Turn Turn Turn
Written By: Brian Freedman on Tue, Jul 17th 2007
The wine world, mercifully, is changing. And it's not happening a moment too soon, because for a while there, it looked as if it might get crushed beneath the weight of its own pretensions.
This, of course, was always a problem in America: We just couldn't seem to get away from the idea the wine is an upscale beverage, a signpost of having arrived at a certain socio-economic stratum, a status symbol on par with a nice watch, a fancy new car, or a house with a swan-shaped fountain anchoring the front yard.
And while the culture as a whole certainly hasn't shed that unfortunately constricting skin, it is undoubtedly in the process of doing so. And thank goodness for it.
When I was a college student, I used to get mocked by my friends for ordering a glass of wine if I was in the mood for it. Real men, after all, drank beer - preferably of the cheap, watery, and tasteless variety. ( Real men also, aopparently, were born without taste buds. ) But a few months ago, just as we were crawling out of the interminable winter, I was enjoying a glass at a local wine bar and saw something I never would have seen five years ago: A group of college-aged guys, all in tattered sweatshirts and sweat-stained baseball caps, sitting around a table, yukking it up like early-twenty-somethings tend to do, and each sipping glasses of wine.
Mon dieu!
Finally, I thought, people were starting to get it. They were starting to understand exactly what true wine lovers have known all along: It's nothing more than grape juice. Sure, that juice can be exquisitely delicious. And it can offer a level of complexity and depth that no other food or beverage possibly can. But when all is said and done, when all the hyperbole and hot-and-heavy wine writing is through, it's just a glass of fermented grape juice. And those college kids got it.
For a while there, it semmed as if getting it meant savoring the oh-so-subtle charms of one of the Yellow Tail bottlings. And whether it was the chardonnay, the shiraz, or the riesling, that kangaroo-labeled bottle on your table meant that you had moved on from boxes of white zinfandel and jugs of faux-Chablis, and that you appreciated the so-called finer points of wine. Indeed, I cannot count the number of people I came across who felt the need to wax poetic about their favorite varietal from "Australia's best."
Unfortunately, far too many people got stuck in a rut, and failed to use those wines as springboards to better - and often better-value - things.
Summertime, however, is the perfect time to do just that. Because this is the time of year that was made for drinking the kind of lighter, brighter wines that tend to cost less and yet, at the same time, offer tons of drinking pleasure.
Start off with a bottle of rosé. Whether it’s from France, Spain, California, Australia, or somewhere else in the wine world, buy yourself half a case. These wines are some of the best values out there when it comes to what you’ll pay for the amount of pleasure they’ll deliver. The Perrin Reserve Cotes du Rhone Rose 2006 is a dynamite value at less than $10, and the Julian Chivite Gran Fuedo Rosado 2005, at less than a dollar more, is one of Spain’s great values in pink wines.
Or, if you’re in the mood for something a little heartier, check out all the value bottlings in Cotes du Rhone reds: Guigal makes a delicious one for less than $11, and for this time of year, there’s almost nothing I prefer more than a nice cool bottle of this blend of syrah, grenache, and mourvedre.
Or go with an unusual white wine-whether it’s the Nora Albariño 2005 or the Yalumba Y Series Viognier 2005, these perfumed, aromatic whites are the perfect antidote to all those over-oaked chardonnays and one-dimensional pinot grigios so many people insist on when the mercury climbs.
Whatever you do, remember: It’s just grape juice. And while there are some bottles that are undoubtedly worth all that extra money, you can derive serious pleasure from less expensive ones, too. It’s the perfect way to counter wine-snobbery. And it’s the perfect way to remind yourself that there is more to inexpensive wine than yellow-tailed kangaroos.
