Jamie Goode reviews Jon Bonné's The New California Wine

A guest post from award-winning wine writer Jamie Goode who gives his own personal take on Jon Bonné's The New California Wine and the issues it raises.

"Jon Bonné, a native New Yorker, was hired in 2006 by the San Franciso Chronicle to cover California wine. Bonné’, whose father was a trained chef, had grown up with wine, and in particular imported wines from the classic European wine regions. 'I showed up somewhat sceptical about the wines of California,' he says, considering them largely to be expensive and monotonous'.

But, he says, California wine hasn’t always been bad. According to Bonné the first modern revolution in Californian wine occurred 40 years ago. Famed winegrowers such as Paul Draper, Warren Winarski and Robert Mondavi were the figureheads of a transformation of Californian wine that spanned the late-1960s, the 1970s and even the early 1980s.

'By the time I got to California,' he says, 'it had reached its decadent phase, and what had happened in the 1970s had evolved into something different.' It wasn't just that the wines had got riper, but also that they had moved to what he calls ‘pure impact’ in style. 'The industry says they were making wines that people liked to drink, but this was a cop-out.'

What went wrong? Around the late 1980s and early 1990s a lot of money was flowing into Napa. 'People loved the fact that wine was becoming an American thing,' says Bonné, and this led to a big injection of cash and ambition.’ This coincided with the last major round of phylloxera in the 1980s, which led to a billion dollar replanting program that hit the reset button in Californian viticulture. Lots of the big, ripe Cabs that came to define high-end California came from young vineyards, which have a tendency to produce fleshy, charming styles of wine.

Also, there were many consumers who were new to wine, and this led to a rise of a system that gave them straightforward guidance as to which were the best. Robert Parker’s The Wine Advocate and the big-selling lifestyle-ish magazine Wine Spectator both offered scores that pointed people to the 'top' wines. 'All the things that had been barriers to entry to the fine wine market were gone,' says Bonné, and there was lots of disposable income ready to be plunged into wine.

So, in the course of a decade, beginning in 1990, the style of Californian wine changed dramatically. 'It became clear, critically speaking, that if you made wine in a riper style you would be rewarded, but if you made it in any other style you would be called for it and punished,' he asserts.

So Bonné arrived in California as a sceptic. To what must have been his great relief, though, he began to encounter interesting producers, making wines that didn't conform to the California mould. He began by speaking to people like Paul Draper at Ridge, Josh Jensen at Calera, and Abe Schoener at the Scholium Project. 'In Abe I saw a spirit of enquiry that had largely been missing in California,' he recalls.

He also met Steve Matthiasson, who by day was a top Napa viticulturist, but whose own passion was making a white blend based on his love for the wines of Friuli. Bonné began to connect with the 'New California', and by 2010 it became evident that this wasn't simply a few people nibbling around the edges, but that the conversation about wine in California was beginning to change. 'Wines were appearing that were completely different interpretations of places people knew.'

Bonné decided that a revolution was occurring that was as significant as the one that took place 40 years ago, and this prompted him to write The New California Wine. It seems to be the right book at just the right time: a manifesto for a growing band of like-minded producers to gather around.

The big question is whether what is occurring now is actually a course correction for Californian wine, or a sign of an emerging diversity? Will the big, ripe critic wines still thrive, alongside a growing set of more interesting wines that show balance and sense of place?

Bonné's book is a snapshot of what's going on in terms of this Californian wine revolution. He describes some of the emerging regions, and profiles the interesting producers who are making wines of balance and sense of place, made in a more sensitive way with an emphasis on allowing the vineyard to express itself more than the heavy hand of the winemaker. I love it, just as I am a fan of the new, balanced wines made by the producers described in its pages.

And my take? I think that for now, although I’d love the New California to be the beginning of a sea change for all of the state’s wines, I think this remains a niche movement, albeit one that is gaining momentum. California is still largely defined by ripe, sweetly fruited wines, whether they be cheap sugared-up examples from the Central Valley, or rather grotesque over-ripe and over-priced high-end bottles from the Napa Valley. I wish this were not the case, but the criticism that the New California wines have had from the major US wine publications shows that plenty of people in the USA like their wines supersized and sweet, and aren’t ready for wines that express elegance, precision and detail at the expense of size and ripeness.

