Sparkling Wines and Star Makers in the Silicon Valley
Pop the Cork : Silicon Valley’s Sparkling Wine Makers Revive Rich 140-Year Old Local Winemaking Tradition
Celebratory, fizzy and fun, sparkling wine is like no other wine. Pop the cork and you smile with anticipation, even before bubbles tickle your nose and dance on your tongue. Monk Dom Pérignon famously said, “Come quickly, I am tasting the stars,” as he sipped the first Champagne he made.
When you think of Silicon Valley, sparkling wine may not come to mind. But thanks to its growing popularity, more wineries in the Santa Cruz Mountains and Santa Clara Valley are producing bubbly. Styles range from bone dry to sweet, slightly fizzy to full-on frothy, pale gold to pink or red in color, made from Chardonnay or Pinot Noir, even Riesling or Syrah. Silicon Valley has a rich history of sparkling wine.
“I was inspired by great aged 10-year-old Champagne,” says Marty Mathis, owner and winemaker at Saratoga’s Kathryn Kennedy Winery.
Beginning in 2000, Marty made five sparkling wine vintages, together with friend Barry Jackson of Santa Cruz’s Equinox Wines. Now on his 30th vintage, Barry is our area’s local sparkling wine guru.
“Sparkling wine is one of the most creative beverages,” says Barry, who handles sparkling wine production—a process that takes special equipment and lots of time—for about 20 wineries.
A Sparkling Tradition
Silicon Valley’s bubbly story begins with Paul Masson, who came to the United States in 1878 from France’s Burgundy region. He joined Charles Le Franc, whom historian Charles L. Sullivan calls the father of Santa Clara Valley’s commercial wine business, at New Almaden Winery in the 1880s.
While Napa and Sonoma are often referred to as the birthplace of California wine, it is Le Franc’s New Almaden Winery that is identified on a historical marker at the original winery site—California Historical Marker 505—as California’s first commercial vineyard planting in 1852.
Masson was smitten with sparkling wine when he arrived at New Almaden and released his first bubbly in 1892. Soon after, Masson left the winery to start his own label.
Masson wanted a cool, hillside region for growing quality wine grapes, and bought the Pierce Road property high above Saratoga (now Mountain Winery), which had a vineyard and winery. He planted Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, and in 1898 the Paul Masson Champagne Company was born. Thus began his quest to make America’s premier Champagne.
The Masson sparklers quickly garnered critical acclaim and gold medals in international wine competitions, earning Masson the moniker “The Pride of California.” In 1936 he sold the business to Martin Ray, who took up the mantle, continuing to make sparkling wine, even after Masson’s death in 1940, until Ray sold the Masson winery to Seagram Company Ltd. in 1943.
For a time, San Jose–based Mirassou Winery operated its sparkling wine cellars at Los Gatos’ Novitiate Winery, now Testarossa Winery, where they offered production services to other wineries, including Kathryn Kennedy and Equinox.
When Mirassou ceased production (selling the brand to Gallo in 2003), winemakers needed another sparkling wine facility. Barry and Marty collaborated, bought some of Mirassou’s equipment at auction and moved it to Santa Cruz.
What’s in a Name?
Some Silicon Valley bubbly is labeled “Champagne” or “California Champagne,” not “sparkling wine.” In 2006, the European Union banned labeling wines made outside France’s Champagne region “Champagne,” but it allowed producers that had been using the term up until then to be grandfathered in, such as Morgan Hill’s Guglielmo Winery and Gilroy’s Fortino Winery.
Many producers make traditional method (méthode champenoise) sparkling wines, where the secondary fermentation—the one that produces the bubbles—happens in each individual bottle. Winemakers pick grapes at low sugar and high acid levels and make a still base wine, or cuvée (a blend).
“What you start out with is an intrinsically unbalanced product. It tastes terrible, has high acid and is thin-bodied,” Barry says. “If you poured someone a glass they’d spit it out.”
Then the magic happens—turning a very tart wine into a delightful, sparkling and very drinkable wine. The process kicks off when a yeast-sugar mixture is added to the still base wine in the bottle. The resulting fermentation produces carbon dioxide gas (CO2), which dissolves in the wine, trapped by a crown cap, making those glorious bubbles.
“When we are done,” says Jackson, “everybody wants another glass.”
Other producers use the Charmat method (tank method). Yeast and sugar are added to the base wine in a big, pressurized tank, turning the wine into bubbly.
The difference? Traditional-method sparkling wines have layers of flavor. These bubblies sit on the lees (dead yeast cells), a byproduct of the second fermentation, for up to three years. The result is yeasty, tasting of brioche, lemon curd, baked apple or pear fruit and nuts, with a creamy texture and tiny, persistent bubbles.
With Charmat, think Prosecco, also made by the tank process. Charmat wines are fresher and fruitier, made to be drunk young. Bubbles are bigger and disappear over time in your glass. These wines are also less pricey than traditional-method wines.
You may see a vintage date on a bottle, or you may see NV for “non-vintage.” This comes from the Champagne tradition of holding some reserve wine back each vintage to blend into future wines, making a non-vintage blend to maintain a specific house style.
Modern Bubbles
Born out of the current natural wine movement of making wine with minimal intervention in the vineyard and the winery, pét-nats are turning up everywhere.
Pét-nat is short for pétillant naturel, a French term for naturally effervescent wine. Halfway between still and full-on sparkling wine, pét-nat is refreshing, fruity, floral and fizzy. In fact, Los Gatos’ Left Bend Winery trademarked the name Fiz Nat.
“Fiz Nat is an Americanization of the pét-nat term,” says Left Bend winemaker Gary Robinson. “It is fizzy and natural as opposed to petillant and natural.”
Fiz Nat is the winery’s best seller by the bottle, especially popular with young wine drinkers, who like to experiment with wine.
Fiz Nat and other pét-nats are different because fermenting wine is bottled under a crown cap. Carbon dioxide releases as fermentation continues, creating bubbles that make the wine frothy. Pét-nats don’t require the traditional method process and aren’t aged long. The yeast sediment is typically not removed, often resulting in a cloudy, or hazy, wine. Think bottle-conditioned, hazy beer.
In San Carlos, Waxwing Wine’s Scott Sisemore started out making pét-nat but now produces a vibrant, fruity traditional-method sparkling Riesling. He also makes a still Riesling from the same vineyard.
“What winemaker doesn’t love sparkling wine?” Scott asks. “Riesling is versatile. It’s fun to show the same grape from the same vineyard in totally different styles.”
Bonny Doon Vineyard’s iconic winemaker Randall Grahm makes traditional-method sparkling Grenache rosé and Vermentino, and is Silicon Valley’s first producer to offer bubbly in cans.
Trend Towards Dryness
Sparkling wine is high in acid. To balance that acid, winemakers add a sparkling-wine-and-sugar mixture, called dosage, to the bottle just before corking. The amount of sugar determines the final sweetness level (residual sugar, or RS). In Silicon Valley you’ll find extra dry (slightly sweet), brut (dry), extra brut (drier than brut) and, becoming more common, brut nature or zero dosage, or bone-dry bubblies.
No matter what style you prefer, there’s a Silicon Valley sparkling wine sure to appeal to your palate, especially as local winemakers continue pushing the sparkling wine limits, while carrying on Paul Masson’s legacy.
“I’m hoping it [Masson’s tradition] doesn’t get lost and someone picks up the torch and keeps going,” remarks winemaker Marty Mathis of Kathryn Kennedy Winery. “I do feel optimistic about the future. There is a crop of young winemakers that are really great.
