The Booklovers' Guide to Wine

by Patrick Alexander

  There are many reasons to question this story of the world-weary Chevalier, if not to dismiss it entirely; but some romantic tales just deserve to be repeated—if only to be savored in the telling over a precious glass of Hermitage. Unfortunately for us romantics, recent DNA testing has shown that, despite tales of crusaders from Persia, Shiraz is indigenous to France, a genetic cross of two relatively obscure varieties, Mondeuse Blanche and Dureza. Nonetheless, the theme of war-weary warriors and the wine’s Australian revival, makes Flanagan and Shiraz the perfect literary pairing.

  Until the Iranian revolution in 1979, Shiraz was still well known for its extensive vineyards and for the quality of its wines. I visited Shiraz in the mid-1970s, inspected the lush vineyards and tasted the deliciously sweet white wines, but never imagined that something so rich and so ancient could be so swiftly destroyed or that such deeply ingrained cultural traditions could be so suddenly terminated. The Shah is gone and now the Mullah reigns; there are no more vines growing, and no birds sing.

  Syrah was introduced to Australia in 1832 by Dr. James Busby, who imported vines of several varieties from Europe. For a while, the Australians called it Hermitage, but when the French finally objected, they started calling it Shiraz, and for at least its first hundred years, it was used as a “field blend” variety rather than being vine-ified separately. Its late-blooming nature suited the warmer growing conditions found in Australia. Shiraz wines from Australia, compared to those from France, tend to be full-bodied with higher alcohol and tannin levels.

  Some Californian and Israeli winemakers offer a variety called Petite Syrah. This name probably originally applied to Syrah vines that were brought from the Rhône valley around 1870. In the years since that time, the name has been applied to a great many old red grape vines in California, including what we now know to be Durif, Peloursin, and other less common varietals. In America, Petite Syrah has now become a generic name rather than a unique grape variety.

  Sylvaner (Goethe): Sylvaner or Silvaner is a variety of white wine grape grown mainly in Alsace and Germany, where its official name is Grüner Sylvaner. In Germany, it is best-known as a component of Liebfraumilch and production boomed in the 1970s to the detriment of quality. While the Alsatian versions have primarily been considered simpler wines, not included among the four noble grapes of Alsace, it was recently included among the varieties that can be used to produce Alsace Grand Cru wine, together with the four noble grapes of Alsace, although only in one vineyard—Zotzenberg.

  This hesitation is explained by the vigor of the Sylvaner vine and the grape’s neutral flavor, which can lead to blandness unless yields are controlled. On the other hand, it gives a blank canvas for the expression of terroir, and on good sites with skilled winemaking, Sylvaner can produce elegant wines.

  A good example is Sylvaner from the town of Würtzburg, in its distinctive bocksbeutal, round bottle. This was the favorite wine of Germany’s most famous writer, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. In a desperate letter, Goethe once wrote to his wife, “send me some Würzburg wine, no other tastes as nice, and I am in a surly mood if I lack my usual favorite drink.” In another letter he famously observed that, “life is too short to drink bad wine.”

  Tempranillo (Cervantes): Tempranillo is only grown on the Iberian Peninsula in Spain and Portugal. It is known as Tinta Roriz in the Douro river area of Portugal. In Spain,Tempranillo is the most important red varietal, and is the major grape in Rioja red wines and in the wines of Toro and Ribera. In Toro, it is known as Tinta-Toro, and in the Ribera it is known as Tinto-Fino. Tempranillo makes wines that are medium-bodied with moderate tannins and acids. They are distinguished by dark colors and deliciously earthy flavors of plum and black currants, truffles and autumn decay.

  More than any other wine, Tempranillo, will always be associated with the Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote of La Mancha, and his faithful servant, Sancho Panza, as they travel around the Kingdom of Castile pursuing justice, saving damsels in distress, and attacking windmills. The Castile-La Mancha setting of Cervantes’ novel is actually the largest continuous vine-growing area in the world, and Tempranillo is the main varietal grown—and was certainly the wine that was drunk locally. Quite probably, it was the Tempranillo wine, as much as the excess reading of books, that transformed the humble Alonso Quixano into the proud knight-errant, Don Quixote. The mixture of wine and books always has ennobling results.

