Tuesday, June 16, 2009

The US needs better education!

Actually, it is not so much the level of wine education, it's the fear of the unknown! The average US wine drinker needs to step out of their box and try some new wines! Check out this story about name recognition of various wine regions. It's sad that so many of my favorites are not well known. Two things that jumped out--the Chianti comment about "Silence of the Lambs" was hilarious and I expect that the people polled were relatively young as I'm surprised that "Chablis" did not have a higher rating--not because of people knowing/loving what Chardonnay should taste like (crisp with mineral undertones as the French produce, versus some of our California oakey butter-bombs!) but because of the famous "jug wines" of the 1980s' (it's okay, everyone drank those Gallo Gallons back in the day; both Chablis and Burgundy :) How many of the wines do YOU recognize? If you DON'T recognize something, why not head to your local store and pick up a bottle? It may be a pleasant surprise! Cheers, Bo