Twenty Something Sense

College taught me a great deal about the cornucopia of beers and liquors that are available for my enjoyment, but I feel The Ohio State University failed to teach me the necessary basics of wine drinking that I’ve found so important in my twenty something life.  The only education I received was that wine comes in two colors (red and white) and drinking excessive volumes of wine late into the night will leave you hurting the next morning (in a worse way than drinking any liquor or beer ever could). 

My guess is that The Ohio State University is not the only higher education center that failed to deliver the required knowledge, so in this post I will attempt to provide a basic introduction into the different types of red wine (white wine will follow in another post), but before I continue, let’s take a step back.

I’m a pretty simple guy and I’m not impressed with wine snobs who use far more adjectives than are necessary to describe the taste of a swig of grape juice.  However I do respect that different grapes produce different tastes and knowing the difference is important when trying to decide which bottle to pull down for your meal.

More important than your taste buds satisfaction from selecting the right bottle, you can help gain some credibility with your coworkers and shake off the “Jr.” title all of your forty-something coworkers have given you, if you demonstrate your wine knowledge by selecting the right bottle when the thick wine book is placed on your lap at your next corporate dinner.

Let me quickly describe the most popular red wine varieties (each of the wine types below is named after the grape that is used to make the wine.  You can also encounter blends of the grapes below, but explaining these is not part of today’s Wine 101 course).

Shiraz (or Syrah)
Taste: Hearty and Spicy
Drink With: Steak
Region: California, Australia, France

Merlot
Taste: Dry
Drink With: Anything
Region: Italy, California, Australia, Chile, France

Cabernet Sauvignon
Taste: Full Bodied
Drink With: Steak
Region: Italy, California, Chile

Malbec
Taste: Easy Drinking
Drink With: Meat
Region: Argentina

Pinot Noir
Taste: Fresh and Light
Drink With: Fish, Lamb, and Chicken
Region: France, California, Australia

Zinfandel
Taste: Zesty Flavor
Drink With: Pasta and Pizza
Region: California

So there you have it!  Although after writing all that out, I still think it is too much to remember for someone who doesn’t love wine.  In it’s most consolidated form, remember these two bullets:

• If you are eating beef – drink a Cabernet Sauvignon.
• If you are eating fish or Italian or Thai or anything a little different – go for a Pinot Noir or Zinfandel.