Lets Talk Wine

I have been wanting to write about wine for some time.  Wine enhances food and food enhances wine, so an interest in both is natural.  I started writing and am getting a little carried away.  In this entry I hope to introduce the topic of wine and lead you through some of the best types of wines produced in the US.  In further installments we will talk about some of the wines of France, Italy, Germany and Australia and New Zealand. 
 

Let’s Talk Wine

I, like most Americans of my generation, did not grow up with wine.  Wine was produced as early as 1630 in what is now New Mexico and beginning around 1769, in California; however I think it is fair to say, that up until the last thirty years or so, wine was not the drink of choice in the US.  This is in sharp contrast to Europe, where wine has been a staple for hundreds or even thousands of years. 

Vitis vinifera, the family of grapes best suited to wine making is a native of Persia.  The process of fermenting the grapes was discovered accidently perhaps as many as 5000 years ago.  The yeast spores needed to change the grape sugar into alcohol were naturally present on the grape skins.  Bunches of grapes picked one day and saved for consumption the next didn’t taste the same and the euphoria they caused was not available from the freshly picked grapes.   Nomadic people began to settle in places where they could grow grapes and have the alcoholic euphoria whenever they wanted. 

Over the centuries, Europeans begin to develop what would become modern day techniques for planting, cultivating, and pruning vines as well as the various methods and steps used to produce wine.  The wine industry in the US was really spawned by immigrants who came to this country from Europe.  They brought the tried and true methods of Europe with them and therefore avoided some of the painful mistakes of their ancestors. 

The cultivating of vines, growing of grapes and the process of turning them into wine is a complicated industry and one can spend a lifetime in pursuit of knowledge regarding the industry.  On top of that, understanding the many types of wine produced and what influences the way the wine tastes once it gets to your table is another layer of complexity, and we haven’t even begun to talk about how wine influences the way food tastes and vice versa.  But alas, it is this kind of talk that scares many people away from wine.

I began to get seriously interested in wine in the early 1980’s when I began to travel to Europe on business.  Most of my trips were in and out of Paris and I took every opportunity to sample the French wines.  I didn’t know much about them, but I knew that I liked them a lot; particularly the Bordeaux’s and the White Burgundy’s.  We began to drink wine with meals back at home in the US and discovered that there were some very elegant wines being produced in the US as well.  Mostly they came from California. 

I began to subscribe to Wine Spectator and started buying and reading books on wine and the process of producing it.

In 1998, we moved to Sydney Australia and lived there a little over a year.  We took in all we could of the Australian wine culture.  We learned to love the unoaked Chardonnay, the Chardonnay/Semillon blends, and the sticky Australian wines, like tawny port, but mostly the big bold Shiraz’s got our attention. 

After retirement in 1999, we made a number of trips to Europe and each time tried to do some tours of various wine regions.  Over the years we have visited and done tastings at a number of wineries in France as well as in Italy.  We also have done a couple of trips with tastings and tours of many of the famous California wineries. 

While living in South Carolina, the local branch of the University of South Carolina offered a broad program of classes available to the large retired population in the Hilton Head area.  I took all of the wine classes that they offered, including specific classes on Red Wines, White Wines, Wines of Italy and Wines of Germany.  Much of what I am saying in this article can be directly attributed to the notes and handouts that I got in those classes. They were really good short courses and I learned a lot, but after roughly 35 years of being pretty interested in wine, I have concluded that  with just a few basics you can be pretty proficient in selecting a wine you might like.  You will feel comfortable going into the wine shop or ordering a bottle of wine in a restaurant.  But the main lesson with wine is, drink what you enjoy!

If you will indulge me, I will try to briefly give you some of the basics that I think will help you to enjoy wine and make you confident when ordering.  If you gain the confidence to order different wines and try them you will expand what you like.  I guarantee it!

There are three basic types of wine.  They are table wine, sparkling wine and fortified wine. 

Table Wine

Table wines are still wines or wines where all of the CO2 gas produced in the fermentation process is allowed to escape. They can be red, white or rose’ and have alcohol content of 7 to 14 percent.  Dry table wines are those where all of the sugar in the wine has been fermented into alcohol.  Sweet table wines still have some of the residual sugar after fermentation. 

Sparkling Wine

Sparkling wines are table wines that are carbonated.

Fortified Wine

Fortified wines have higher alcohol content than table wines, usually 17 to 22 percent.  They include Ports, Sherries and Madeira’s.

Next, let’s talk about the various wine producing nations of the world and what kind of wine they produce.   By far, the largest producers of wine are Italy, France, the United States, and Australia/ New Zealand.  Other producers of note in Europe are Germany and Spain.  South Africa and Chile and Argentina are also major exporters of wine to the US.  Virtually every country produces some kind of wine, but if you know a little about the bigger ones you will be set. 

Wines produced in Europe are generally identified by appellation.  That is, where the grapes were grown.  For instance, in France a wine might be a Medoc.  The Medoc is an area in Bordeaux.  What you really need to know is that Bordeaux wine is virtually all red wine produced by blending various combinations of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot grapes.   Unfortunately, if you want to drink a lot of wine from Europe, you will have to learn what the various regions are in France, Italy and Germany and what the types of wine are that come from those areas. 

