Nouveau

A young wine meant for immediate drinking, usually seven to ten weeks after being made. The most famous wine made in a nouveau style is Beaujolais Nouveau.

The Sonoma wine region is known as the “Valley of the Sun.”

Answer: False.

Sonoma is also sometimes known as the “Valley of the Moon.” Before the Spanish missionaries arrived in the early nineteenth century, Native Americans had lived in the Sonoma Valley for over 12,000 years. Legend has it that Sonoma derives from an indigenous word meaning “many moons.” Sometime in the 1840s, General Mariano G. Vallejo, who was the Mexican commander in the area, translated the term from a local Native American tribe, believing it to roughly translate to “valley of the moon.” The name stuck.

“I guess I am a chauvinist, but the idea that fine California wine has to be dependent on oak from Europe, as part of its quality, was not acceptable.”

—Paul Draper, CEO, Ridge Vineyards
Quoted in Wine Business Monthly, April 2018, referring to his use of American oak to age Ridge wines.

—Paul Draper, CEO, Ridge Vineyards
Quoted in Wine Business Monthly, April 2018, referring to his use of American oak to age Ridge wines.

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