B.

C.

At one time, extra dry Champagne was the driest, but as time went on, newer drier styles of Champagne—including brut—were created. The evolving styles of Champagne began to occur in the early nineteenth century when more and more Champagne firms, hoping to capture new markets and increase sales, positioned Champagne as an aperitif, perfect to begin an evening, rather than a sweet wine to have at the end. First came half-dry Champagnes—called demi-sec. When these proved successful, producers began making sec, or dry, Champagnes (these were still fairly sweet by today’s standards). By the 1840s, the British in particular began to request even drier Champagnes. Producers responded with “extra-dry” (a term in English rather than French) Champagnes made just for the British market. As other countries caught up with the British preference for dry bubbly, the French began to make an even drier version of Champagne—called brut. Which is how brut turns out to be drier than extra-dry. Today, of course there’s an even drier style of Champagne than brut. It’s called “extra brut.”

D.

The region of Rias Baixas in the province of Galicia in the country’s northwest corner is a place of ocean breezes, winding estuaries, and lush vegetation reminiscent of Ireland. It’s often called “green Spain.” It could probably also be known as “white Spain” because it is home to one of the most exciting Spanish white wines— Albariño, a vibrant varietal with aromas of apricot and peaches with a citrusy core. Albariño has been popular among the seafood-eating people of Galicia for centuries.

C.

Saint Macaire, native to Bordeaux, was widely planted there before phylloxera devastated the region in the late nineteenth century. However, it was not widely replanted; current official statistics report less than 2.5 acres are planted throughout the entirety of France. The variety is also grown in California where it is used in Cabernet blends. Among other wineries, O’Shaunessy winery in Napa Valley, and J Lohr winery in Paso Robles grow Saint Macaire and blend it with their Cabernets. The variety is said to give a deep color and a “mouth-puckering palate” to a blend.

C.

Petite Sirah has grown in California since the 1880s. In the early days some of those vines were probably a type of Syrah that had small—petite—grapes. (All things being equal, winemakers prefer small grapes because there’s a high ratio of skin to juice. Since color, flavor, and tannin come primarily from a grape’s skin, small grapes yield concentrated, flavorful wines.) From a flavor standpoint, however, there is nothing petite about Petite Sirah. The wine is mouthfilling and often hugely tannic. In the early days of grape growing in California, Petite Syrah was interplanted with other varieties, creating field blends. As more and different varieties (sometimes misidentified) found their way into California vineyards, Petite Sirah’s true identity grew more and more obscure. Eventually in the 1990s, DNA typing revealed that most California Petite Sirah is the French grape Durif, a cross of Peloursin and Syrah. Today, some of the oldest “Petite Sirah” vineyards remain field blends of many varieties, including true Syrah, Durif, Carignan, Zinfandel, Barbera, and Grenache.

A.

That was a tough one! The native Spanish varieties are Garnacha (which the French call Grenache), Monastrell, (known as Mourvèdre in France), and Achéria (better known by its French name: Cabernet Franc). Cabernet Franc is thought to have originated in the Spanish País Vasco (Basque Country).

D.

Colorado’s 125 wineries are mostly nestled in high-elevation river valleys and on mesas—many of which are at elevations of 4,000 to 7,000 feet above sea level, making the Rocky Mountain state’s vineyards the highest in the U.S. Colorado’s vineyards are also considered some of the highest in the world. At such elevations, nights are cold, but during summer, days are warm, dry, and sunny.

C.

Many South African wines— white and red— possess a complex herbal, floral, and earthy aroma/flavor the South Africans call “fynbos” (FEIGN boss). The name (which means “fine leaved plants” in Afrikaans) describes a distinctive type of vegetation (including shrubs, proteas, reeds, and heather) found only on the southern coastal tip of Africa.

D.

Between 1850 and 1870, the diseases powdery mildew, downy mildew, and phylloxera arrived from America. The “American Plagues,” as they ultimately came to be called, unleashed a cascade of devastation, for there were no known remedies at the time. In the diseases’ aftermath, until partial remedies were found, scores of grape varieties were nearly or permanently abandoned. In several parts of France, the vineyard acreage shrank by more than 50%, and some wine areas disappeared altogether. With the exception of Languedoc-Roussillon, no wine region in France is as big today as it once was.

D.

The vineyard area of Muscadet is in the westernmost part of the Loire Valley, not Burgundy. In fact, Muscadet is the leading wine of the Loire by volume. The Côte d’Or in Burgundy is a 30-mile-long limestone escarpment, or ridge, with villages on the eastern side of the slope. This is where Burgundy’s legendary wines come from. Now we get to the tricky part. Although Beaujolais has almost nothing in common with Burgundy, for French administrative purposes, Beaujolais is considered part of Burgundy. And as for Chablis, it is the northernmost subregion of Burgundy; entirely devoted to growing Chardonnay grapes.

B.

Several hundred years ago, many bottles of vintage Madeira were stenciled, rather than labeled with a paper label. The stenciling was done by hand by older women in the Madeira producers’ lodges. Stenciling was common because the island of Madeira (which is off the African coast) was so poor and isolated, shipments of (expensive) paper from the mainland could not be depended upon. Moreover, paper labels, prone to disintegrate with time or moisture, were less than ideal in Madeira’s humid climate. And when wine was transported, as Madeira was, on sailing ships, paper labels could be easily damaged by water. Stenciling— usually with white paint— was the answer. Today, for aesthetics rather than out of necessity, many of the very top, old Madeiras continue to be stenciled rather than labeled with a paper label.

