An Evening at Ridge: Back to the summer of ’65

They say that all tastings are not created equal. This was decidedly proven true during our recent MW trip to California; it was confirmed by the thorough tasting of old vintages at Ridge Winery, located at the top of the Santa Cruz mountains, at an altitude of 800 meters.

Paul Draper (pictured below) welcomed 48 Masters of Wine, and after a detailed tour of the old and young cellar, together with an explanation about the use of American oak, it was time to taste. And, what a treat that was! Before I go into the tasting let me put down a short note about the use of American oak. Ridge is one the very few premium wineries that employ American oak, exclusively.  “We taste every year and we treat American oak with respect, and we save money, as well’’ says Paul Draper, as we stand in what must be the biggest room of American oak in the world (pictured below). He continues by saying that: “we use 3% Demptos and Taransaud coopers French oak as our control, just for the sake of comparison.” To set the record straight, I am not particularly fond of American oak, but Ridge is one of the few wineries that makes you wonder if this is the absolute ''truth'' or not.