Dan Berger is in the studio today with Steve Jaxon on California Wine Country to talk about the Sonoma County Harvest Fair 2023 winners.

Dan Berger is in the studio today with Steve Jaxon on California Wine Country to talk about the Sonoma County Harvest Fair 2023 winners.

The winners have been announced at the Harvest Fair website and in the PD. Dan explains that it is a competition all for wines made from grapes grown in Sonoma County. It is also an opportunity to examine the differences present in the county’s different regions like Petaluma Gap.

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Some family-owned wineries won big. Wilson Winery of Healdsburg won the red category and Fritz Underground Winery in Cloverdale has won in the white category. Clay Fritz who owns Fritz Underground Winery is the brother of Jay Fritz who owns Lynmar Estate. He was on this show on this recent episode. A 2021 Russian River Valley Chardonnay from Fritz winery was the big winner.

Wilson is on Dry Creek Road; their winemaker is Antoine Favero who makes intense and deeply flavored Zinfandels. It was a 2021 Zinfandel that won the red category. Dry Creek is cool enough to capture the black berry fruits but warm enough to produce some of the exotic notes.

2021 was a relatively warm year but not hot, which is ideal. 2021 was a very good vintage, says Dan, and the 2021 and 2022 are worth comparing to see the difference. Dan likes to buy a 2020 and a 2021 Pinot Gris from the same producer, to compare them.

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Healdsburg’s De La Montanya Vineyards & Winery won the Specialty category with its 2020 Twisted Jill Blanc de Blanc from Russian River Valley, made by winemaker Andrew Schwendeman.

Dan Berger also runs The Dan Berger International Wine Competition every year, and this will be his 42nd consecutive year, on December 8, this year. All of the judges in his competition are winemakers.

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Harvest Fair had 964 entries this year. The judges at the Sonoma County Harvest Fair like to award Zinfandel for excellence, because of its importance in the county’s overall wine production.