good,
very good. Indeed, if you really, I mean, that's how
I want to start reviewing wines, you know. I think that's a great
way to do it. And the thing, you know, as you realize
after time in the business and experiencing tasting wines, that wines can go through
an evolution, and there's sometimes they're quite closed, especially with high acid wines,
and if you taste the wine, you might not get anything or much
out of the a aromatic profile, et cetera, and a year later it
could be a revelation. So I think it's an imperfect system. It's good
and certainly I look at that if they happen, if I'm buying on a
site that posts these things, but it's just hard to say. Some reviewers
are known for having palettes the bigger, the better, and those publications,
you know, have their followings, but our wines don't do well in those
and that's okay. It's interesting also to me to see that there's a stylistic
revolution going on from the big, bold wines of the late nineties early two
thousands too much more delicate, nuanced wines that are really I start to see
people really appreciating them. Yeah. So for someone who hasn't had the privilege
to taste for DoD wines yet, what do you think they're missing out on?
I know you've talked about nuance and obviously Spanish varieties, is there anything
else? They're definitely I would call have bright profiles. The Alberino has great
acidity, minerality, aromatics. The Temporneo is from some of the cooler climates
in California maybe and the valley might have been the coolest climate. The Temporneo
is planted in California. And then even the Caberney I make part of it
is from half of it is from Whale Rock Vineyard and that's a limestone vineyard
in the Templeton Gap, which is the coolest ava and passer robules and that
lends its incredible freshness to the cabernet. So people taste that wine and they're
like, oh my god, this is not like a passive cap. This
is completely different. It's fresh and this and focus and elegant, and so
I think you do get that with my wines, you get a certain restraint.
So if space aliens were to land at your property and knock at your
tasting room door in slow the Slow Coast, which of your wines would you
want to welcome them with? O? Well, I think rose. We're
not Rose because everybody likes rose, and you know it could probably goes with
alien food as well. Well. So I have a question, and I
want to talk to you about food in a second. But I have a
question because I always ask, like getting down as a wine drinker, red,
white or rose? Is it fair to say rose is your choice?
Well, certainly I feel that that is the most Uh what's the word I'm
looking for? Versatile? Versatile of wine? Thank you, of any wine
it's got attributes of white and red and it can match up to meet or
just as an have it as an aperitif I had a beautiful one yesterday when
we were out to dinner, the Terra Brune from Bandol and that wine is
just absolutely gorgeous. So yes, I love rose. And speaking of you
know, food, how I mean you're drinking all these great wines and as
you said, you do lunches in you're opening up bottles of wine. Do
you follow any rules when it comes to pairing food and wine? Do you
look for any certain things to make the choices? Or do you just put
wines on the table and have fun a little bit of both if we're if
I'm entertaining or have a special bottle, I'll try to work around the food
around the bottle to bring out the best of that. So yeah, are
there are there things? What are you looking for? Are you looking to
match things or contrast things, or you know, do you follow certain rules?
Well, i'd like do I call it? Yes? I think if
you're doing pasta or something with a tomato based sauce, it is amazing how
Italian wines and Tuscan wines are really able to match that well, the high
acid and low tannin, yes, yes, and the freshness. But you
know, I tend to gravitate towards maybe less tannic reds. We do a
lot of grilling, but and then you know, we just eat. We
don't eat a lot of meat, but we do enjoy it on occasion,
and that's when we break out the temporneo and the big Surah and things of
Tabernet, sa vegnandapot. So getting into kind of wine making. And you've
been doing this for a long time and you're working with a lot you focus
on Spanish Fridays, but obviously with Linquist family wines, you know you work
together on with rown grapes and other grapes. I'm curious you're working with different
vineyards along the Central coast. We know there's vintage variation from year to year,
but in your experience, have you seen more commonality or do you see
variation from year to year. Definitely a variation from year to year, and
maybe it's become a little more varied over the last five years or so,
I've noticed a little more extremes. It's actually starting with seventeen when San Luis
Obispo Labor Day weekend was the hottest place on Earth, hotter than Afghanistan,
I mean one hundred and fifteen at that point was on the record on the
coast. Just a few miles away from the coast, and that that was
blew me away. We normally get a heat wave right around Labor Day.