  Torrontes (Tasker): Torrontes is a white grape from the Salta province of Argentina, grown in the highest vineyards of the Andes, sometimes at elevations in excess of ten thousand feet. The grape is descended from a cross between the two vines originally brought from Spain by the Conquistadores, Palomino (Pais/Criola/Mission), and Muscat of Alexandria. It is a deliciously aromatic and refreshing wine, with marked acidity, a satisfying mouth-feel, and a distinctive lingering aftertaste of peaches. Torrontés is so aromatic, so perfumed with scents of orange blossoms, honeysuckle, and lavender, that, according to the Miami Herald’s wine writer, Fred Tasker, you could put a dab behind each ear and go out for an evening of fun and romance.

  Torrontes is also the name of a distinctively flavored grape varietal native to Galicia. Although there was large-scale emigration to Argentina from Galicia, this did not significantly occur till the early twentieth century, long after the Torrontes vine was established in the Andes. Recent DNA testing shows there is no relationship between the two varietals other than the name.

  Touriga Nacional is the best of the grapes that are blended to make Port. It has been used in Port making as far back as the eighteenth century. Touriga Nacional is an early maturing grape that makes wines of especially deep color, intense fruity aroma, and tannin. This variety grows rapidly, and is adaptable to a wide range of growing conditions including limited rainfall. It is grown almost exclusively in Portugal, on the granite plateau of the Dao, and also the remote, steep sides of the upper Douro river valley, near the Spanish border.

  The Touriga Nacional variety makes the best of the Ports, but its yields are small (less than half of other key varieties), and it is the most expensive of the grapes to use. It is used in high percentages only in the best Ports. This grape produces wines with smooth, soft textures that have excellent aging potential.

  Trebbiano: Although not well-known, Trebbiano was for a long time the second most widely planted grape in the world. It produces good yields, but makes undistinguished wine at best. It can be fresh and fruity, but doesn’t age for long. Its high acidity makes it important in Cognac production. Also known as Ugni Blanc, in particular in France, it has many other names reflecting a family of local subtypes. Trebbiano is also the most widely planted white varietal in Italy. It is grown throughout the country, with a special focus on the wines from Abruzzo and from Lazio, including Frascati. Mostly, they are pale, easy-drinking wines, but a few select Trebbiano wines from producers such as Valentini have been known to age for over fifteen years.

  Ugni Blanc (See Trebbiano)

  Verdelho is the most popular white wine grape in Portugal, especially on the island of Madeira—recently the grape has been successful in the vineyards of Australia, particularly the South Burnett wine region in Queensland, Hunter Valley region, Langhorne Creek, and the Swan Valley. Australian versions of Verdelho are noted for their intense flavors, with hints of lime and honeysuckle, and the oily texture that the wines can get after some aging.

  Verdejo is a Spanish white wine grape found mainly in the Rueda region between Toro and Ribera in Castile and Leon. Rueda DO wines must contain a minimum of 50 percent Verdejo grapes, and wines labeled Rueda Verdejo must contain a minimum of 85 percent. The Marques de Riscal has begun developing a fresher style of wine to replace the traditional heavy and oxidized style, and this new style is becoming popular in the USA.

  Verdicchio is grown in the areas of Castelli di Jesi and Matelica in the Marche region of Italy, and gives its name to the varietal white wine made from it. The
name comes from “verde” (green). The white wines are noted for their high acidity and a characteristic nutty flavor with a hint of honey.

  Vernaccia (Patricia Highsmith): Vernaccia is an undistinguished grape from central Italy, used for blending with other grapes such as Trebianno, to make the local white table wines. However, the Vernaccia grapes, which are grown around the central Tuscan town of San Gimignano, have raised and distinguished themselves above their humble origins to make sophisticated wines of distinction. Since the Renaissance, Vernaccia di San Gimignano has been considered one of Italy’s finest white wines. It was the first Italian wine to be awarded DOC status, which was later upgraded to DOCG. The grape was immortalized in Dante’s Divine Comedy, in which the poet described the gluttonous Pope Martin IV drowning a plate of Bolsena eels in a flask of Vernaccia before swallowing them and then slowly savoring the wine.

