Into the white: Chardonnay's reign continues, but today's wine drinkers are willing to venture out and explore other white wine territory

Cheers,  May, 2007  by Doug Frost

• E-mail
• Print
• Link

ABC, as most of you know, stands for "anything but Chardonnay." I hate the concept. Chardonnay is the most successful white wine in America, yet the wine industry turns up its collective nose at a wine most people enjoy. Success breeds contempt.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Why has Chardonnay been so successful? My guess is that it is so easy to understand, at least in its buttery, gooey, baking spice laden version. Chardonnay in Burgundy and Chablis is subtler, far less overt. If many Americans find wine's esoteric nature confusing, California Chardonnay is anything but esoteric.

California Chardonnay is, well, obvious. People buy it, I suspect, because it's easy to notice, easy to describe and easy to either love or hate. Personally, I have a different reaction to New World Chardonnays--most of the time I simply like them.

Perhaps surprisingly, the flavors most people enjoy in Chardonnays are the result of winemaking: the spices associated with barrels, oak aromas, flavors and textures, as well as the character from extended lees aging and malolactic conversion. Geoff Labitzke, director of education for California wholesaler Young's Market, says, "In my mind Chardonnay is a blank canvas for the winemaker." For many New World winemakers, Chardonnay is an opportunity to demonstrate a cellar amply stocked with expensive new French oak.

With the vast majority of New World Chardonnays dripping with oak, some sommeliers can't stop talking about un-oaked Chardonnays. These sommeliers might be bored with standard Chardonnay and are promoting the un-oaked varieties, but the wines are not necessarily flying off the retail shelves. I have no problem with them, but I've always believed Chablis and Macon were all the un-oaked Chardonnays anyone could want for.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

When asked for alternatives to Chardonnays, some sommeliers demur; they're sticking with French Chardonnay. Glenn Bardgett of Annie Gunn's Restaurant in Chesterfield, Mo., notes, "Sometimes I think that we forget about how fantastic the original role model for Chardonnay can be." Kathy Morgan, wine director/sommelier of 2941 Restaurant in Falls Church, Va., says, "I'm not sure that anyone really wants an alternative to a delightfully racy white Burgundy."

BEYOND CHARDONNAY

"We have seen all our white wine sales increase over the years with more people looking for Riesling, Pinot Grigio and even Chenin Blanc," says Mary Melton, beverage director at Scottsdale, Ariz.-based P.F. Chang's China Bistro chain.

Riesling is (finally) hot stuff again. Only instead of the dull, over-produced sweet wines of the 1970s and 1980s, the new Rieslings are usually off-dry, delightfully crisp and full of character. One well-known California producer has had to purchase bulk German Riesling to keep up with the demand for what was previously a California appellation wine. And the last few years have seen a surge in Pinot Grigio sales, as well as other white wines.

If (as I've opined above) it is Chardonnay's intensity that drives its popularity, then how is it that Pinot Grigio has been challenging it as the fastest growing white variety over the last two years? With all due respect to the high quality versions of the grape, Pinot Grigio is the epitome of bland, simple white wine.

Perhaps Pinot Grigio's meteoric popularity is proof that consumers are intrigued by any white wine that's different than Chardonnay. Still, if difference is all that drives Pinot Grigio, why that grape more than others? The grape's mildness may be its best asset for many, a tonic after the intensity of typical Chardonnay.

For P.F. Chang's Melton, part of the answer is that "people are turning away from the heavy, oaked-up wines that California Chardonnays have become." The mantra among many sommeliers is that buttery, oak-laden Chardonnays are inappropriate to most foods. As Bardgett of Annie Gunn's notes, "What turns so many people off is not the grape itself, but the extraction and oak aging that is added to it." For buyers such as Virginia Philip, M.S., wine director at The Breakers in Palm Beach, Fla., many of these other white wines achieve flavor intensity without excessive alcohol levels. "The moderate alcohols in many of these wines," she notes, "allow our guests to drink a glass or two without feeling as though they have been hit over the head with a two by four."

It would seem that Sauvignon Blanc would be the grape most likely to take advantage of this perceived opportunity, but the numbers suggest otherwise. At the 2007 Cheers Beverage Conference, market analysts Mike Ginley and Jeff Grindrod offered a view of Sauvignon Blanc as more or less static. It seems that other grapes may be tempting Chardonnay's faithful to stray.

In Palm Beach, the Breakers' Philip is promoting Albarino and Torrontes, among others. "Both grapes have the ability to pair well with food due to their high acid structure, floral notes and non-oak component," she maintains. Eric Hemer, M.S., educational director, Southern Wine and Spirits of Florida, says his customers are selling "the 2005 Loire whites from Muscadet to Sancerre, and the '05 Mosel and Rheingau Rieslings as well." He sees interest in Albarino and Gruner Veltliner.