Hot Days, Cool Wine

The days have been hot here in Northern California. We’ve been joking that 2010 is the first year on record in the East Bay with no spring. One day it was raining and cold, the next day it was 95 degrees.

Hot days call for crisp, chilled white wine (or rosé, of course). This Yountville single-vineyard sauv blanc is just what the global warming ordered.

I have something of a love affair with sauvignon blanc. I was one of those guys who wouldn’t drink white wine. It wasn’t even that I necessarily didn’t like white wine, it was that I thought if I drank it, it made me some kind of wuss. Now, at 6’3″ and what my mother would lovingly refer to as a “husky” build, I don’t think too many people would have made an issue of pointing out my wussiness in carrying a glass of white wine around a party, but peer pressure’s a bitch.

So when I started drinking white wine, and started liking it, sauvignon blanc was a big part of that. Possibly just because it wasn’t chardonnay. Now that I’m a big proponent of drinking white wine (I cringe when people say “well, I really only drink red wine” like they’ve had all the whites on the planet), I’ve found reasons to like most of them.

I usually like a stinky sauv blanc. This isn’t that. The 2008 Gamble is very light in the glass, almost clear. Sauvignon blancish to begin with, for certain. The nose features notes of green apple and wet grass—some of the “stinkiness” I like.

On the palate, however, no stink/stank/funk/whatever. The wine is light bodied, dry and crisp, featuring notes of fuji and green apples, and some underripe tart honeydew melon. The finish lingers, featuring mostly the less-tart fuji apple on the back end.

Nice. Real nice, crisp and “refreshing” (I still struggle with using that to describe any wine, really). Perfect for hot days. Not a ton of acidity, and a hint of barrel-aging might make this a little more of an acquired taste for hardcore sauv blanc fans, but I can easily recommend it.

Verdict: B+