The controversy that the New California, and the similar In Pursuit of Balance (IPOB) organization – whose tasting I recently attended in San Francisco – are stirring up in the USA shows that the ripeness (and related high alcohol) issue is a fault line in the Californian wine scene.

From my perspective, I am fully on the side of IPOB. The major US critics don’t seem to like IPOB, because it acts as a mirror showing how misguided (in the views of many) their judgements on the now dominant riper style of California wines has been. It would require a sharp turn in direction for them to recognize that the IPOB/New California wines are really where it’s at for interesting, compelling, fine Californian wines, and this would require a certain admission of failure on their part. This isn’t going to happen. So they are caught in a dead end – and many of their readers have filled their cellars with high alcohol, dead fruit wines – and there’s no easy way out. Hence the acrimony.

Are all the New California wines wonderful? No: picking earlier to make lower alcohol wines doesn’t always make for greatness, if it’s something your terroir won’t give you. There are a few lemon juice Chardonnays that don’t really have much character. But having said this, the vast majority of New California wines are brilliant. I was blown away by the IPOB tasting in San Francisco, and the offerings displayed at the New California event in London recently at which Jon Bonné spoke. This movement is a welcome correction of the sins of the past, and it is turning California into a great wine destination, once again, as long as you are selective in who you visit.

Jamie Goode is the author of Wine Science (published as The Science of Wine in the US) and publishes his own website and blog wineanorak.com. The New California Wine by Jon Bonné is published by Ten Speed Press.

This month you can win a copy of The New California Wine, along with a case of wines from producers that are mentioned in the book from Roberson Wine and a voucher for Sager & Wilde, the east London wine bar that regularly features them. Enter here.

Book review: Leon Fast Vegetarian

Having eaten Jane Baxter’s food on a number of occasions I was really looking forward to the publication of Leon Fast Vegetarian, the book she’s just written with Leon founder Henry Dimbleby, one of a series of books that has been published by the Leon chain.

Jane used to work at the Riverford Kitchen in Devon and I’ve frequently dipped in to the two books she’s written for them, The Riverford Farm Cook Book and Everyday and Sunday: recipes from Riverford Farm. Although she’s a chef she’s a really great home cook with an intuitive feel for how ingredients work together.

This is a slightly bigger book, divided by types of meal (breakfast & brunch, pasta, grains & pulses, rice & curry ...) rather than ingredients or seasons. As well as Jane’s own recipes there are contributions from co-author Henry Dimbleby and some nice guest recipes from family and friends, Henry’s mum Josceline Dimbleby and restaurant critic Giles Coren among them. Plenty would be suitable for kids - it’s very much a family cookbook.

There were a lot of recipes I wanted to make from the book but settled on three:

The first, as I was somewhat obsessed with a deep fried cauliflower I’d had in Paris, was a whole roast cauliflower with a caper and golden raisin dressing though not being able to find golden raisins I used ordinary ones instead. The taste was great (it also involved lashings of butter and smoked paprika) but the cauliflower a little undercooked even after giving it extra time. I blame the Aga but might possibly think of blanching it first another time to get it cooked right through (I reckon they did that in Paris). It makes a fantastic centrepiece for the table - I can imagine it with roast pork if you’re not a veggie.

The next was a spinach, squash and blue cheese bake because I had some Stilton and double cream to use up. All it needed in addition was some butternut squash and spinach (although I reckon I could have substituted chard), some fresh sage (I used dried) and some walnuts for which I substituted pistachios. A really good dish with a lovely balance of flavours though for four rather than the suggested 4-6 unless there were several other dishes on the table. Cooking it at a low temperature to set the custard gave it an indulgently smooth silky texture.

The third recipe - and an absolute triumph which I’ll definitely make again - was a Little Gem and egg salad which had the best vegetarian substitute for a caesar dressing I’ve ever tasted. Again I had to make a substitution. Having neither pernod or anisette I used a tsp of fennel seeds crushed with about 2/3 of a teaspoon of Maldon salt. I added it cautiously and found just over half that amount was enough to get the aniseed flavour I imagine Jane was looking for. The dressing also contains hummus, Dijon mustard and soy sauce among other ingredients. Goodness knows how she came up with that combination but it’s an absolute winner. You could, she suggests add some croutons to the salad too.

