The noble grapes: riesling, part 1

"Blindingly delicious." That's just one of the typical terms used by authors of wine books to describe riesling -- the magnificent, the glorious, the perfect, the stunning, the incomparable. The woefully underappreciated. We might go out on an allegorical limb and say that among wine writers riesling is to other grapes what Barack Obama is, among political writers, to other politicians -- except no one could imagine that gentleman woefully underappreciated.

What accounts for riesling's glories, and for their neglect among wine drinkers? The grape naturally has a combination of sweetness and high acidity, which makes a delectable combination in the glass. Think of bunches of soft drink grapes, Sprite perhaps, hanging on a vine: most of us love the balance of sugar and acid, and would regard a natural product like that as a wonder. Exactly so with riesling. Rieslings are also low in alcohol, so they remain refreshing, crisp, and bright whereas more potent wines like chardonnays seem thicker-bodied and apt either to overwhelm a meal or to induce sleepiness (or both) after a glass or two. Rieslings have vivid lemon-cake-and-clove aromas and burst with fruity, apple-pear flavors, which make a dry riesling especially such a sparkling and satisfying accompaniment to food.

The adjective often used in connection with riesling is "racy." This makes sense on an instinctive level, but it is hard to put into other, more solid words. Speed, lightness, quickness all come to mind with the word "racy," and it may be that the word makes best sense when you try to apply it to your memories of other white wines. Chardonnay, racy? No. Pinot grigio -- no. Sauvignon blanc, not exactly -- white zinfandel, no. Riesling -- somehow, yes.

Try it ... but here we encounter riesling's problem. It's woefully underappreciated. People often won't try it, and for this wine writers blame the wine's reputation as unfailingly and boringly sweet. Karen MacNeil in The Wine Bible says that this reputation was fully deserved in the years after World War II, when German producers made oceans of sugary rieslings to appeal to the taste of American soldiers occupying Germany, and to the taste even of the German public, who were starved for sweets because sugar had been rationed during the war. Jancis Robinson in How to Taste says that some German winemakers kept churning out the sweet stuff, out of a pure cynical desire to make money, for decades after.

Things have long since changed, and now Germany does put out an endless array of rieslings including the dry and even the really bone-dry; but as my old favorite Willie Gluckstern hollers in The Wine Avenger, a dry riesling is not therefore the correct One, its appearance constituting our sign from heaven that now it's okay to try It. The riesling grape has a sweetness whose balance with acidity makes the delight of the wine. Many foods and, indeed, any cooking process is going to add sweetness to what we taste -- toast is caramelized bread, a seared steak is caramelized meat -- and we don't turn away with a shudder from either taste experience.

The circumstances under which riesling comes to perfection, the perfection of acid-sugar balance and that elusive "raciness," are a part of the wonder. Riesling is quite the snow princess. It grows farther north of the equator than any other noble grape. In fact Germany, and we are talking about southwest Germany, marks the northermost limit of viticulture anywhere. Riesling's favored regions lie at the same latitude as Mongolia and Newfoundland (Karen MacNeil, The Wine Bible). Grapes can only survive here when they are planted on the south-facing hillsides of river valleys, where the river itself moderates the cold weather, cold air runs down and away from the vines, and the southern exposure catches as much summer sun as possible. The ripening process is downright tortuous, and acidity in the grape is never a problem (imagine biting into a nice, hard little unripe anything. Eeew.) Riesling's natural sugar levels come to the rescue in the making of the final, palatable product, especially in warm sunny years when the killing frosts of autumn may be postponed so long that a grower may go through his vineyards more than once, harvesting a second or a third time or -- keeping his fingers crossed -- maybe even a fourth or a fifth. With each harvest, the grapes will be just that bit riper, and will make just that bit fuller, richer, more acid-balanced wine.

The noble grapes: Riesling, part 2

The styles of wine

I work in a store which organizes wine by "style," rather than by grape variety or country of origin. The more I consider it, the more I think -- with all due respect to Mr. Entrepreneur whose idea it was -- this concept is a bit of a dead end street. While first-time customers seem pleasantly struck by the notion of searching for a taste profile ("Mellow") rather than a grape, nobody ever returns asking specifically for another mellow wine. In fact, understanding the differences between the various profiles, which are sensible enough in themselves, presupposes quite a bit of wine-tasting experience, and the store is meant to welcome people who have little or none. Also, organization by style makes the retail clerk's job more difficult. People come in to the store looking for a grape or a place of origin, even if (especially if) they know nothing of wine and are buying a gift for someone who does. Many a time I have had to roam the shelves like a doofus hunting for a pinot noir or a Chianti, because I can't remember in what section they have been put and the computer inventory does not acknowledge the traditional categories, per se.

