Ep 597: Lodi, California -- The Past, Present, and Future of this Historic Region

Wine for Normal People

Arts, Food

4.6 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 25 February 2026

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week I cover Lodi, California, an historic wine region in the Central Valley of California that has been growing grapes since the 1850s.

Located 40 miles /64 km south of Sacramento and 90 miles/ 145 km east of San Francisco, Lodi is an often overlooked wine region, despite the fact that it has been recognized as an American Viticultural Area (AVA) since 1986.

Lodi AVAs. Source: Lodi Winegrape Commission

Lodi doesn't lack for vineyard land --today the region has 100,000 acres/ 40,500 ha planted to wine grapes, with 750 growers, 80 wineries, and about 65 tasting rooms. 20% of California's total wine is made from Lodi grapes. The AVA also has the highest concentration of old vines in California.

Photo: Bechthold Vineyard planted 1886. Credit: Randy Caparoso, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Although Lodi is known for big, juicy, high alcohol Zinfandel Petite Sirah, Cabernet Sauvignon, and red blends, the real secret is that with a library of 125+ different grapes, Lodi is doing a lot of experimentation with alternative varietals and some of it is pretty cool: it has a few tricks up its sleeve.

In this show, I cover all of the details of Lodi - from the history, to the climate and land, to the AVAs, and the wine styles. I mention some key producers, and then I wrap with some of the challenges that Lodi faces and the opportunities it has in front of it.

Source for this show was primarily the excellent site of the Lodi Winegrape Commission:

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Wine for Normal People, the podcast for people who like wine, but not the snobbery that goes with it.
0:15.8	I'm your host Elizabeth Schneider, author of the Wine for Normal People book and certified wine dork.
0:21.7	This podcast is brought to you by Wine Access. Go to wine access.com slash WFNP to get into their site
0:28.4	and let them know you found out about them through me. Then you can browse their very
0:32.4	curated and amazing selection of wines from all around the globe at competitive prices. These are wines that
0:38.7	you can't get elsewhere. So check it out today. Wine Access.com slash WFNP. Listen in the middle of
0:46.1	the show for more details. Last week, I did the show on the New World versus the Old
0:52.2	World and did a deep dive into some of the
0:55.5	controversy, although I don't think there is really any controversy over those two names.
1:01.2	And it did get me thinking, I haven't done a show on a New World region in a while.
1:06.0	So this week, it was on the list. I've been meaning to cover it for a while, so I'm going to cover
1:11.5	Lodi, California. Now, this is a region that is often overlooked, and the producers of this region
1:18.1	are very frustrated frequently that they don't get their due. Part of this has to do with
1:24.5	the location of Lodi, California, and part of it has to do with some
1:30.2	of the wine styles. I will be very upfront in saying that I generally don't drink the
1:35.2	wines of Lodi, but I do think that after the show, I'm going to seek out more of the
1:41.3	alternative varietals. It's certainly worth trying and seeing what they're up to.
1:46.0	There is one winery that I have always liked, but have had a hard time getting their wines.
1:51.8	It's a female run winery called acquiesce, and they only do white wines. I'll talk about
1:57.9	acquiesce a little bit later, but there are some set reasons why those
2:02.0	wines are so good, but there are other really great wines. And I also understand, and I'm
2:08.4	totally admitting my bias to you, because you guys know that I like to be up front with you about
	...

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