I mean it's almost like clockwork. We'll have a cool, foggy as you
see, overcast summer, and then Labor Day weekend, it's like the fog
is peeled away and the sunshine comes in, often with the bang. But
we have had you know, it was seventeen with super had that extended heat
wave. Again in twenty there was some heat events more than one that affect
did all the vineyards on the central coast to some degree or another. And
then last in twenty two, it was just the most difficult, challenging weatherwise
vintage that I've ever experienced. And I believe I'm not the only wine maker
that would say that. Huh, So, are there any signs or predictors
you look for that are going to tell you what a vintage is going to
be? Like? Well, I've been fooled many times too thinking that.
I mean, we've barely had any sunshine for the past two weeks. I
mean, there was a couple hours yesterday morning, a couple of the other
afternoon, and I think and it's so it's been gray, a June gloom,
cold, and then you get trigged and we're over a month behind after
a cold, wet winter. So you can easily get tricked into thinking like,
oh, har is going to be late, but then you'll get a
heat event and everything will equalize if we Yeah, so I right now,
I'd say it should be a cool late vintage, but who knows. Mother
nature has her own way. So I know that you make your wines at
Aubonne Clement in the Santa Maria Valley are based out in the Slow Coast.
That's where your tasting room is. You guys have a lot of traditions here.
As you said here you do lunch every day as a team pretty much
Monday through Friday and usually Saturday during harvest, which is great. So do
you have any other good luck rituals or traditions that you do at the start
of harvest? No, not really, ill you know, we do have
a winemaker here, Michael Brugelli, who brings the priest into pluses vintage and
the first grapes he brings in, which is really a neat tradition that maybe
it spreads over it to the rest of the grapes exactly, hoping he shares
the blessing with all of us. And I'm wondering this might sound like a
silly question when you go into the vineyards and you know, you spend time
in the vines and then you know, I know, you're you're sourcing the
different fruit. But when you bring it in here and it's in the barrel
and it's your baby, Now, are you known for talking to your wine
or communicating with it? I think last year I was cursing at it.
So yes, yes, it gets a reprimand sometimes right tough love we call
it. Yes, Yeah, it's you know. It is interesting though,
when you have a ventage where it's even and the ripening is calm and everything
is kind of relaxed and chill on the weather, hits all the right notes
that the usually the resulting grapes do make exceptional wine, and there are vintages
that you just know from the beginning are going to stand out. As long
as you don't screw it up, the wine should be pretty special. Yeah,
no talking to it, because it behaves. So you were telling me
at the beginning that you, you know, kind of were introduced to wine
when you were in you know, end of high school type thing. And
you chose wine as a career path earlier than many people do. But when
you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew
up? A forest ranger or a fashion model? But I clearly not designed
it like that fashion model. Forest ranger. I love it. And when
you're not working, how do you like to spend your free time today?
You know, I like to hike and walk, I like films, I
like to read a lot. I love to cook. Travel is a huge
part important part of my life as well. And yeah, just after the
pandemic, I really appreciate times I have with friends, and so I like
to keep up relationships with my friends and family as much as possible. And
you were talking also about how you know, you'll usually start out with a
white wine and then if you have me's go into red wine. And you
know, you and Bob drink a lot of really good wines. But if
you were going to set a romantic evening, I mean your kids graduating from
college, like there's time to celebrate, relax, it's just the two of
you. What sort of wines do you open to make for a romantic evening?
And not just an average night or maybe every night's romantic because you open
so many wines. Well it's okay, so this is good timing. Yesterday
we celebrated our anniversary, not the anniversary, thank you. So we went
out to dinner and I guess bought would be the romantic one here because he
bought a lot of ninety seven's and we bought some together. He bought some.
And so last night we had the nineteen ninety seven Chateau Rayas and celebrated
our anniversary, had a dinner at a local wonderful restaurant called Ember, and
it was magical and the wine was phenomenal and it really was a beautiful evening.
I love it. So romantic evenings are met with wines of significance are
fun fun wines too. So, Lisa, I'm wondering, you know,
we're all given advice throughout our lives from you know, teachers and parents to
mentors. Wondering if there's a piece of advice someone gave you along the way
that you try to live or work by. Always have a sense of humor
and you know, really never let it go you down too much where you
and I just got to get up and put one foot in front of the
other when things when times it's tough, and luckily my husband and partner is
a natural optimist and always always believes that the outcome will be fine and good.