Wines produced in the US and Australia and New Zealand are identified by varietal.  That is to say the type of grape used to produce the wine.  So these wines will be called Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, etc.  I think the US system is easier to understand, but the Europeans have identified specific very small appellations that repeatedly produce fine wines and they prefer to label in that way.  The US is now divided into 230 appellations, and they are noted on the bottle of wine, however, it isn’t necessary to try to know all of these.  After a while you will learn that maybe you especially like Chardonnay from the Russian River Appellation, but you don’t need to know much about the other 229 appellations.   

Let’s talk about the wines of the US first.  They are, I think, the easiest to understand and will be the easiest to find and afford.   Generally, the four most common wine grapes in the world are Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Chardonnay and Riesling.  Of these varieties, the first three are all very common in the US.  Riesling is grown on a limited basis, but we will talk about that more when we get to Germany, which is where the grape originated. 

First let’s talk about Cabernet Sauvignon.  It is the world’s most famous red wine grape.  It is considered one of the Noble wine grapes, along with the three others mentioned above.  This is because all of these wines can be grown in various types of soil or climate conditions and will still yield wines that have the same distinct characteristics.  Cabernets from France, the US, Australia and Chile will all resemble one another in some of their flavors and textures.  In the US, Napa Valley has long been associated with fine Cabernets. 

Cabernet Sauvignon : Characteristics

Appearance

Can be purple and almost inky when young, turns slowly to ruby, then garnet and finally mahogany as it ages in the bottle.  Colors, no matter the age, should be deep and opaque.

Aromas and Flavors (these are characteristic and may vary by wine)

Blackberries                         Black Cherry                        Black Currant          Cherry

Raspberry                             Black Pepper           Clove                          Mint  

Nutmeg                                 Vanilla                       Cedar                         Coffee

 

Body

Wines can be velvety and soft to harsh and tannic.  Tannins will mellow as the wine is aged and the wine will become full and round.  Tannins are compounds that occur naturally in the skin, stems and seeds of grapes.  The longer the juice of the grapes sits on the skins and seeds in production, the more tannin will be in the wine.  It is the tannins that make wine taste dry.  These tannins are antioxidants and they are what allow red wines to be aged for long periods.  California is one of the world’s best producers of Cabernet Sauvignon, along with the Bordeaux region in France.

Merlot, another of the Noble grapes, is a cousin of Cabernet Sauvignon.  It was originally introduced in Bordeaux in the early 1800’s as a blending wine to be mixed with Cabernet.  Merlot has gained in popularity, however, as wine consumers have noted that wines made from the merlot grape have many of the good characteristics of Cabernet, as they are full, fruity and satisfying, without the harshness that tannins add to Cabernet wines.  Merlot is grown extensively in California.

Merlot: Characteristics

Appearance

Bright purple color when young, although It soon turns to garnet and then brown.  Merlot matures more quickly in the bottle than Cabernet.

 

Aromas and Flavors

Plum              fruitcake       currant          cherry            chocolate

Spice              earthy            leather           tobacco         pepper                                 

Nutmeg         cloves                        vanilla

 

Body

Can be generous, subtle, and velvety.  Less tannic than Cabernet, fleshy.  Round, smells fruity and sweet without the edge of Cabernet, softer and warmer.

Chardonnay is another of the Noble grapes.  Chardonnay is the canvas on which winemakers can test various styles and techniques because it is flexible and versatile.  From cool climates, when it is aged in stainless steel, it mirrors it’s terroir, from under lemony, nutty fruit.  In warmer climates, it becomes richer, fuller and even tropical.  When aged in Oak barrels (the characteristic California approach) it absorbs vanilla, spice and cream flavors.  Chardonnay is grown in literally every wine growing area in the world, but California is known worldwide and one of the finest producers of the variety. 

Sauvignon Blanc, also sometimes called fume’ Blanc in California, is meant to be drunk young.  It is sharp, tangy, and reminiscent of green fruit or grass.  It is a popular wine, but I would go with the Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand.  It is the wine that put New Zealand on the world wine map. 

Pinot Noir is capable of producing great red wines, despite the fact that it is one of the most difficult grapes to grow.  It does better in cooler climates.  The vines need to be pruned to yield concentrated flavors but too much pruning yields light colored wines with weak flavor.  Pinot Noir was originally cultivated from wild vines, particularly around the Burgundy area in France.  About 70% of all wine planted in Burgundy is Pinot Noir.  In California, experimentation has produced some good Pinot Noirs in Caneros, Monterey and the Anderson Valley, but Oregon is the home of the finest Pinots in the US, with some of the best coming from the Willamette Valley.

Pinot Noir Characteristics

Appearance

Colors range from light to deep and opaque, purple/red to garnet

Aromas and Flavors

Spicy              cloves                        plums             leather           wood             smoke

Floral             menthol        cedar             toasty                        coffee                        raisins           

Tobacco        black pepper                       violets            truffles

Strawberry  cherry           

Body

Like its appearance, the body of Pinots can range from lighter to some of the very heaviest of red wines. 

Let’s summarize what we have said about wines from the US.  It is this simple.  Buy Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot from California.  They come in multiple price points and produce some great wines.  Chardonnay from California is some of the finest in the world, especially if you like the oaky, buttery taste that is the classic California approach.  If you like Pinot Noir and don’t want to pay for the classic Burgundies from the Cote D’Or, buy Oregon Pinot Noir, especially from the Willamette Valley.  Typically for other varietals, I go to the country that is famous for their production.  We will talk about some of those wines in later installments when we discuss the wines of France, Italy, Germany,  etc.