Drink this Now Lesson 8

Lesson 8: The Big Three Whites Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, & Riesling. 

What they smell like. What they taste like. Where you get them from. What foods bring out the best in them. Are these the best three white grape varieties on the planet? Not necessarily, but they are certainly the three white grapes that are used to produce the vast majority of white table wines…the Zraly text says “more than 90 percent of all quality white wine is made from these three grapes,” and a quick browsing of any wine store shelf would confirm this fact. They also happen to be the ‘establishment’ grapes for a host of classic wine regions, which is perhaps why they are still so prevalent in today’s wine world: Burgundy and Chablis are whites made from Chardonnay; Sauvignon Blanc is a Bordeaux and Loire staple; and Alsace and most German exported wines are forever Riesling. So what’s all the fuss with these three? Let’s take a look.

What to grab: One bottle from each list of the following from your local wine shop or grocer: Riesling Bottles $5-$15 Richter Piesporter (Germany)

Yalumba Y Series (Australia) St.-Urbans-Hof (Germany)  Hogue Columbia Valley (Washington) Kukl Kabinett (Germany) Mosselland Piesporter Michelsebrg Spatlese (Germany) Bottles $16-$30 Pacific Rim (Washington) Hugel (France) Bottles $30+ Richter Graacher Himmelreich Auslese (Germany)  J.j. Prum Auslese Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling (Germany) 

Sauvignon Blanc Bottles $5-$15 Bogle (California) Babich (New Zealand) Brancott (New Zealand) Quintay (Chile) Simi (California) Robert Mondavi Fume Blanc (California) Kim Crawford (Australia)

Di Stefano (Washington) Bottles $16-$30 Cloudy Bay (New Zealand) Domaine Cailbourdin Pouilly-Fume “Les Cris” (France) Domaine La Croix St. Laurent Sancerre (France) Bottles $30+ Alphonse Mellot Edmond Sancerre (France) 

Chardonnay Bottles $5-$15 Butterfield Station (California) Post Road (Washington) Alamos (Argentina) Casa Lapostolle Casablanca Valley (Chile) Stephen Vincent (California) Greg Norman Estates Yarra Valley (Australia) Bottles $16-$30 Di Stefano (Washington) Bottles $16-$30 Cloudy Bay (New Zealand) Domaine Cailbourdin Pouilly-Fume “Les Cris” (France) Domaine La Croix St. Laurent Sancerre (France) Bottles $30+ Alphonse Mellot Edmond Sancerre (France) Chardonnay Bottles $5-$15 Butterfield Station (California) Post Road (Washington) Alamos (Argentina) Casa Lapostolle Casablanca Valley (Chile) Stephen Vincent (California) Greg Norman Estates Yarra Valley (Australia) Bottles $16-$30

Don’t worry if you can’t find these exact labels. You can always ask your local wine store salesperson to help you pick out a good representation of the varieties I have described above. Show them the list and tell them to get you something close to it. 

What to do: 1. First, before you even chill them, open all three bottles immediately and pour a glass of each. It might be wise to label each glass accordingly (which varietal it is). Take the rest of both bottles and stick them in the fridge for 30-45 minutes. 

2. While you are waiting for the wines to chill, go ahead and assess each of the three white wines, and it really makes no difference what order you do them in (*unless you purchased a wine that you know to be sweeter, in which case do that one last*.) What is the color, the aroma and the taste of each wine? Record all impressions. You should be able to detect a distinct difference in flavors and aromas in these wines…and perhaps even different colors as well, but that is not of great significance for our exercise. Really work hard at picking out and describing differences between each of these varietal wines. As always, include as many descriptors as possible to define each wine, even if some may be a stretch. Check below for a bit of varietal vocabulary to choose from. 

3. Now pull out the chilled wines from the fridge and repeat Step 2. As you go back and forth from one wine to the next a few times, be sure to cleanse your palate with a bit of bread or plain crackers. Sip some water as well, if you absolutely must. But don’t do any other food—it will easily alter the results of your descriptions. Don’t worry: you can finish the bottles with dinner later. 

