Sam Platt wrote:Despite the fact that I profess to prefer reds, we own and drink more German Riesling than any other wine. It's great with many foods that we prefer, and it stands up well on its own. German Riesling served as my introduction to the wine world.
Sam, I think Riesling, and especially German Riesling, served as an introduction to the joys of the wine world for many, many people.
It's a great place to start because most of the QBA and QMP Germans have some residual sugars that balance out the acidity of the grape, the flavors aren't "smack you in your face" bold and aggressive, and the alcohol levels are a bit more forgiving.
(An aside, but a fairly pertinent one: when I was a retailer in Texas we had a brand called San Martin from Santa Clara. Fairly MOR/jug brand, but they came out with what was then a brilliant idea: they brought in a German winemaker and developed a separate line of wines called "Soft wines". Pretty simple really: they'd take familiar varieties available then and make them so that they were fairly low alcohol and retained residual sugars....hence, the "soft"...while keeping all the varietal flavors. With the then just beginning trend for wine, with a lot of people trying to get into wine but not liking "sour", i.e., dry wine, the soft wines were a big seller, served as an introduction to wines to many. Who then went on to the other wines, of course.
Of course the "serious" wine drinkers sniffed and condescended at the soft wines...but who cared? They were already into wine. These were people who were trying to get into wine.)
If I had people just starting to get interested in wine, the German section was where I'd usually start, and then work them up from there.
Trouble was, even though they would often start with the German Rieslings, once they got into other wines they usually developed a "dry snobbism" and started dissing wines with any residual as not being "serious" enough. They also, almost inevitably, would get caught up with body and overstatement as the prime things they were looking for in wine....more oak, mor malo, mor tannin, more extration, more jam. They seemed to favor the bold (Cabernet Sauvignon) over the nuanced (Pinot Noir), the heavy (barrel fermented and barrel aged Chardonnay) over elegance (Riesling). So they moved away from Riesling.
But the interesting thing, to me, is that most wine lovers...eventually....come back to an even more full and nuanced appreciation of Reisling and its many attributes. And that's because it is, quite simply, a great wine variety.