The White Zinfandel Story
(The Great Mistake)

The grape Zinfandel produces a hearty powerful rich red wine reminiscent of

blackberry jam, spice, and toasted coconut. Aged in American oak barrels and the

alcohol content is frequently 15% or higher. Zin is known as the "California" grape

as it is the only area in the world with LARGE plantings. Apulia a province know as

the "heel" of the boot of Italy grows a clone of Zinfandel known as Primitivo.

The Zinfandel grape has been made into Rose wine way back but never really

caught on as far as sales are concerned.

In the 1970's, Sutter Home Winery produced premium red hearty Zinfandel wine.

In that operation they used the Saignee technique to bleed off some of the grape

juice prior to fermentation to concentrate the compounds in the grape skins to

make a bolder red zin. The product that was bled off was in fact a "white zin" that

was not that popular.

In 1975 Sutter Home's White Zin experienced what's called a stuck fermentation.

That is that the yeast dies out and does not consume all the sugar. This accidental

juice was set aside and weeks later the winemaker tasted what then resulted in a

pink, sweet and low alcohol wine. It was decided that this batch would be bottled

and put on the market and over time this "White" Zinfandel became very popular

outselling the Red variety by a 6 to 1 ratio.

In today's wine market White Zin is extremely popular. It is a light, fruity, sweet,

inexpensive and low alcohol wine made for immediate consumption. We

encourage the "White" Zin lovers to stop by Ryan's and check out our supply and

competitive prices.