  The grape pairs most beautifully with the American writer Patricia Highsmith, who also rose from humble origins to literary eminence. Coming from distinctly non-literary and unsophisticated rural Texas, like her hero Mr. Ripley, Ms. Highsmith quickly became the epitome of the sophisticated and cosmopolitan European literary elite. Like Highsmith’s writing, the Vernaccia di San Gimignano are noted for their crisp, dryness, complexity, and a certain salty fruitiness. The story of Pope Martin and the eels perfectly reflects the gleeful cruelty of Ms. Highsmith’s delightfully complex plots.

  Vin Du Pays (Ernest Hemingway): Vin du Pays is a French expression, meaning “the local wine.” When traveling around France (or Spain or Italy), it is always the best thing to order in a bar or restaurant. It’s just the ordinary wine of the region, which probably does not travel, and is not available elsewhere. As Hemingway wrote in A Movable Feast:

  “In Europe then we thought of wine as something healthy and normal as food and also a great giver of happiness and well-being and delight. Drinking wine was not a snobbism nor a sign of sophistication nor a cult; it was as natural as eating and to me as necessary, and I would not have thought of eating a meal without drinking either wine or cider or beer. I loved all wines except sweet or sweetish wines and wines that were too heavy.”

  Viognier was once a little-used varietal best known in the commune of Condrieu, and limited to the northern Rhône valley where it is the dominant white grape. It is experiencing a resurgence in popularity as more of it is being planted in California and elsewhere in the world. Often mistaken for Chardonnay, Viognier makes fruity wines of medium body. Stone fruit aromas (peach and apricot) are often found in wines made from Viognier, along with a bit of spice. Depending on the producer, the wine can range from exquisite to ordinary. Also, depending on the producer’s style, the wine matches well with “Asian Infusion” dishes, as well as many foods that are often served with Chardonnay.

  Viura: Known elsewhere as Macabeo, Viura is the white grape of the Rioja, and produces a light refreshing drink for early consumption. It is also one of the main varietals used in the blending of Cava sparkling wines in Spain’s Catalonia region.

  Xinomavro: The most famous wines made with the Xinomavro grape come from Naoussa in the Macedonian region of northern Greece. Xinomavro means acid-black in Greek, which aptly describes both the color of the grapes and the resulting wine. The wines, with their lingering taste of olives, are high in both tannins and acid, which means they can be aged for a very long time. Perfect with Greek salad and feta cheese.

  Zinfandel is a grape variety that has been important almost exclusively in California. The Zinfandel grape can make solid red wines with good fruit and structure. It was a popular variety with home winemakers during the American Prohibition era because its thick skins allowed the grapes to ship without damage. It later (in the late 1970s and early 1980s) became popular for the wines produced from it, with fruit-forward flavors and spicy overtones. There are vines in Sonoma Valley that are probably the oldest grafted vines in California, going back to 1888, and there may be even older vines on their own roots in Amador County. Zinfandel declined in popularity in the mid-1980s, and became unprofitable to grow until “White Zinfandel” was accidentally introduced. Red Zinfandel has regained popularity since the turn of the century, partly as a reaction against mediocre Merlots, and partly as a growing appreciation of the full-body, high alcohol qualities of “old-vine zins.”

  Based on DNA evidence, California Zinfandel originated in Croatia. Zinfandel has been in Croatia a very long time, perhaps as early as 1300. This fact makes it one of the oldest grape cultivars that we make wine from today. The name of Zinfandel in Croatia is Crljenak Kaštelanski (“black grape of Kastel”), but nobody knows why it was named Zinfandel when it arrived in America. Zinfandel is genetically identical to Primativo, which probably migrated from Croatia, across the Adriatic Sea to Puglia in Italy in the late 1700s. Once regarded as an unimportant South Italian wine, since the discovery of the sexy Californian Zinfandel connection, Primitivo is now being proudly and successfully marketed all over the world.

