Wine Lists of Shame: The Top KC Restaurants that Serve No Local Wines





801 Chophouse
◦Wine List Note: Some regional wines from Oregon and Washington
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

Bluestem Restaurant
◦Wine List Note: Focuses on a range of Californian and some international wines
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

Bristol Seafood & Grill
◦Wine List Note: A wide-ranging list including many smaller vineyards
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

EBT Restaurant
◦Wine List Note: A range of US and International wines including bottles from Washington and Oregon
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None (MO and KC wines occasionally present at wine tastings)

Grand Street Café
◦Wine List Note: Some regional wines from Oregon and Washington
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None (one MO wine was on the list in the past)

Houston’s Kansas City
◦Wine List Note: A range of international and California wines
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None (one MO wine was temporarily on the list several months ago)

Lidia’s Italy
◦Wine List Note: Focuses on Italian and Californian wines
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

Piropos Restaurant on the Hill
◦Wine List Note: Argentinian, Californian, international and some regional US wines
◦Missouri of Kansas Wines Available: None (one MO wine -Amigoni red –was on the list until about a month ago)

The Savoy Grill
◦The Wine List: Includes international, Californian and Oregon wines
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

YaYa’s Eurobistro
◦The Wine List: Includes international, Californian and Oregon wines
◦Missouri or Kansas Wines Available: None

http://regionalwinetaster.com/2012/01/25/wine-lists-of-shame-the-top-kc-restaurants-that-serve-no-local-wines/

Issue discussed on The Local Show on KCPT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kskvjN1Zhno&feature=player_embedded

I support local, but Mo Wine is really average to below average to horrible.

yeah, why would a top restaurant serve missouri wine? (i can only imagine how bad kansas wine is). amigoni wines are the only missouri wines i can think of that are at least palatable - but they are also very expensive (at $15-30 retail). you can get good old world wines for that price.

that said, everyone should check out the new amigoni winery space and tasting room in the west bottoms, it's a beautiful space.

Yeah, there really aren't too many MO wines good enough to serve in a restaurant. Some Nortons are passable. I could see locatarian chefs like Jonathan Justus (Justus Drugstore) doing some kind of special to pair with a Norton but I wouldn't expect restaurants to carry MO wines in general.

I couldn't tell the difference between a Cabernet and a Franzia, but the Stone Hill Winery in MO did very well in that blind wine taste test on KCPT among people that supposedly know about wine. At the very least, restaurants could offer it. I would guess the average customer is not that discerning when it comes to wines.

jesus. i am not exactly a wine connoisseur, but stone hill wines are truly vile. of the 20-odd wines they make (which is clue enough that they are bad), only maybe 3 even approximate "real" wine, and they are still not good at all. the rest are sickly sweet, "blueberry wines" and the like, and taste like bartles and james wine coolers.

i support local/regional products whenever possible, and really really want to like MO wine, but...

I've only had one MO wine, and it was terrible, but it was some sweet nasty thing. Are there local wines out there that can really compete with Napa, Oregon, or old world wines? I'm not aware of any, but I'd really like to be wrong.

And it's not because of poor winemakers. Our intense summers just don't produce grapes as well as areas that have Mediterranean climates.

But MO helped save the French industry over a hundred years ago...



http://www.missouriwinecountry.com/articles/history/

Everyones tastes are different. I would say a good majority of people that are not really wine drinkers and couldn't tell you what a Tannin is, are more likely to order and like the sweet wines that taste like a wine cooler. It seems like every women i know loves Moscato

and that's fine, folks are entitled to enjoy sweet MO wine. but it also explains why it's not available at KC's finer restaurants. that said, i do know that i've seen Amigoni wines at some good KC restaurants, and their wines more closely approximate "real" wines than any others i have had in MO. i.e., the cab franc tastes like cab franc, the cab sauv tastes like cab sauv, etc. they are overpriced compared to very good value wines from around the world, but they are decent.

Problem is those restaurants reputations ride on the taste of people who do know what a tannin is.

I've had at least one MO wine paired at Bluestem.

I think Chrizow has got it right - Amigoni is the only good local wine I've had, but their better wines are priced a bit on the high side. Their Urban Red cab blend is quite good, but I think it retails for around $20+. You can find some better options at that price. Their Viognier is not to shabby and it tends to be more reasonably priced.

Sommerset Ridge from the Paola area has a couple decent wines, but they also make some of the worst wine I've ever tasted. They actually do a good job with ports - both a tawny and a ruby.

The rest of the local wines I've had range from awful to barely passable.

Hadley Cells:


Warm air escaping from the Hadley Cells over the ocean corresponds, shockingly enough, to areas known for great wine production. Almost all of the great wine regions are due East of an ocean at a similar hemispheric position for the hadley cell to deposit warm air currents. Those currents are often tempered and cooled by a forrest or hilly/mountainous area before they fall into the specific terroir where earthy, quality grapes tend to thrive. This allows the grapes the heat they need in the summer, but not too much, and the consistency of weather they thrive on. I could be a tad off in my description, but you get the idea.

People have found grapes that do quite well in other climates, but they are often sweeter or have a different taste that many wine drinkers are not used to. I'm not saying there can't be good Missouri wine, but I think it is more difficult to make it, and you are at the whim of scorching heat. There is a reason why Northern Cali, France/Spain/Italy, Australia, Chile/Argentina, South Africa, all do well with wine making. It is a similar climate for making high quality grapes.

Results of the blind taste test.

http://regionalwinetaster.com/2012/06/22/bottle-shock-redux-missouri-wines-triumph-in-blind-tasting/

List of area wineries.

http://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/news/2012/06/25/list-boutique-wineries-near-kansas-city.html

While the temperature is not optimal to growing complex-flavored wines like in the above spots, the reason wine is grown in Missouri is because the soil and terrain is conductive to growing grapes (as most probably already know) but really nothing else. Thus it would be kind of a waste not to try to grow some wine grapes there; the other option is letting it go wild.

It is not just a case of the uneducated masses not knowing what tannin is. There are many who are knowledgeable but just prefer the sweeter flavor.
Thus maybe Missouri wineries could simply remove all pretense and focus on making dessert wines.

With regards to many "fine" items I believe there is a certain amount of snobbery with regards to how people judge those items. Where those "fine" products are from or who makes them or how they are priced affects how they are judged. Those products that appeal to the common folk are therefore downgraded because they are not exclusive to the selected few.

Eh, I think you're right about some things. But a lot of Missouri wine is objectively shit (Les Bourgeois, excluding the Norton). It might taste good in a sense(who hasn't enjoyed a sickly sweet table wine at some point?), but well-crafted wine most often is not.

I wish it were better. Maybe it will get there? Special hardy grapes that are resistant to 105 degree summers?

I very much mostly agree with this. But, I occasionally buy an Augusta Norton that's cheap and pretty good, $10 and comparable to fine $10 California or even Spanish stuff, e.g. At least it was.

Also, Charlie Trotter's used to have a very extensive US regional state wine collection. I never went there, but there was a pink from Nebraska I would get a Hy-Vee that was quite good. I think there were a few from Missouri, can't recall if there were any from Kansas.