Other recipes I’ve earmarked to try include fennel, radish and broad bean salad, orecchiette with peas and spinach, Puglian bean purée (Jane spends a lot of time in Italy), green bean and cashew curry and stir-fried spiced spring greens. I also love ‘the Snickety Corner’ - a quirky line-up of fridge snacks and there’s a great selection of sides. Some nice desserts too though they aren’t the main point of the book. I definitely fancy the parsnip, cashew and coconut cake and you can find Jane's rhubarb and strawberry crumble sundae here.

The one drawback of the book is that while the recipes are simple, justifying the title Fast Vegetarian, the sourcing of the ingredients isn’t necessarily as straightforward. Even living in a city and with a relatively well-stocked storecupboard there were ingredients I found hard to track down. A garden - or even a couple of herb boxes - would certainly help and are encouraged at the start of the book.

And while there are helpful tips at the bottom of each recipe and a very useful ‘Happy Families' section which tells you how you can substitute one vegetable for another you need a bit of experience to get the best out of the book.

That said the recipes I tried were bold, delicious and inspiring. I’ll definitely be dipping into them again.

Buy Leon Fast Vegetarian if:

* you’re a vegetarian, obviously, but even if you aren’t and want to introduce more vegetarian food into your diet

* you get a veg box and need inspiration as to what to do with it, though Jane’s other books (see above) would also help

* you’re a keen cook with a well-stocked storecupboard

* you have reasonably adventurous kids - or kids you want to eat more vegetables.

A Change of Appetite - but what if your beloved doesn't want to change?

I can’t tell you how excited I was about A Change of Appetite. To the extent that, impatient with the review copy not having arrived I dragged myself on a fruitless visit to Waitrose to buy it then drove down to Bristol City centre. On a Saturday afternoon. (Locals will know this how insane this is.)

The only thing I didn’t allow for is that my husband might not want to change his appetite too . . .

Back to the beginning. Change of Appetite is award-winning author Diana Henry’s eighth book. They’ve all won ridiculous numbers of awards so much so that you look at a shortlist and think 'Not Diana Henry again!' But dammit, she deserves it.

The reason she keeps on winning is that in addition to coming up with brilliant recipes she’s also a fine writer with the knack of making it sound like she’s talking to you but also of infusing her recipes with such passion and poetry that you just can’t wait to get into the kitchen and try them.

Past books include the inspiring Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons, Salt Sugar Smoke and Food from Plenty but in this book she’s decided to focus on healthy food. And this is where the problems started. My husband has not the faintest interest in eating more healthily or of departing from his normal register of bourgeois French and Italian cooking.

I tried four recipes all of which I could tell he’d made up his mind he wasn’t going to enjoy. (If this makes him sound like a fogey he isn’t - his taste in music and books for example is far more adventurous and electic than mine but, to coin a phrase, ‘he knows what he likes’.)

The first recipe I tried, burmese chilli fish with a hot and sour salad was infuriatingly the least successful of the four due to the fact that I used only about a third of the fish for the two of us (750g seemed like a lot of fish for four). Never a good idea to second guess the author. It made the turmeric which I’d only scaled down by half too dominant but I loved the bright zingy flavours of the hot and sour salad. My OH less so.

He also took against the fabulously sticky chicken and fennel with honey mustard and orange as being too sweet - my fault again for not making the accompanying black and white pilaf which contains bitter watercress to balance the honey's sweetness. An easy midweek dish, as Diana says. I thought it was really tasty. I imagine kids would too.

The other two thankfully went down better. A very simple and imaginative dish of purple sprouting broccoli, ricotta and parmesan with lemon (above) - a lovely way to serve PSB and an unusual and again very easy white fish, saffron and dill couscous pilaf (below) which I’ll definitely be making again (preferably when my OH is out).

Other recipes I’ve bookmarked are the Japanese rice bowl, Japanese ginger and garlic chicken with smashed cucumber, warm salad of pink grapefruit, prawns and toasted coconut and lamb scottadito with summer fregola (the recipes are divided up by season). Oh, and braised venison with beetroot and horseradish because I bought some great looking venison from the butcher we visited for the BBC Food & Farming awards the other day. I reckon even my OH would like that.