4. If you are feeling cocky, go ahead and compare the warm versus cool glasses for each varietal wine. Are you starting to pick up tangible differences in the wine smells and flavors as the temperatures change? If so, you rock. If not, you are still cool: just hang in there. You are drinking wine after all, and life is good! 

What to look for: The whole point of this exercise, and others to follow, is to get you fluid and fluent in recognizing and describing the major varietal wines produced in the world today. Of course you know that the term varietal wine means a wine made predominately, if not exclusively, from one type of grape. As you do the tasting, focus on comparing and contrasting these different wines, with more of an emphasis on contrasting. 

Well, congratulations! You have now officially tasted the world’s work-horse white wines. They are never hard to find, and they come in a huge variety of styles, so you can drink a new one every day for the rest of your life and still never run out of new tastes. Some are bone dry, some are sweet. Some are made in stainless steel, some are heavily oaked. Some are fruity and delicate, some are full-bodied, acidic, or aggressive. Flavors and aromas are influenced by the climate, the particular growing season of the year of production, and winemaker style. And a lot of these differences are encapsulated by, or can be defined by, what region they are from. A California Chardonnay is a uniquely different beast than a Burgundy Chardonnay, but I’m hoping mostly that this exercise at least helped you differentiate between the Chardonnay, the Sauvignon Blanc, and the Riesling. 

Comments         

Below, I tried three different wines for this assignment. I compared all three to each other and researched the wines, their varietals, and also the main descriptors and comments that are needed for this assignment! 

Chardonnay: Chateau Ste Michelle 

Vintage: 2018 

Columbia Valley

Product Description: Washington- This well-crafted Chardonnay opens sharp and spicy, with light buy juicy fruit. Flavors of clean apple and pear run into hints of peach, then resolve with a creamy finish.

Color: Very light almost clear color 

Bouquet (smell): When I smelled this wine, I smell apple with hints of citrus. 

Taste: I taste more of the pear and peach than the apple though when I tried this wine. It felt light and was very easy to drink. 

Body: medium 

Compare/Contrast to other wines: With the other wines, I think that all three wines tasted pretty similar. They all had fruity tones/ nodes to all of them. But, this wine in particular had a stronger fruity taste with the apple and was easier to drink compared to the other two. 

Sauvignon Blanc: Vina Maipo Wine of Chile

Description: Vina Maipo was founded in 1948 in the Maipo Valley, a world-renowned region for producing wines of outstanding quality. In 2000, Viña Maipo implemented an aggressive development plan, exceeding in 2006 the goal of 1 million cases sold and becoming the 4th largest exporter of wine from Chile. In 2007, Max Weinlaub joined Viña Maipo as chief winemaker, giving way to a new strategy focused on developing world-class wines, expressive of their origin.

Vintage: 2019

Wine of Chile 

Color: This color is a bit darker than the Chardonnay but still light in color. 

Bouquet (smell): I smell hints of fruity aromas and citrus.

Taste: I definitely taste the fruity taste in it with the citrus nodes. It has a lot of the general Sauvignon Blanc descriptors in it like citrus and fruity. 

Body: medium 

Compare/Contrast to other wines: I do think these wines tasted similar since they are the big three wines. But, this wine in particular I believe had more citrus tones than the other two wines. It also had some nice fruity tastes and scents that I think were more similar to the Riesling. 

Riesling Fetzer

Description: Our cool-climate Riesling is a perfect balance of fruity and floral. Breathe in for lavender, jasmine and honey tones, and indulge in bright citrus and peach flavors.

Vintage: 2019

Color: Light yellow/ clear

Bouquet (smell): Again, I smell bits of sweetness and citrus. But also I do smell the peach and floral aromas. 

Taste: It doesn't taste as sweet as it smells. I taste floral and sweet citrus nodes in the wine and taste classic Riesling descriptors. 

Body: medium

Compare/Contrast to other wines: Finally, after trying this wine, I think it tasted most similar to the Sauvignon Blanc because it had similar tastes with the floral and citrus nodes. I did think though compared to the others, this one was more fruitier than the other two wines.