My sister and I like to get together over a bottle of wine. Sometimes we even include dinner in our itinerary. We recently went to Landmarc restaurant in Tribeca, which is known for its relatively low markup on wines and a large selection of half-bottles. The food is very good as well.
My sister much prefers red wine, so we started with a Californian Pinot Noir, which wouldn’t compete with our salad selections. When that half-bottle had been finished, I returned to the wine list to make a new choice. My sister has previously shown a regard for full-bodied, fruity red wines, so I suggested a California Zinfandel. She blanched at the suggestion.
What’s wrong, I asked? I would think that you would like Zinfandels, given some of the other wines we have enjoyed together in the past. But I don’t like pale, sweet wines, she protested. Aha! The problem became crystal clear. My sister thought I was referring to "White Zinfandel," the great marketing success of Sutter Home (and also produced by others).
Trust me, I said and went on to explain that Zinfandel is indeed a red grape, whose parentage is linked to a variety, which originated in Croatia. It only appears on the shelves as a blush wine because people favored white wines in the 1970s (somehow thinking that white wines were healthier than reds) and it was too costly for vineyards to replant from one variety to the next. With a shortened period of leaving the juice on the grape skins just a glimmer of color is extracted. Hence, White Zinfandel was born. A clamor for a problem batch of wine which had a higher than usual residual sugar sealed its fate and became the ubiquitous White Zin, tarnishing the reputation of this bold and spicy RED wine.
The server brought out the new selection and, after tasting it and giving her the go ahead to pour, my sister’s glass was filled with deep, ruby liquid. I urged her to taste it and share her opinion. Yes, she was pleased. This was not the wine she initially thought it would be. I advised her that its synonym was Primativo, should she dine out in an Italian restaurant, the other "home" of the Zinfandel grape.
Whether she cared for the history and geography lesson, I can’t say, but by the end of the evening, there wasn’t any wine left in the bottle or in her glass.