A.

The Yakima Valley, an American Viticultural Area established in 1983, was the first AVA in Washington State. It’s more than 600,000 acres in size and is located about 155 miles southeast of Seattle on the eastern side of the Cascade Mountain range. The AVA is best known for Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay and several prominent Washington vineyards are located here including Boushey, Ciel du Cheval and Olsen. The Columbia Valley AVA and the Walla Walla AVA were both created in 1984, a year after the Yakima AVA. And the Snake River AVA, created in 2007, is not in Washington. It straddles Oregon and Idaho.

C.

Every bottle of Spanish Sherry carries the words Jerez-Xérès-Sherry, the names for Sherry in Spanish, French, and English, respectively. Jerez (hair-ETH), the original name, also refers to the place in southern Spain where authentic Sherry is produced.

B.

The name California was used officially in Spanish documents as early as 1542. It comes from a description of a fabled, gold-laden island called California in the popular Spanish romance novel Las Sergas de Esplandián (The Adventures of Esplandián) by Garcia Ordonez de Montalvo. The island was ruled by a black warrior queen named Queen Califia who ruled over a kingdom of black women. Some historians believe that the early Spanish explorers who moved north from Mexico may have thought that what is now California was an island.

B.

Rioja has a classification system based primarily, but no longer exclusively, on how long the wines are aged. The aging hierarchy includes Crianza, Reserva, and Gran Reserva. Crianzas are young, easy-drinking wines. Reservas— supple wines with flavors of earth and old saddle leather, are aged longer and are made in very good years from superior grapes from top sites. Finally, Gran Reservas, made only in exceptional years, come from the very best vineyards and are rare. The top red Gran Reservas are silky and languorously mellow—the kind of wines that were once cultural imperatives, slipped, as they were, down the raspy throats of cigar-smoking Spanish men. Check out our red Rioja wine cheat sheet below:

The Red Rioja Aging Hierarchy

Crianzas

• Reds: Must be aged for at least two years (one of which must be year in oak casks).

Reservas

• Reds: Must be aged for at least three years (one of which must be in oak plus at least six months of bottle aging).

Gran Reservas

• Reds: Must be aged for at least five years (two of which must be in oak casks and the remaining two years must be in bottles).

C.

Burdigala was the name bestowed on the region of Bordeaux by its first Celtic occupants, the Bituriges Vivisques tribe, according to Jane Anson in her authoritative Inside Bordeaux (Berry Bros. & Rudd, 2020). The tribe settled in the Bordeaux region around 567 BCE, and remained there—even under Roman rule–until the 3^rd century AD.

B.

Sercial is the driest style of Madeira. The grapes (also named Sercial) are grown in the coolest vineyards, making tart base wines which are turned into hauntingly dry, tangy, elegant Madeiras with a bracing, almost salty twang. Amontillado and Manzanilla are not Madieras—they are styles of Sherry from Spain, and Tawny is a style of Portuguese Port.

A.

The word “booze,” once spelled “bouse,” comes from the medieval Dutch word büsen, meaning “to drink to excess.” Bouse dates back a thousand years to medieval English but was commonly used in the 16^th century by unsavory characters—mostly thieves—before becoming part of general slang.

D.

Champagne is made by different types of producers. The type can be identified from abbreviations that appear on every bottle of Champagne.

• NM stands for Négociant manipulant. These companies buy grapes and make the wine. Most of the houses (Moet & Chandon, Taittinger, Perrier Jouet etc.) are NMs.
• CM stands for Coopérative de manipulation. These are cooperatives that make wines from the growers who are members, with all the grapes pooled together (the well-known brand Nicolas Feuillatte is a CM).
• RM stand for Récoltant manipulant. These are “Grower Champagnes” that is, the grower makes wine from its own grapes.

Other initials you might see include:

• SR stands for Société de récoltants. An association of growers making a shared Champagne but who are not a co-operative.
• RC stands for Récoltant coopérateur. A co-operative member selling Champagne produced by the co-operative under its own name and label.
• MA stands for Marque auxiliaireor Marque d’acheteur. A brand name unrelated to the producer or grower; the name is owned by someone else, for example, a supermarket.
• ND stands for Négociant distributeur. A wine merchant selling under his own name.

C.

Nicole Clicquot (known as Veuve— “Widow”—Clicquot) was born Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin in 1777 in Reims, in the Champagne region of France. She was the daughter of one of the city’s wealthy textile merchants. At the age of 21, Nicole Ponsardin was married (in an arranged marriage) to Francois Clicquot, the son of a competing textile merchant. Although in line to inherit major textile firms, Both Nicole and Francois were more interested in wine, which both of their families produced, in addition to textiles. Francois died after only seven years of marriage from what may have been a suicide, but in the end, was attributed to typhoid. Nicole, still in her 20s, took over the fledgling wine business much to the dismay of her in-laws. Although the business was failing at the time, Nicole Clicquot built the Champagne house into one of the most successful in France and made Champagne a fixture in royal courts throughout Europe in the 19^th century. Quite the businesswoman, she also invented riddling racks (pupitres)—A-shaped frames—that, after the second fermentation, are used to collect yeasts in the necks of Champagne bottles so that the yeasts can be removed. In addition, her 1810 vintage Champagne is thought to have been the very first vintage Champagne. The quote above is from a letter Nicole Clicquot wrote to a grandchild in the last years of her life.