Although I’m in love with this book I have a couple of minor quibbles. One is that as with Ottolenghti (who is a fan) some recipes feature quite a lot of hard to source ingredients - although Diana always gives alternatives. Even in Bristol I had difficulty finding some of them and I was well-motivated to track them down. And it would be useful if some of the recipes had been for two - maybe the simpler ones. A lot of people wouldn't necessarily be sharing the dishes with friends and family and scaling down isn’t always easy.

As I’ve mentioned before I always think cookbooks have a target audience. The same book isn’t going to suit everybody. So here’s who I think it would appeal to - and who would possibly find it less useful

Buy A Change of Appetite if

* you genuinely want to give your cooking a healthy makeover and incorporate more fruit, vegetables and fish in your diet

* you're drawn to light bright flavours. If you’re an Ottolenghi fan you’ll love it

* you read cookbooks obsessively in bed. This will give hours of pleasure

* you're into food porn - the photos, by Laura Edwards, are quite glorious

Don’t buy it if

* you refuse to eat anything other than French bistro food

* you’re an inexperienced cook (while the recipes are not difficult they’re not really for beginners)

* you haven’t got a well-stocked store-cupboard or the budget to acquire extra ingredients and seasonings

But buy it for someone else . . .

A Change of Appetite is published by Mitchell Beazley at £25.

Save with Jamie - a better book than you’d think

There have been the predictable howls of outrage over Jamie Oliver’s new book Save with Jamie. How dare a multi-millionaire, with no concept of what it’s like to go hungry, tell the poorest in society how to eat?

OK, he got it totally wrong with the ‘big telly’ remark - something he has apologised for on Twitter. "Thx for the comments guys good & bad I read them I don't always say the right things & media doesn't help but I always have best intentions."

Having interviewed him a couple of times myself, I think that’s true although he could have insisted the book was priced at a level those on a budget could afford instead of hefty £26 it will cost you to buy full price. (Not that you need to. Given the inevitable 'half-price' offers it's currently £13 at W H Smith and £9.99 on Amazon - but then you need a credit card to order it. And he did give away 4000+ copies to local libraries . . . )

He’s also naive to think the traditional Mediterranean lifestyle can be easily translated to the UK and maybe sees it with a bit too much dewy-eyed idealism, as Rachel McCormack points out in her excellent article in the New Statesman.

BUT - that’s not the point. Save with Jamie is not primarily for those who are using food banks but established Jamie fans who find themselves on a limited budget. Just as with any other income group some have the skills to cook and others don’t. And Jamie primarily addresses the former.

There are several recipes I fancy making particularly from the veg section which is sensibly placed at the front of the book. A lot are healthy and child-friendly like the Grated Rainbow Salad with Sesame Feta Fritters. I love the sound of Really Tasty Charred Asian salad and Jamie’s take on Okonomiyaki. And no-one could really complain at the expense involved in Baked Onion in the Hole.

The meat sections perhaps mistakenly start with a roast, or ‘Mothership’ recipe as Jamie puts it. Few people on a tight budget could afford that - or find themselves with much in the way of leftovers if they did. But it does highlight what you can do with a bit of forward planning. Save 300g from a roast joint of brisket (good to see him use that cut) and you can make a hearty brisket stew which can be used in four different ways (wirh yorkies, as a hotpot, with jacket potatoes and a pie) to feed six. And his chicken and chorizo paella for 4-6 is based on just two chicken thighs.

So basically this book is full of good ideas and recipes to make food stretch not about coping on the breadline. As someone who’s written a similar book The Frugal Cook* that’s what I tried to do too - and got a similar amount of flak for it. One critic on Amazon said "if the author thinks this is frugal she should have a word with my mother who cooked her way through the Second World War." You can't please everyone, especially when you're as high profile as Jamie.

* with a similar strapline, I was amused to see. My book, published in 2008: Buy Cleverly. Waste Less. Eat Well. Jamie’s new book: Shop smart. Cook clever. Waste Less.

Jamie Oliver's new series Save with Jamie starts tomorrow (September 2nd) on Channel 4. If you're looking for really low cost recipes check out the excellent A Girl called Jack with a book of the same name coming out next February.