Category Archives: USA

Jul 07 2012
45 Comments
USA

I’m back with a note on U.S. customs duties for wine

In case you got here through a search engine and are wondering how much wine you can bring into the United States from anywhere in the world my answer is this: As much as you can carry. The duty free allowance is one liter, which means one bottle. But, that is only the duty free allowance which means you have to pay no import duty on that amount. The thing is that US import duties on wine are very low, under $5 per gallon, which means less than $1 per bottle. So what you do is: Take as much as you can, declare it on your customs form, tell the agent that you have something to declare, and then they will most likely wave you through (we’ve brought 12 bottles per person many times and never had to pay anything). Good luck and safe travels! If you are wondering how to pack the wine, this is my post on how I do it. (Summary of 09/23/2013)

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We’re back in the States. I am kind of embarrassed that I have not written more over the last weeks, but it just felt right to take a break and enjoy our time in Germany. The current heat wave in Ann Arbor (and that our house was without electricity for way over 30 hours upon our return) makes me miss the “German summer” with way less heat even more.

Our trip was really good, as I indicated in my last post in June. We ended up with way more wine than we had meant to acquire, but I guess that always happens to us. The last day in Germany was spent mostly scheming how to get as much wine into our luggage as possible. Turns out that we were able to bring 22 750ml bottles and 2 375ml! That is a new record for us. It makes sense, because German wine usually costs between twice and four times in the US compared to what it costs in Germany. Also, it is quite the hassle actually getting the wines because often they are only available through big wine sellers online and then you have to buy a minimum of 12 bottles plus shipping, which would completely overstep our budget. (If anyone has good alternatives, let me know!)

Scheming and packing…

A friend will bring an additional 13 bottles over the course of the next months, and 6 750ml as well as 4 375ml bottles will be waiting with my mother to make their way here.

A lot of people keep telling me that you can only bring one bottle of wine per person into the United States. That is wrong. Correct is: Your duty-free customs allowance is 1 liter of wine, which usually brings you down to 1 bottle. That is only the duty free amount. Naturally, you can bring home more. You will have to declare it and potentially have to pay customs duty on these wines. What nobody knows, and I have not been able to find the information online anywhere, is that customs duty on wine is dirt cheap. How I know? We were stopped by customs this time around.

I always declare the number of bottles I am bringing (usually 8-9) and notify the customs agent that I have wine to declare. This usually leads to them waving me through without checking. This time around, we declared our wine together (23 full bottles), and that startled them. So we had to go to a booth and talk to a customs officer. After him checking one bottle and being satisfied that it was indeed wine and not liquor, he had to check his lists for quite some time until he found out that the customs duty on wine is a whopping $3.45 (not sure about the .45, might be a bit higher) for a gallon of wine. You read right, a gallon. That is almost 5 bottles…Another customs officer explained that they have discretion on whether to collect customs duty up to $20. And since filling out the paperwork probably costs more than they can raise, they decided to waive the duty.

So, please, on your next overseas trip: Go and stock up on wine that you cannot get or want to pay reasonable prices on. It is really easy!

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May 24 2012
9 Comments
2009, California, USA

2009 Sterling Vintner’s Collection Meritage

I am just realizing this is my first blog entry on red wine…see, I am not as one dimensional as you thought!

Prior to buying this, I had never seen the name Meritage before, so I checked it out and found this on it: It is a term coined by American winemakers, that stands for Bordeaux-style wines. This means not one or two grape varietals but rather a blend of several varietals to create a complex and harmonious product. Some California winemakers decided to found the Meritage Association (now: Meritage Alliance) in 1988 and you have to be a member to label wines “Meritage”. A clever guy came up with a combination of “merit” and “heritage”, so it is to be pronounced like heritage, just with an “m”…

