OFFBEAT WHITES
Looking for good value white wine? Don’t make with the rolled eyes and harrumphs, please. In fact, deals in wine are easy to find—if you know where to look.
First, know that never before in the history of wine has more and better wine been made all over the globe. And second, pick the peculiar. If you want the best wine for the best price, go for grape varieties that you’ve never heard of (often from places that you didn’t know made wine).
Here’s a too-short list of white wine values, from the grape’s point of view.
Furmint
You well may have tasted this Hungarian grape in its sweet rendition, as the famed and easily available Tokaji Aszu, a luscious wine made of Furmint allowed to ripen in extremis, all the while being concentrated in flavor and richness by the beneficent mold botrytis cinerea.
Not long ago however, Tokaji makers discovered that if they made a dry wine of non-botrytised Furmint grapes that a terrific table wine came out the other end. Because an entire vineyard of grapes does not ripen uniformly under botrytis, some harvested furmint just isn’t ready for the sweet turn.
Whereas sweet Furmint tastes of apricots and honey, dry Furmint is of pear, apple and lime. Both versions are plushly textured and sport screechingly vibrant acidity. But while Tokaji Aszu costs a sometimes unpretty penny, dry furmint comes in way less.
Dry Furmint is an exceptional white for seafood, in large part due to its acidity, especially with salted or cured salmon or mackerel.
Garnacha Blanca (Grenache Blanc)
You’ve probably had some garnacha blanca under its French name of grenache blanc, for it plays a frequent role in blends of both white Côtes du Rhône and white Châteauneuf du Pape. But 90 percent of all Garnacha blanca, by that Hispanic name, is planted in Catalunya in northeastern Spain. There, much of it is made into an unblended white wine calling itself “Garnacha blanca.” It is the sibling to Garnacha tinta, the world’s most widely planted red wine grape and the mainstay of many Mediterranean reds.
Alone, Garnacha blanca can be a One Note Johnny, so it’s often gussied up with wood aging, fermentation on the skins or lees stirring. In particular, judiciously used oak can make for a wine nearly unctuous in texture. Cool fermentation accents its flavors and aromas of yellow fruits, kiwi, and citrus.
Because of its texture, Garnacha blanca makes a delish aperitif, just itself in a glass, well chilled.
Torrontés
Torrontés is the most widely planted white wine grape of Argentina and always has made everyday white wine there because it is prolific and fairly easy to grow. Originally thought to have come from Spain, DNA research showed it as the progeny of a mating between muscat of Alexandria and the grape Argentines call criolla chica and what we call the mission grape, the sturdy foundation of all California winemaking many decades ago.
As such, Torrontés used to produce thin, tart plonk meant as the vinous equivalent of a cold one. Today, however, when it is cropped back on the vine in Argentina’s dry and elevated vineyards, and treated with skill in its wineries, it makes for delicious, thirst-quenching, freshly crisp whites at terrifically reasonable prices.
It is most notable for its effusive aromas of citrus (tangerine especially, but also lime, lemon or bergamot), underlain with tastes of white or light yellow stone fruits (white peach, nectarine, ripe but not dried apricot). Its better renditions retain tingly acidity, sometimes even a bit of spritz. There’s really nothing like it—it’s so in your face aromatic and delicious—but the best always comes from higher-elevation Andean vineyards (look for the regional names of Salta and Cafayate especially).
Torrontés is a fine aperitif, especially on warmer days outside, but fares well with a wide range of foods from light bites to fish and fowl and pork preparations.