I had no idea what might be the benefit of such a system, then, until by chance I came across The Sommelier's Guide to Wine (Black Dog and Leventhal Publishers, 2003), at a discount book store. Author Brian H. Smith writes:

"Some stores have been particularly successful in placing a maximum price on the majority of all their wines, and organizing by wine style, with frivolous and humorous categories such as 'Robust and Bold Reds,' or 'Kid-glove Whites.' This can be particularly useful for those customers who know what kinds of wine they like, but are not married to a particular grape type or geographic area ...."

Maximum price on the majority of all wines leaps out at me. (So does Mr. Smith's use of the word "particular" three times in one paragraph, but that's another matter. Where was his editor?) I suppose it would be possible to charge unusually high prices on wines if they were separated from each other in the store, and all the pinots and all the Chiantis thus spared competition with each other. But if that was the Entrepreneur family's Cunning Plan -- apologies to Blackadder -- I am not sure it works. Our prices are generally below $20 or $25 anyway, and that's not me looking over my shoulder, but me reporting company policy as well as reality at our store. Besides, customers coming in looking for pinots are going to want to see all of them, and once they've found them, they can compare prices as usual.

All of the foregoing has made me speculate on the way I would organize my wine shop, if I could wave a magic wand and have one of my own tomorrow. Hugh Johnson in How To Enjoy Your Wine separates the quaff into eleven categories, "viz. and to wit." (as Amy makes her will in Little Women):

1. Dry, simple white wines -- jug whites, supermarket-level Chablis, etc. "Essential as a foundation for more exotic wine-drinking."
2. Lightweight, grapey, aromatic whites -- ordinary rieslings and gewurztraminers.
3. Sparkling wines, "with champagne as the boss."
4. Assertive, full bodied whites -- chardonnays and the higher-end examples of almost any other white.
5. Sweet whites -- Sauternes, dessert-quality rieslings.
6. Roses
7. Fresh grapey young reds -- Beaujolais, lambrusco.
8. Standard cheap reds -- jug and supermarket types. "Traditionally, always on tap."
9. Medium to full-bodied reds -- fine Bordeaux, Burgundies, the higher-end examples of almost any red. All need aging.
10. Turbo-powered reds -- Napa cabernets, Italian Barolos and Brunellos; "Australia's massively succulent Barossa Shiraz." (Think B for Big, perhaps.)
11. Fortified wines -- ports and sherries.

I'm sure Hugh Johnson's list is beautifully thought out and bespeaks decades of experience. But I would organize my wine shop based on what people ask to buy. In that case, I would divide wines into half a dozen or more categories, and I would have big signs on the wall announcing them: Sweet, sparkling whites; sweet whites; soft whites; very dry or acidic whites; sweet, sparkling reds; sweet reds; soft, lush reds; dry, tannic reds; and dry, sparkling whites. What most people want to know about an unfamiliar wine is whether it is sweet and whether it is bubbly. They don't necessarily ask those questions, but eventually that information is what seems to clarify and hasten their decisions. And that too makes sense, given that for most of us, the taste profile we really know well is soda pop.

The one style I've forgotten in my imaginary wine shop -- apart from fortified wines and dessert wines specifically, which I wouldn't separate from their color categories -- is roses. And considering the sales behemoth that is White Zinfandel, I suppose I must leave room for roses, too, sweet and dry.

Now Mr. Entrepreneur is not going to ask my opinion of his concepts anytime soon, but I do notice that the one wine we absolutely do not carry is white zinfandel. You'd think someone had determined that it cannot fit anywhere.

The Hunt for Rosa Regale

Turmoil in the wine trade. Large wholesale distributors taking over smaller ones, and the employees of the smaller ones leaving to start their own wholesale businesses; men thrown out of work because the new conglomerate doesn't need them; retail wine shops that can't buy a favorite wine anymore, because the new conglomerate has chosen not to offer it and that's that. Angry columns in the wine blogs, about control and arrogance and money, and the consumer ultimately being scr -- shall we say, underserved.

