Sometimes people ask me which of my wines ("Which do you think is better, the '95 or the '96 Zinfandel") I like the best. As a winemaker, and particularly because I am a winemaker in a tiny winery, this is very much like asking me which of my children I like most, Lea or Jesse.

It is not lost on me that I carry this concern for my wines throughout their "lives", much as I still caution my children to be careful at tasks they have long since mastered. When someone picks up a case at my winery and we place it in the trunk of their automobile, the lecture is automatically cued: "Don't leave this in here too long and if you have to stop on the way home, park in the shade.

But then I am the kind of person who, if going shopping for wine and the day is hot, brings along an ice chest with a top that closes tight and a few ice cubes in a plastic bag to keep the contents from heating up.

I do not have any data about how hot it can get in the trunk of a car parked in the sun on a warm day, but we both know it can melt the heck out of a Hershey bar, don't we! Wine literally cooks in that level of heat and if tasted later, has a dead, red liquid but not wine, flavor.

I recently visited a friend's new home and he mentioned that he thought some of the wine he had purchased from me was going bad. After I removed the knife from my heart, we took a look and saw that he had a fine, out-of-the-way-storage place for the wine…on top of his refrigerator! I was amazed that any of my creations had survived the heat and vibration there.

Heat is the enemy of fine wine. Keep it cool and alive.

Paul Kreider