https://haysfreepress.com/2017/03/15/new-wine-bill-demands-100-wineries-show-concern-about-100-texas-grape-bill/New wine bill demands 100%: Wineries show concern about 100% Texas grape bill
Excerpt:
A Texas House Bill sent to committee last week could impact the wine industry, starting September 1, 2017.
House Bill 1514, filed Feb. 2, would require wineries looking for a Texas wine distinction to use 100 percent of the grapes grown on Texas farms and produce it entirely in the state to qualify. The current benchmark for consideration was 75 percent of the volume, said Terry Franks, chief of staff for Texas Representative Jason Isaac (R-Dripping Springs).
“As the wine industries grows and becomes more sophisticated in Texas, we really need to do a lot more to protect and bring the wine industry into more of a recognized status so when you buy a Texas wine, you’re buying Texas grapes,” Franks said.
On first blush, the idea's a good one. IMHO, it's premature by perhaps a decade. The Texas wine industry has grown rapidly, moving from 10th to 6th in the US over the past few years. Last year, they barely produced enough for in-state consumption.
Many wineries in Texas buy grapes from outside their local area...hey, North Texas can be hellish for producing grapes. My friends at Lost Oak Winery in Burleson buy grapes from the Lubbock area (Texas High Plains AVA) and states such as California. In the three years I've been a wine club member, I've seen their rapid growth...they're struggling to keep up with the demand.
What's lost in this bill is an appreciation for the producers' abilities to produce great wine, no matter where the grape was grown. Our wine producing friends in Germany do it right: their labels show the varietal grape and the vineyard from whence it came. For example, a Piesporter Michelsberg Riesling Auslese gives you the town (Piesport), vineyard (Michelsberg), varietal (Riesling - btw, for a grape to be on the label, the wine must be made from at least 85% of that grape), and category (Auslese denotes the amount of residual sugar in the wine).
This bill will only make it more difficult for small vineyards in Texas, and I'm not sure that it will help out the larger vineyards such as Becker or Llano Estacado.
The bill was referred to the licensing and administrative procedures committee March 9, though Franks said the provision of the bill calling for 100 percent of the wine volume to be produced in-state will likely be unobtainable in the near future.
100 percent? That is simply not realistic. I am an ardent Texan wine enthusiast, but again, the focus should be on the producer, not the grape. What makes the Texas wine industry so appealing is the imagination used in blending wines, increasing the level of "fun" in drinking wine, getting away from the pretentiousness/snootiness of other wine regions. A casual drinker won't find a significant difference between a $20 Texas Cabernet and a $200 Napa Cabernet.
My goodness, I've run my own "blind taste tests" of Piesporter Auslese with friends and family. It was hilarious: the cheaper Michelsberg wine (I call it the Walmart of German vineyards) beat the more expensive Goldtropfchen wine. On top of that, I've found the Rieslings produced by Llano Estacado and Lost Oak to compare very well to my beloved Mosel Rieslings.
BTW, these Piesport wines can be found in larger stores such as Spec's and Total Wine, usually between $12-$15 per bottle. Good quality wines that don't have the panache of an Urzig or Graach, but can be bought at 1/3 to 1/2 the price.