Yesterday a man on the front lines explained things to me and I began to understand afresh. George lost his job as a salesman when Southern Wine and Spirits (the Devil) bought out his employer, Glazer's/Union -- which used to be Chicago Wine Merchants, somehow, if I am unraveling this correctly. At any rate, George went through a harrowing ten days' unemployment, watching younger people get hired around him, while his daughter's college expenses loomed ahead of him in a place called August.

Luckily, the Devil took him on board. But, he explained, many of the wines that he used to know and promote to local retail shops on behalf of his former employer now will vanish from those shops, because Southern will not carry them and its only other big competitor in the area, Judge & Dolph, will not assign a salesman to the south suburbs. Apparently our thirst for wine is not such that Judge & Dolph can justify paying someone specifically to call on us and tell us what's new -- or even supply us with the little that we have shown we like.

I begin to understand because now I can translate this into personal experience. Let's say that I enjoy one of George's wines, a sweet sparkling red from Italy, beautifully bottled, called Rosa Regale. I go to my local wine shop and it isn't there. I try a liquor store, and a grocery store and maybe a gas station. If I am lucky, I might buy one last bottle, and the staff at all these places will tell me -- as I tell my customers -- that we're having a hard time getting a lot of wines in because of all the changes in distributors and vendors this summer. (People look puzzled at this, and who can blame them.) And that's that.

Wine is unique in that sometimes, yes, a type you liked ceases to be available. ("It's not like buying diapers," a colleague of mine used to sniff.) Vintages sell out forever, or a grower chooses to plant different grapes than before, or a winery fails or is sold. But in hunting for Rosa Regale, my problem is not that a delightful wine has gone into that starry purple oblivion where they do tend to go, but that a third party has decided I don't need to have access to that wine anymore. Oh, I could drive to the north suburbs, I suppose, and hunt for it there, or I could call north suburban wine shops and ask if they deliver. In both cases I've spent time bumping my costs up considerably, in gas money and in shipping fees, and local businesses have lost a local sale.

What next? Shop on-line? Here just for a start I find Liquorama, Wine.com, and Napacabs, which offers a good price by the way. But I have to remember Illinois state law, which as of this past June 1st forbids me to buy wine from non-Illinois retailers. So, check Liquorama off my list -- they are in southern California. Wine.com assures customers that it has opened warehouses in many states including Illinois, simply so as to have a retail presence and secure the right to ship wine inside the state. Napacabs makes no such claims but merely avers that it ships to Illinois. Another retail outlet, BevMo! has terrific prices, and presents a drop-down menu with IL as a shipping choice, but it is located in southern California also and clearly has no retail stores elsewhere. I hunt for my zip code. "We're sorry, but ...."

At this point I am tempted to call off my search for Rosa Regale. There are other wines, and maybe it's not that important after all. The wholesale distribution conglomerates heartily agree. They want to sell what suits them in the quantities it suits them as efficiently as possible, which from an economic point of view is perfectly understandable. The head of the Wine & Spirit Wholesalers of America put it better than a fiction writer could have devised when he said:


"The American consumer who's complaining that he can't get some obscure frou-frou wine produced and bottled by Croatian virgins is missing the point. The reason he even WANTS that bottle of wine is because of the incredible variety that is already on the shelves. And how did it get there? WE put it there!"


Well, true in part, but that's such an odd attitude for a wholesaler to adopt toward his retail clients' customers. I can't imagine wholesale book distributors or wholesale meatpacking plants swallowing each other up in the race to get bigger, and then, when customers notice that a book or a cut of beef is now hard to find, dismissing complaints by saying, "The only reason you all want frou-frou Chaucer or beef tenderloin is because WE made it available for you." Be content now, in short, with Steinbeck and a pork chop, because that's what we're shipping now. Next week if we find it profitable to ship Mark Twain and chicken livers, you'll get that. And you'd be vegetarians with no reading material at all if it weren't for us.

