White zinfandel is a pale-rose wine colored that's very sweet. It has gained immensely in popularity since the 1980s, and sadly it is often looked down on by "real wine drinkers" because of its youth and sweetness. This is sad because every wine has its place in the grand palate of flavors. Yes, white zinfandel is light and sweet. But this is perfect in some situations - say a hot summer day with a crisp fruit salad. It's also a great way for non-wine-drinkers to get used to the flavors in wine, without being put off by a heavily tannic monster wine.
Beringer Vineyards is the most popular producer of white zinfandel. White zinfandel is often a wine that new wine drinkers will "enter into wine drinking" with. A society that trains people to love super-sweet soda and Hi-C creates adults that have very sweet taste buds. White zinfandel is a way to slowly retrain those palates to appreciate the dryer flavors.
White zinfandel is delicious with cream-based-sauce with pasta, with fish, pork, and other "lighter" meals. It tends to have citrusy and light flavors - orange, vanilla, strawberry, raspberry, cherry. In addition, new white zinfandels have fruit juices added to them right before bottling to create new flavored versions.
White zinfandel should be drunk at around 54F which is much warmer than fridge temperature (around 35F). A too-cold wine hides all of its flavors. It's like eating a frozen pizza in its frozen state vs nice and warm. Let your white zinfandel warm up a bit if you keep it in the fridge before drinking it, so you can appreciate those gentle flavors it has in it. White zinfandel is NOT an aging wine and should be drunk within 6 months.
http://wineintro.com/types/whitezin.html
--Yuqing
No comments:
Post a Comment