While modern times have become more and more obsessed with single variety wines (you know what I’m talking about when you look at your supermarket’s or winestore’s wine displays), it is not at all uncommon to blend several grapes into one wine. Bordeaux is the prime example, but also Chianti classico is made of several varietals (until a couple of years ago, they could even include white grapes!) same as a lot of wines from Portugal’s Douro region. It gives winemakers the unique chance of blending different tastes together into one. I personally like blended wines, the rough edges of a cabernet sauvignon can be mellowed by merlot for example. When I once talked to a Douro winemaker friend of mine and mentioned that I had tried and hated a single varietal “tinta barocca” in South Africa, he looked at me in shock. How could anyone make single variety tinta barocca, he asked? It is a classic filler grape for bigger reds…

Now on to this one. Sterling is a huge winery in Napa Valley. You can check out their site here (with elevator music…). The Vintner’s Collection is their “cheap”, really mass label. We paid about $10, I think. This Meritage (thankfully they put that on the label) has 66% Cabernet Sauvignon, 24% Merlot, 7% Malbec, and 3% Petit Verdot in it. Upon pouring, it showed its not overly dark color, which I found surprising. I had expected a way darker red. The nose was strong and full of different smells: initially strawberry hit me, then vanilla and cherry. Somewhere in the middle, herbal and floral notes crept in and I think I smelled some very light tobacco as well. It was awesome. I have not had a bold red in a while, and this reminded me of all things good. The taste was chewy and powerful. Initially smoky, leathery, some black pepper. Then red fruits came in. There was a distinct note of acidity that gave the impression of some unripe grapes in the wine. This acidity also made the wine taste more like plums, which I found appealing. The finish is ok.

I did like this wine. It was bold and not ashamed of it. Especially given that it was mass-produced I did like it. Some imbalances, the acidity, but all in all a very decent wine. Oh, and it went well with the pizza we had, too.

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May 22 2012
3 Comments
Michigan, USA, Wineries

Fenn Valley Vidal Blanc 42 Ice Wine

The beautiful and fitting label was just the start for a great experience.

Having set the tone with my ice wine post yesterday, it is my pleasure to write about this particular one.

Fenn Valley winery is, according to its website, a family owned winery on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan and has been in operation since 1973. The farm is spread over 230 acres (93 hectares for my European friends), quite sizeable when you consider that my usual winery at the Mosel works on between 5 and 15 hectares (between 12 and 40 acres). It has to be noted though that they also produce fruit wines (a common thing for a Michigan winery, as I had to learn when I started checking out local wineries), so not all the land is used for wine production. Fenn Valley has a proud history of exploring new varietals for the area, such as vidal and viognier, but also riesling and gewürztraminer.

Their wine list is extensive, and as you will notice the wines are all priced rather reasonably. And the wine I am going to talk about now definitely makes me want to try more of their stuff, and definitely visit the winery.

Friends of ours brought this bottle as a participant in one of our wine and cheese parties. Being the German wine snob I am, I was at first skeptical: an ice wine from Michigan…ha. Well, we’ll see…Once I read that the grapes were actually frozen on the vines before harvest (same as the method in Germany), I was pleasantly surprised. It was also my first go with the vidal grape (at least I cannot remember another instance I might have tried it). The wine has 10.5% vol. alcohol, which is rather high for an ice wine.

The color was a beautiful light honey. The nose had candied fruit and honey notes as well, which I liked a lot. Another taster remarked on tropical notes. Tastewise, it does not have the acidity structure that a riesling ice wine would have brought to the table which diminished the experience a bit, because it made the wine very very sweet without a counterbalancing acidity. The fruit however was very well concentrated and I liked the long lasting finish. I thought all in all it was a tad too one-dimensional, but it was still a great work of art and skill. When I later learned that the half-bottle is a mere $15 (that is an insanely low price), I was stunned. This wine could definitely retail at a much higher price.

Another taster who had tried the wine on winery remarked on cellartracker.com (oldest post) that Fenn Valley had agreed to produce that wine for a neighbouring land owner who, because of the economic crisis then could not buy back the finished product. So Fenn Valley retained it at a steep discount and decided to pass that discount along to customers…WOW!

This wine is a steal, and a very affordable way to try a well made ice wine. Unfortunately, it has sold out at the winery, but I have definitely seen it at a liquor store in Ann Arbor. That means it is still around, so go hunt! It is well worth it!!

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