I see the arrogance in the wholesalers' attitude, but the truth is the distributors do offer more variety more quickly and consistently than any one person could find in a lifetime of self-education and private searching. It's the sheer greed that cuts you off from the search, that makes them sponsor, for example, actual laws to forbid Illinois residents from buying out-of-state wines that Illinois wholesalers have not vetted (and gotten their cut from) that is outrageous, and that will eventually -- I hope -- be no match for the annoyed consumer's wish to buy wine, even from Liquorama or BevMo! of California.

But since I don't want to go to prison for skirting Southern's wine choices for me, I suppose the next step would be to write to my Illinois representatives and senators about my problem, particularly the ones who over the years have accepted thousands of dollars in campaign donations from Illinois wine wholesalers. "Dear Sir, I would like to buy a bottle of Rose Regale wine from BevMo! in California, but it's against the law you sponsored. Would you consider changing your mind about this? It's a very nice wine, and my local stores don't carry it anymore."

Unfortunately, neither of the men who sponsored the June 1st legislation, HB 429 -- Representative Edward Acevedo (2nd district), 109 State House, Springfield, IL 62706 -- or Senator James F. Clayborne Jr. (57th district), 629 Capitol Building, Springfield, IL 62706 -- represents my districts. Which leaves me with the challenge of looking up the voting records, on HB 429, of the men who do. Wine and democracy: a fine pairing. How a propos that Rosa Regale is a festive little bubbly.

Wine with fried computer

I had chosen a lovely wine for the evening of August 4th, a Lagrein 2001 from H. Lun, which makes wine in northern Italy and prints its labels in German (Weinkellerei Cantina Vini, Sudtirol) and Italian (Alto Adige). Sudtirol and Alto Adige are both place names referring to --



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-- a German-speaking section of northeastern Italy, formerly called the South Tyrol, relinquished to Italy by Austria after World War I (from Karen MacNeil's The Wine Bible). This Sudtirol or Alto Adige is also one-third of a larger wine-making region of Italy called the Tre Venezie, the "three Venices," "because of their historic relationship to the Republic of Venice."



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The Lagrein is a grape native to Alto Adige, and it makes a red wine that is, according to MacNeil, "fascinating, tasty, and sharp." It is thick with fruit flavor, near-black in color, but also, at least in the hands of H.Lun, gently rich and tingly. It was pairing perfectly well with my poached-egg-on toast dinner after work, when around 8 o'clock, a storm that would give the Chicago area six months' worth of lightning strikes in four hours -- no kidding, there were ten thousand of them, over eight hundred a second sometimes -- um, arrived.

The wind blew the beaded curtains almost straight out from the window, and it wasn't a gust but kept on blowing; and I heard a rising, eerie whistling sound that might have been warning sirens, or the wind through the telephone wires outside, or might have been something else. This was the first time I recall summoning the family to the safety of the basement, without the man on the crackling radio assuring me I should. In the basement, we lost electrical power, just like that, and then there was a fumbling with flashlights and candles. The lightning was perpetually orange outside the window. Another storm blew through at midnight, and the sirens sounding then were eerie just in themselves. Next morning, even the atmosphere and the dull blanket of cloud over the day looked orange for a while. There was some damage to trees.


The trouble was that, being the bright souls we are, we had the hard drive of our computer plugged into the wall outlet, while two surge protectors were all full and safely protecting things like lamps and telephones. Days later, when the nice man from the phone company came to look at our modem -- whose third little green light just would not go back on, no matter how patient we were -- he said, well yes. When the electricity comes back after an outage, that can send quite a jolt through your system. He explained that we had fried our "Ethernet Card," and would have to buy a new one. So we did, and my husband spent the first day of his summer vacation installing it and talking on the phone to all sorts of knowledgable people, in Texas, in India, you name it, who helped him jump through whatever cyber hoops were necessary to, as the heroes in dinosaurs-gone-wild movies always put it, "get the mains back on line."

Meanwhile, I enjoyed my bottle of H.Lun Weinkellerei Cantina Vini Sudtirol-Alto Adige Denominazione Di Origine Controllata Lagrein 2001 (Neumarkt - Egna - Italia), with this meal and that, with a bedtime snack of crackers and cheese sometimes. I started reading a new book, and returned to my old standby of writing things that are simply printed out on pieces of paper, for me to read and put in a drawer. And now that everything is all fixed, we've learned our basic electronics lesson, and have the surge protectors put to better use. That leaves a free outlet in the office wall, where we can plug something else in when technology makes its next leap forward.