The Immortal's Guide to Wine
15. Old World, New World- Which one makes better wine?
People have been arguing about this since the 1970s. They will be arguing about it long after I have stopped paying attention — which, given my track record, may not be for some time.
Old World wine and New World wine are two different conversations about what wine
should be. Neither one is right. They are answers to different questions.
Old World
Old World refers to the traditional wine-producing regions of Europe — France, Italy, Spain, Germany, and others. These regions have centuries of winemaking tradition behind them, and that tradition shapes everything from how the vines are grown to how the wine is labeled. Old World wines tend to be more restrained, with lower alcohol levels, more earth and mineral character, and less obvious fruit. The goal is often to express where the grapes were grown — the terroir — rather than the grape variety itself. You might notice that a French wine label will often say the region (Bordeaux, Burgundy) rather than the grape.
New World
New World refers to wine regions in California, Oregon, Washington, Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, Chile, and South Africa — places where winemaking traditions developed more recently, and with fewer inherited rules about how things should be done. New World wines tend to be fruit-forward, riper, more approachable young, and often labeled by grape variety. The warm, reliable growing seasons in places like California produce fruit with consistent quality and generous flavor.
Vampire Vineyards is a California producer — proudly New World. We've been committed to the fruit-forward character of California winemaking, paired with real discipline about what goes in the glass, since 1988. But like the Europeans who once crossed an ocean to plant vines here and shape California's wine world, I came from the Old World myself — and old habits die hard. We still keep one foot across the Atlantic, producing our Dracula's Daughter Prosecco Rosé and an authentic Spanish sangria, Fangria, alongside our California wines.
The Real Answer to Old World vs. New World
Neither style is better. They are different preferences, different occasions, different moods. A meal in Provence calls for one thing. A summer evening in Malibu calls for another. The best approach is to try both, pay attention to what you actually like, and stop arguing with people at dinner parties about it.
Find your style — shop Vampire Vineyards at vampire.com
Your Host -
The Count of Vampire Vineyards
At some point, someone convinced you that wine was complicated. That it required the right vocabulary, the right knowledge, the right reverence. They were wrong. And I have had five hundred years to be certain of it.Vampire Vineyards has been making gold medal-winning wine since 1988 — not because we followed the rules, but because we ignored the ones that didn't matter and obsessed over the ones that did. The fruit. The winemaking. The experience in the glass.This series exists to share everything we have learned. No pretension. No forest floors. Just wine, explained honestly, by someone who has had rather a lot of time to figure it out.
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