{"id":2477,"date":"2014-03-27T21:23:50","date_gmt":"2014-03-27T21:23:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/?p=2477"},"modified":"2014-03-27T21:23:50","modified_gmt":"2014-03-27T21:23:50","slug":"read-wine-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/","title":{"rendered":"More on How to Read a Wine List"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Wine<\/a>Once a diner decides upon price and category (White, Red, Ros\u00e9, or Sparkling) from a restaurant wine list the real challenge begins, but so does the fun if one knows how to break the codes and make the connections between Old World wines and New World wines.\u00a0 Much of the confusion and difference comes down to varietal labeling (Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, etc.) in the New World versus generic labeling in the Old World (Burgundy, Chianti, Rioja, etc.).\u00a0 This is especially important when a large number of wines from France, Italy, and Spain appear on a wine list.<\/p>\n

For starters, all white French wines from Burgundy, which include Chablis, Macon-Villages, Pouilly-Fuiss\u00e9, and the wines of Chassagne and Puligny are all made entirely from Chardonnay grapes.\u00a0 On the other hand, white Bordeaux springs almost exclusively from Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon, with the emphasis on the former.\u00a0 Sancerre, another popular\u00a0 French white wine on restaurant wine lists, comes from all Sauvignon Blanc.\u00a0 Red Burgundy, which includes many place names (Beaune, C\u00f4tes de Nuits, Pommard among a host of others) must be made from 100% Pinot Noir grapes.\u00a0 And Grenache and Syrah constitute the major grape varietals found in the red wines of southern France, including the Languedoc and the Rh\u00f4ne Valley: think C\u00f4tes-du-Rh\u00f4ne, Ch\u00e2teauneuf-du-Pape, Corbi\u00e8res, Fitou, Minervois, etc.\u00a0 The latter constitute some of the best red wine values.\u00a0 The problem is the grape variety or varieties rarely appear on the label.<\/p>\n

Italy can be a bit more daunting because of the proliferation of varietals, but even there, several great red grapes appear ubiquitously: Barbera and Nebbiolo from Italy\u2019s Piedmont, and Sangiovese from Tuscany and throughout central Italy.\u00a0 A clone of Sangiovese plays an integral role in all Chianti, Brunello, Vino Nobile and nearly all Tuscan reds.\u00a0 Many of Italy\u2019s most popular white wines (Frascati , Orvieto, and Soave for example) bear only the name of their place of origin and are blends of indigenous grape varietals not widely grown outside of Italy.\u00a0 For the record, they are typically at their best in the first three years of life.<\/p>\n

And then there is Cava.\u00a0 Cava is Spain\u2019s answer to Champagne, except it goes down more easily than Champagne partly because it\u2019s fun and easy to drink and one need not blow a paycheck on a bottle at a restaurant.\u00a0 Cava is made from a variety of indigenous Spanish varietals along with an increasing amount of Chardonnay.\u00a0 Meanwhile, Spain\u2019s most popular red wines, Rioja and Ribera del Duero, emanate all or primarily from Tempranillo.\u00a0 Tempranillo rules the finest growing areas of Spain, though old vine Garnacha (aka Grenache elsewhere) from Calatayud, Castilla y Leon, La Mancha, and Toro, can be equally satisfying and constitute exceptional value.\u00a0 So, let\u2019s start breaking those intimidating codes and enjoy perusing the restaurant wine list.<\/p>\n

Salute!
\nDon<\/p>\n

photo credit: ilovebuvette<\/a> via photopin<\/a> cc<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once a diner decides upon price and category (White, Red, Ros\u00e9, or Sparkling) from a restaurant wine list the real challenge begins, but so does the fun if one knows how to break the codes and make the connections between Old World wines and New World wines.\u00a0 Much of the confusion and difference comes down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":""},"categories":[7,11],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nMore on How to Read a Wine List | Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Wine lists can be daunting. Get the best possible wine when you go out to eat by becoming a master wine-list reader.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"More on How to Read a Wine List | Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Wine lists can be daunting. Get the best possible wine when you go out to eat by becoming a master wine-list reader.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/WineMonthClub\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-03-27T21:23:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Wine-Book-1024x682.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Don Lahey\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@WineMonthClub\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@WineMonthClub\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Don Lahey\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"More on How to Read a Wine List | Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club","description":"Wine lists can be daunting. Get the best possible wine when you go out to eat by becoming a master wine-list reader.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"More on How to Read a Wine List | Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club","og_description":"Wine lists can be daunting. Get the best possible wine when you go out to eat by becoming a master wine-list reader.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/","og_site_name":"Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/WineMonthClub","article_published_time":"2014-03-27T21:23:50+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Wine-Book-1024x682.jpg"}],"author":"Don Lahey","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@WineMonthClub","twitter_site":"@WineMonthClub","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Don Lahey","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/","url":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/","name":"More on How to Read a Wine List | Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2014-03-27T21:23:50+00:00","dateModified":"2014-03-27T21:23:50+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/252df0a64b62c4bf914deff2def08ccc"},"description":"Wine lists can be daunting. Get the best possible wine when you go out to eat by becoming a master wine-list reader.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/read-wine-list\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Wine Blog Home","item":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Interesting Wine Info","item":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/category\/interesting-wine-info\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"More on How to Read a Wine List"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/","name":"Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club","description":"A wine blog written by the experts from The International Wine of the Month Club","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/252df0a64b62c4bf914deff2def08ccc","name":"Don Lahey","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/dafbad9ba70ee4ae413f7973d30430ff?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/dafbad9ba70ee4ae413f7973d30430ff?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Don Lahey"},"description":"Don Lahey's career in the wine industry spans over 30 years as an importer, author, consultant, and educator. He leads the tasting panel that selects our wines each month.","url":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/author\/donlahey\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2477"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2486,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477\/revisions\/2486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winemonthclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}