That's helpful. So when you look back at your career, what would
you say is one of your proudest achievements to date? Oh, let's see,
I guess just getting a label on the bottle it was pretty amazing to
me. Planting our vineyard felt great, although the capital expense was higher than
we anticipated, and on the ongoing expense is certainly a lot to take very
seriously. Just you know, sometimes just making a wine that you're apply proud
and excited about is what. There's nothing better than that feeling of just I
think, feeling like you actually it worked. Everything kind of was right,
And you know, I feel like my wines are good and qualitatively or consistently
good. But you know, it's only once every few years that you really
are spelled bound by a special wine. And I'm always very proud about that
and lucky. So imagine a scenario. We're sitting at a table here and
we've got your bottles of wine on the table, but there's an empty seat
next to you. Who from any walk of life, living or deceased.
Would you want to share a bottle over DoD Wines with Alison? Oh,
that would be a tough one. I don't know. I mean have to
think about that. Really. Winston Churchill would be fun. And he was
a drinker. He loved to drink, so he would be a lot of
fun to meat and just to meet and to share some wine with that would
be a lot of fun. See, I told you there'd be some silly
questions. That's all I warned you. With complete the sentence. For me,
a table without wine is like a table without wine is like a bread
without butter or olive oil, covering all bases there. I love it.
I love it. And then we're almost finished. Got got just a just
a two? Three more quick little fun questions. One is if you were
being sent off to a deserted island and can only take three wines with you,
With all the great wines you drink and have drunk and love, what
three wines would you pick if you could only take three? I would take
obviously this is an unlimited budget. Yes, I would take the Tat and
Jay compe des Champagna rose would be one. Oh gosh, I'd have to
say the I'd take a Mao Temporaneo or keep their right outside of Regrettel Duero
one of their higher level blends, which would beautiful wines. And then oh
gosh, for white wine, Oh gosh, it's just too hard, and
might want something that's you know, there's some wines that are really special and
full bodied and you know, very satisfying when you have a bottle once in
a while, and there's some things that you want to drink all the time.
And hmm, I know, so many choices, so many choices.
Gosh, almost tempted to do a rose because it goes with so many.
Why not let's see that. Yeah, can give me a minute, you
know, being on an island, i'd have to say, I might want
to load up on some of that Bandol rose that we had as an apparaitif
last night. That was spectacular. There you go. So we're almost finished,
but it is time for a little game where we pair wine with music.
Not distress you too much, but based on we'll keep it easy.
We're going to focus on your three wines that you make, well, you
make four, but I'll focus on your Spanish writing, so I want to
start with your albarino. Okay, I would say that would be a line
for some good country maybe like Loretta Lynn or Dolly Parton music. It's been
fun and great stories and not what I would expect, but I like that.
And you're Rose of Garnaca. That would be a definitely more of a
Oh let's see what would be perfect grenache? Probably some h some some thank
celebratory, some kind of high energy jazz but not but but fun jazz,
not something that you have like if you go into a cloud, people are
going to tell you to be quiet, and you're temporanneo. Tempornia has got
to be bossanova. I love it. I love it. Not what you
might expect. Well, Louisa, you've been great and I know that put
a lot of pressure on you to do the music. So this should be
an easy two part question. The first part is what wine region in the
world is at the top of your bucket list to go explore that I haven't
been to yet or maybe return to. It's up to you. Oh wow,
well, I've never been to Bordeaux. And it turns out our youngest
son is going to do his last semester in college at the University of Bordeaux.
So I'm excited to have that opportunity finally to visit there. And another
for white wine is the area of Galicia where Godeo is planted, and I
have not been there, and I feel like that's dying to go there,
dying to go. So in two places at the top of your bucket list.
And if our listeners wanted to come find you, take a trip up
the coast, come to or down the coast, depending or out to the
coast, depending on where they're coming from. You're in the slow coast.
And where can they find you and how can they find your wines. Well,
we have a tasting room in a Royo Grande. It's right now at
it's right in the village of the old village of Arroyo Grande. We're moving
locations, so by the middle to end of August we'll be just at another
location in the village of Arroyo Grande. And you can look us up on
at www dot for Dad Wines and linquisfamily dot com and you can we can
tell you how to get our wines. Wonderful. Well, Liusa, thank
you for joining us on Wine's Soundtrack. It's been fun chatting with you and
I'm ready to go taste some of your wines. Great. I can't wait.
Thank you, Allison, it's been a pleasure. Appreciate it. Thanks
for listening to a new episode of Wine Soundtrack USA. For details and updates,
visit our website winesoundtrack dot com.