The Wine Curmudgeon

Wine of the week: Domaine Ste. Michelle Brut NV

Those of us of a certain age remember American “champagne” – sweet and flat and almost more like 7-Up than 7-Up. If you went to a wedding reception or big party until the 1980s wine boom, that’s what you drank. One of the two worst hangovers I’ve ever had came from that stuff, when I had entirely too much at a newspaper colleague’s wedding in 1980.

That we no longer have to drink that sort of thing is testament to the revolution in American wine over the last 30 years. I may pick at the biggest U.S. wineries for one thing or another (and another and another), but the technical quality of their work is beyond reproach.

Which brings us to the Ste. Michelle ($11, purchased), which amazes me every time I taste it. This Washington state sparkler (from the same company that does Ste. Michelle riesling, Columbia Crest and 14 Hands) is a stunner – varietally correct, tasty, inexpensive and widely available. if someone had told me in 1981 that I’d be able to go to a grocery store and buy this quality of bubbly, I’d have been appropriately curmudgeonly.

It’s zesty and tingling, with green apples, a bit of caramel and a hint of sweetness in the back. Use it to toast the New Year, for brunch on New Year’s Day, or anytime bubbly sounds like a good idea.

Wine of the week: Castello Montauto Vernaccia di San Gimignano 2010

We’ve had more than 250 wines of the week on the blog since we started, and this may be the most unique.

For one thing, the Montauto ($10, purchased) is a white wine from Tuscany, best known as a red wine region. For another, it’s made with vernaccia, a minor grape even by Italian standards, given that there are more little-known grapes in Italy than almost anywhere else in the world.

And it doesn’t taste like you’d expect an Italian wine to taste, which means it’s not for everyone -- especially for people who prefer anything but subtlety in their glass. Look for some white pepper and lots of minerality to go with a little lemon peel, and not much else. In this, it’s almost like an aperitif made with tonic water and vermouth. But it’s fresh and clean and very well done.

In fact, it was far from a wine of the week when I first tasted it, but the more I thought about it, that difference was part of the Montauto’s charm. It’s the sort of wine that fits the holidays -- light and refreshing, whether for drinking on its own or with Christmas oysters.

Wine of the week: Ravenswood Old Vine Vintners Zinfandel 2009

One of the things that the Wine Curmudgeon doesn’t like about this job is how cynical it has made me about grocery store wine. So many of them have been so disappointing that I’m at the point that if the front or back label uses adjectives or descriptions like reserve, old vine, or artisan, I figure the marketing department is compensating for quality (given that federal regulations for using terms like these is vague, at best).

So I expected absolutely nothing from the Ravenswood ($10, sample); that’s why it sat in the wine closet for 13 months. Shows how much I know, other than to reiterate the No. 1 rule of wine reviewing: Don’t judge the wine until you taste it.

This red is surprising in many ways, not the least of which is that it held up for a year. There is lots of sweet berry fruit in the modern zinfandel style, but it’s not unpleasant and it’s balanced by some some traditional zinfandel character (particularly pepper). It’s a nice value for $10.

Don’t worry too much if the wine you find is the current vintage and not this one. One of the good things about grocery store wines is that they are consistent in taste and style from year to year.

Wine of the week: Alois Lageder Pinot Bianco 2010

One of the great joys of Italian wine is also why Italian wine is so frustrating. There are too many wines and too many regions and too much to understand, but the thrill of finding a wine completely by accident makes up for all of the aggravation.

That’s what happened with the Lageder ($10, purchased). It’s an Italian white wine made with a German grape, pinot blanc, that is more popular in France than it is in Germany – but in Alsace, a region of France that used to be part of Germany. And if that wasn’t complicated enough, this wine is made by a fifth-generation Italian producer that comes the country’s far northeast, which is almost in Austria (as you can tell by Lageder, which sounds more German than Italian).

With a story like that, how could I not buy the wine? Best yet, the Lageder rewarded me for the decision. It didn’t taste like I expected it to – none of that Italian minerality or bracing acidity. It was a more subtle wine, fresh and clean but with a bit of richness to go with some apple fruit. In this, it was more Alsatian than Italian, though I paired it with my annual spaghetti carbonara dinner and it was exactly what the spaghetti needed.

Wine of the week: Yalumba Y Series Shiraz/Viognier 2010

The epic decline in the Australian wine industry has been well documented; the wineries that have survived have done so because they have been that much better than the rest of the business

Case in point is Yalumba, which managed to avoid the excesses on both the high and low ends over the past two decades and has emerged as an example of what a post-modern Aussie winery can be. Jane Ferrari, who tours the world for Yalumba, told me the effort wasn’t always a lot of fun, but that the fifth-generation family business was the better for it.

One improvement is better distribution, so that we can buy the wines in more places in the U.S. The shiraz ($10, purchased), a red blend with a bit of viognier to add interest, has been difficult to find in Dallas. That always annoyed me because Yalumba’s Y series has terrific cheap wine.

The shiraz is an Australian wine that one can actually drink without taking a nap between glasses. It's still big and juicy (lots of black fruit and 14 1/2 percent alcohol), but both are well under control. Missing is the ashy aftertaste that so many of these wines have, and that makes them so difficult to like. It’s a red meat wine, but you can enjoy it without food. Highly recommended, and a candidate for the 2013 Hall of Fame.

Wine of the week: Domaine D'Arton Les Hauts 2011

Domaine D’Arton, a white blend from the Gascony region of France, is great cheap wine, even by the Wine Curmudgeon’s exacting standards. It’s not only on a level with the Gascon wines in the $10 Hall of Fame, but it also demonstrates that wine doesn’t have to come from the same old places and be made with the same old grapes.

The D’Arton ($9, purchased) is an odd blend, even for Gascony, made with mostly colombard and fleshed out with sauvignon blanc (not the region’s best grape) and gros manseng. The result is a dry white with some lemon peel in the front, yet underneath is that wonderful white grapiness that makes Gascon wines so distinctive and so much fun to drink. It's the kind of wine that doesn't require a critic or a sommelier; just a simple dinner or an evening on the porch, friends and conversation.

And I’m not the only one who feels this way, for all the doubters and chardonnay drinkers out there.

Is this a Thanksgiving wine? Is the Wine Curmudgeon a crank about cheap wine?

Wine of the week: Tormaresca Neprica 2010

Background music for this post.

“It’s not going to work any more.”

“What are you talking about? We’ve been together since you started the blog – five years, five vintages. You need me. I need you.”

“I thought I needed you. But we’ve grown apart.”

“How can you say that? We were made for each other.”

“Maybe we were once. But not any more. You’ve changed this vintage ($11, purchased), and I don’t know that I like the changes. Where’s your Italian character, that darkness that made me want you in a way I never wanted another wine? Where’s the plum and earth that made you the blog’s favorite wine for so many years? Instead, you’re jammy and extracted, with gobs of red fruit and almost no acid for balance. I can get that anywhere – even from one of those California tarts.”

“Does this mean it’s over? After all this time, after all the wine we’ve shared?”

“You tell me. Should we give it one more chance, one more vintage? Or is it already too late?”