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Drinking Dierbergs
• by Joe Pollack
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About 135 years ago, when Missouri was the No. 2 grape grower and winemaker in the U.S., our enologists and plant scientists helped save both the French and the California wine industries. The first great phylloxera epidemic, or at least the first that was recorded, was destroying grapes in both places.
But Missouri grapes were resistant to the little, ugly louse that feasted on grapevine roots, so scientists and farmers shipped Missouri root stock to California in the 1870s and California responded by using its newly saved grapes to make better wine than Missourians ever could ever hope to make. Of course, the phylloxera has returned, but the California grape industry had more than a century of peace and success.
Over the years, Missourians have dabbled in wine in California. Frederick Hussmann, one of the 19th-century pioneers, made wine, consulted and taught in California. Lucien Dressel, one of the key figures in the 20th-century revival of the industry, has worked in California. The Bryant Family has Napa vineyards and makes excellent – and enormously expensive – red wines. Russ Raney, who ran the wine store at the Cheshire Inn in the 1960s and ‘70s, moved to Oregon and established Evesham Wood, a small, elegant producer.
And now Jim Dierberg, who has owned Hermannhof, in Hermann, Mo., for some 30 years, is in the California wine business, with three wines from his vineyards now getting national distribution. His Santa Barbara County properties were the natural next step for a man who loves wine and who has searched the world for the proper places to grow the grapes and make the beverage.
Dierberg grew up in Creve Coeur, where, in 1910, his grandfather founded what was called the Creve Coeur Farmers Bank. Dierberg said he started working there as a seventh-grader and became president of the company at the age of 29, after graduating from Washington University School of Law. The banking business led him into other areas and interests, like an involvement with the Hermannhof Winery in Hermann.
"People down there talked to me," he said with a chuckle in his voice, "and they advised me that getting into the wine and beer business would be a good idea, that it would just grow in value through the years."
Of course, Dierberg knows the old story about making a small fortune in the wine business. Nothing to it. Start with a large fortune.
"But the more I stayed with it," he went on, "and the more I learned, the more I liked the business. I looked at property in Bordeaux for a while, and got close to buying something, but Suntory (a giant Japanese wine and spirits company) got there."
With France out of the picture, Dierberg turned to California, where he had been traveling, and learning about wine, and looking at property, for a long time.
"I traveled there for 30 years," he explained, and continued, "We had banks in San Francisco, banking and real estate interests, and Mary – when she could – joined me out there so we could explore. We watched Napa grow up, and Santa Barbara County today is like Napa was then.
"And then we discovered the Star Lane Ranch, in the Santa Ynez Valley, and it was for sale, and we bought it. It didn't have any grapes on it, either. It was a cattle ranch of about 4,000 acres. It had been a dude ranch in the ‘30s, part of it is in a national forest, and it is beautiful. We raised excellent beef, sold a lot of it to restaurants in San Francisco, and began planting grapes with about 240 acres, mostly cabernet sauvignon and syrah, but other varieties as well."
By now, Star Lane Ranch has grown to about 20,000 acres, and Dierberg also has a vineyard in the Santa Rita Hills area, as well as the Dierberg Vineyard, in the Santa Maria Valley. All three are in the Santa Barbara County appellation.
Nicholas G. de Lucca is the winemaker and the wines are made at a nearby winery in San Luis Obispo while the winery and tasting rooms are being constructed at the Star Lane Ranch. He hopes they will be ready in time for the 2006 harvest.
Right now, there are three Dierberg wines – two under the Three Saints label and one simply called Dierberg – on sale in St. Louis. The ‘02 Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, at suggested retail prices of $20 and $33, respectively, are estate grown and from the Santa Maria Valley. The Three Saints 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon ($24) has a Santa Barbara County appellation.
All three wines show fine flavor. The Chardonnay lacks the special qualities of the two red wines; it's good, with a feel of lemon on the palate. The aroma also shows citrus but there's a lot of oak from the barrel fermentation, and it lacks the finesse of the French white Burgundies, which to me are the benchmark for white wine made from chardonnay grapes.
The Cabernet Sauvignon is youthful, but shows much red fruit – plums and cherry predominate – and still a little hardness. Give it a year or so and it will be an elegant wine, with a long, rich, tantalizing finish, and should improve for another five.
Best of all, in my opinion, is the Pinot Noir, with a lovely aroma of cherry and a flavor of spicy vanilla. Good balance and a long finish with considerable complexity. It will continue to improve for six to eight years.
MO Wine Archive
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