White Wines Everyone Can Enjoy

In “Hello. My name is: Chase” I told you a bit about how I got into wine. What I didn’t tell you was that I spent almost an hour reading and re-reading the back labels of almost half my local liquor stores wine selection. I picked up each bottle aware that I was not looking the part and hoped that something would say “You will like me!” The lingo I had loved and started to learn thanks to the journal had suddenly become a confusing jumble of seemingly random metaphor. Plus, all my friends who talked of drinking wine talked of enjoying reds more than whites, so though “fresh , crisp and sweet” sounded more appealing than “a dry wine swimming with cherries and raspberries that  finishes with the tannins of a perfectly made cup of earl gray” I felt the need to get a red and, after my hour of reading landed on a red enjoyed out of the need to enjoy and not because I liked the wine.

Your first bottle of wine shouldn’t be “a dry blah blah blah”, especially if it is your first serious experience with alcohol. I remember tasting a lot of alcohol and a low amount of fruit and though this is largely because the Hoya de Cadenas Reserve Tempranillo was not of great quality itself I strongly believe that going with something sweeter would have been better for me and that by giving into my desire to be suave rather than my desire to enjoy a good bottle of wine I caused myself more pain than I admitted at the time.

So, as a promised , here is a list of white wines that I think anyone can enjoy. There are those who will enjoy reds before they enjoy whites, and I will deal with you next week, but for the most part I think this list of three white wine varietals will be a good place to start.

1. Go out and buy a sweet Finger Lakes Riesling right now. A few Vineyards that are known for making a consistently good vintage are Standing Stone, Dr. Konstantin Frank and Bully Hill. Riesling is a grape that has waved in its popularity in the States. A traditionally sweet wine, resent trends are rendering this grape dry, I recommend though that you find a sweet or semi-dry bottle like Dr. Frank’s and enjoy.
2. The restaurant I worked at during my “One Wine a Week Summer” was Italian based and thus we severed a bunch of Pinot Grigo. This varietal is called Pinto Gris by many State based vineyards. One bottle I enjoyed was the Montevina Pinot Grigio from 2006 that I drank at an Olive Garden recently.
3. This last wine I recommend with a few reservations. First of all you have all heard of it. OK, maybe not all of you but if you flip open any book on wine in the States you will note how important Chardonnay is. Sadly, this means a lot of bad Chardonnay is made so keep to something like Robert Mondavi or Charles Krug (priced around $10 and $20) and beware of vineyards that seem to like oak.

There are other whites, we will talk about many of them as time goes on but please feel free to comment below and tell us all about different vineyards that make a Riesling, Pinot Grigio or Chardonnay you like. Or, if you don’t enjoy any of these choices, please tell us about a white grape you do like.

Next week “Going Red in The Vase”.

Untangling the vines of wine culture-
one word at a time.