White Wine Demystified

Hi, I'm Jordan Salcito. You're watching eHow.com. Today, we're going to talk about some basics of white wine. First we're going to talk about Riesling. This is a German Riesling from the Mosel region in Germany. German is the motherland of all Riesling. The most ethereal Rieslings come from the Mosel region. You can always tell a Mosel Riesling because you have the green glass. Back before people could read they had to tell what wine was from what region based on the color of the glass. Green bottle, Mosel region. This is a bright, fresh, crisp grape with a lot of acidity. Usually there's a little bit of residual sugar here as well. It's very aromatic. It's known for smelling like lime blossoms and fresh lime peel and white flowers and unripe white peach. It's really lovely, elegant, great as an aperitiff and an amazing pairing for food with a little bit of spice to it. Here at Lotus of Siam, a Thai restaurant in New York City, we have spicy Thai cuisine. This Mosel Riesling is my go to pairing. There's a little bit of sweetness, it's fresh, it's crisp, it's light, it's bright and it goes beautifully with a spicy cuisine because that little bit of sweetness mitigates that spice and it's perfect in balance. Next, we're going to take about Sauvignon Blanc. Sauvignon Blanc is an extremely popular grape right now. It's motherland is the Loire region in France. Sancerre is a very famous region where, that uses the Sauvignon Blanc grape. This one right here is from Friuli in Northeastern Italy, right on the border of Slovenia. This is a great example from Northeast Italy. Also Sauvignon Blanc is very very popular in New Zealand right now in the Marlborough region. Some tips about Sauvignon Blanc, an interesting side note, it is the parent of Cabernet Sauvignon, that meaty red wine that we all known from Napa. This is it's parent, this light floral delicate wine. It's known for being very floral, like white flowers and chamomile and jasmine blossoms. It's also known for being really grassy like fresh cut grass or grapefruit pith. It's really a green wine, lots of fresh herbs like fresh cilantro, very fresh, very crisp and a great aperitiff. It has nice bright acidity, not so much as Riesling but especially when it's grown in a cool region like New Zealand or the Louire Valley, very crisp, very fresh, great to drink on its own or to pair with some of your favorite lighter foods like a soft goat cheese or fresh salad. Next, we have Chardonnay. Chardonnay is a grape that is so interesting because it doesn't really taste like a whole lot and it really absorbs the flavors of how it's made and where it's grown. So this is a Chardonnay from Burgundy. This is a white Burgundy from the Village of Merso from one of my favorite producers. This is a Chardonnay grown in California. This one right here, the Merso in Burgundy is known for being nutty and growing on this great limestone soil. It's really fresh. It's great bright fresh acidity but yet it has a depth and a richness because of the grape itself that gives it a much richer mouth feel than either the Sauvignon Blanc or the Riesling. The Chardonnay from California is also really luscious in mouth feel even a little bit more luscious than in Burgundy because it's warmer in California. The grapes get riper. They have more sugar in them. That translates to more alcohol and a little bit more flavor. It's really lush, it's buttery, it's very elegant and it's cool to try these two side by side to see how different one wine from the same grape or two wines from the same grape can taste. Next up we have a Pinot Gris from Alsace. Pinot Gris is a very cool grape. It's the same grape as Pinot Grigio, it's just that this one is grown in France, in Alsace, right on the border of Germany instead of in Italy. Also, it's a little bit richer here in Alsace. It's a little bit sunnier. The wine making style is to leave a little bit of sweetness in the wine and so it's a really rich, lovely, interesting wine that is extremely versatile and a cool counterpoint to the Pinot Grigio that we all know so well. The next wine is a Vionnet. Vionnet almost went extinct. It was grown only in this little tiny part of France called the Northern Rhone Valley in the towns of Candiria and Chateau Greeye. It almost went extinct and then it was really sort of rediscovered. Vionnet is right now in this period of rebirth where Californians are planting it all over and it's great. It's a lower acid grape. So it's really luscious. It's really mouth coating. It's very very floral. It's a very pretty wine that texturally is completely different than everything else that we've talked about. It's a one to have in your quiver of wines for when you want to try something new. You don't want anything that's too fresh or too crisp tasting. You want something that's just, it's like wrapping yourself up in a big pillow of flowers. Gewurztraminer, this is another one of my favorite grapes. This one is grown in Alsace. Gewurztraminer means spicy traminer, and it's because there is a spice to it. It's a ginger spice, a white pepper. This is one of the most complex grapes. Like Vionnet, it has, it actually has less acidity. This is the grape so far with the absolute lowest acidity and that gives it this richness, this lushness, this comfort. Also it's very tropical and exotic. It tastes like litchi and fresh ginger and tangerine and lots of exotic fruits and spices, persimmon is another one. So it's just sort of like an exotic fruit basket in a glass and it's grown in Alsace. A few other places are experimenting with it as well but it's a great one to have around if you want something to pair with cheeses, especially rich cheeses like a dense hard Alpine cheese. It's delicious with that. It also can make a great dessert wine if you have a producer like this one, Zinhumbret, that leaves a little bit of residual sugar in the wine. So there are hundreds of white wine varieties out there. These are just a few of them. We all know California Chardonnay. We all know Pino Grigio but hopefully you've discovered something that makes you a little bit curious to go out and try that bottle. I bet you'll find something that you never knew you loved. I'm Jordan Salcito. Thanks so much for watching. Come have a glass of white wine with me at Lotus of Siam in New York and on eHow.com.