  Zinfandel (White): In 1975, Sutter Home accidentally created a pink, sweet, and easy-drinking jug wine with low alcohol and an acid balance. The wine can be compared to Mateus Rosé, Snapple, Lancers Sparkling Rosé, and other rather saccharine beverages. To everyone’s surprise, it became an overnight success, and remains the third most popular wine, accounting for ten percent of all the wine consumed in America. White Zinfandel outsells red Zinfandel by six to one. As a result, many otherwise well-educated Americans still associate Zinfandel wines with those sickly, sweet, pink glasses that Aunt Elsie still insists on serving at family gatherings.

  Non-Grape Wines (Ray Bradbury and Edward Thomas): Probably because it is not a grape-growing country, the English have a long tradition of making wine from flowers. It was a tradition that they took with them to their colonies across the Atlantic. Dandelion wine was so popular as a country-wine that Ray Bradbury used it as the title of one of his most moving and enchanting novels, describing the boyhood magic of a long-distant, small-town summer of Illinois. Back in England, perhaps the most popular of country wines is made from elder flowers and elderberries. Recently, a French company has been using elder flowers to distill a sublimely aromatic liqueur called St. Germain. But nothing will ever evoke English wine and the English countryside more than Edward Thomas’ poem, “Adlestrop:”

  Yes. I remember Adlestrop—

  The name, because one afternoon

  Of heat the express-train drew up there

  Unwontedly. It was late June.

  The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.

  No one left and no one came

  On the bare platform. What I saw

  Was Adlestrop—only the name

  And willows, willow-herb, and grass,

  And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,

  No whit less still and lonely fair

  Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

  And for that minute a blackbird sang

  Close by, and round him, mistier,

  Farther and farther, all the birds

  Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

  Chapter

  7

  FORTIFIED WINE

  “The only advice I can give to aspiring writers is don’t do it unless you’re willing to give your whole life to it. Red wine and garlic also helps.” — Jim Harrison

  Fortified wines are regular wines to which brandy has been added. The process was developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries by the Dutch and the English, who both had large overseas colonies which involved long ocean voyages. Both nations discovered that by fortifying the wines with brandy, they would better survive the journey. By happy chance, they also discovered that the wines thus treated significantly improved in taste.

  Brandy: Brandy simply means distilled wine. Although first discovered by the Moors in Andalusia and used for making perfumes and medicines, the process was first used commercially by the Dutch. Both the Dutch and the English
had long been closely involved in the Bordeaux wine trade and Dutch engineers were very involved in the draining of marshes and reclaiming land on the west coast of France. Vast areas of land to the north of Bordeaux in Cognac and south of Bordeaux in Armagnac were planted with Ugni Blanc or Trebbiano grapes, which made poor but high-yielding white wines. The Dutch distilled the wines, primarily as a way of transporting them more economically, and also to minimize export and import taxes, which were based on liquid quantity. However, after discovering that the resulting brandewijn (Dutch for “burned wine”) tasted better after being aged in the oak barrels, it soon became sought after for its own sake. The two most famous brandies are obviously Cognac and Armagnac, but brandy is found everywhere that wine is made; Mexico and Spain are also well known for their brandy. At the end of the fermentation process, most winemakers will distill the pomace residue of skins and juice into homemade brandy for personal use. In France, this is called Marc. Many regions use a variant of the name “water of life” for brandy; for example eau de vie, aqua vitae, and aguardiente. Adding brandy back into the original wine from which it was distilled results in the following fortified wines.

  Sherry: Sherry is a fortified white wine grown and produced exclusively in a very small region called Jerez, just outside Cadiz in Southern Andalusia. Unfortunately, because the name was not legally protected until 1996, “Sherry” has become synonymous with sickly, sweet wines from South Africa, California, and Cyprus. Sherry is now defined by law as the English name for the wines of Jerez, and, far from being sweet, most Sherry is among the driest of all wines.

  Sherry is made primarily from the Palomino grape and sometimes, for sweet versions, with Pedro Ximenez. The wine is fermented to about 11 percent alcohol, and then blended with brandy to bring it to 15 percent or higher. The four most common styles of Sherry are: