clarkey1952 Posted April 19, 2006 Share Posted April 19, 2006 hi, can someone tell me the best way to recognise a medium dry white or rose wine in France. Unlike here in England where it's rated 1 to 5, I have great difficulty selecting a wine that is not dry (short of tasting them all ha ha). Someone suggested looking at the percentage of alcohol present, and aiming for over 12%. Is this true?Cheers, Sue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Smith Posted April 19, 2006 Share Posted April 19, 2006 1 Buy bottle of wine.2 Drink wine - go to 43 Choose a different wine4 Did you like it? Yes - return to 1, No - go to 3Really the easiest way is to learn what wines you like by trying them. Most whites and rosés in France will be dry or sweet, I'm not sure about medium dry, as I don't think I like it, or even know exactly what it means...If you look here and scroll down the page you will get some sensible advice - they suggest Burgundies ordinaire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will Posted April 20, 2006 Share Posted April 20, 2006 Most of the Loire whites are quite dry, e.g. Touraine Sauvignon, Sancerre, Muscadet sur lie etc. The cheaper whites from the western Loire such as ordinary Muscadet and Gros Plant are probably a bit less dry. Sancerre rose is a rare find, but quite wonderful. The cheaper Loire (and other) roses can be a bit too sweet for my own taste, but the better Provence ones, and Tavel from the Rhone, are a different matter altogether, you might like them. Alsace produces some good whites, but they can be a bit acidic. A decent Chablis is well worth a try too, but now we're getting beyond everyday drinking.Others will probably disagree with me, like all wine it comes down to personal taste, so do as Dick says. If the above are too dry for you then Dick's suggestion of the cheaper Chablis and Bourgogne chardonnays might be more suitable but I have to say that I don't like them much.The alcohol content is more an indication of weight - the higher alcohol wines tend to taste fuller and heavier (which applies to whites as much as reds) than sweetness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suze01 Posted April 20, 2006 Share Posted April 20, 2006 Our everyday gluggable rosé wine is Cabernet d'Anjou which I would say is medium dry, and the good news is it's less than 2 euros a bottle! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyh4 Posted April 21, 2006 Share Posted April 21, 2006 [quote user="clarkey1952"] I have great difficulty selecting a wine that is not dry (short of tasting them all ha ha). Someone suggested looking at the percentage of alcohol present, and aiming for over 12%. Is this true?Cheers, Sue.[/quote]No Sue, definitely not.Sugars in the grapes are converted to alcohol, so the more alcohol there is the less sugar that is left, so the drier the wine will be.However this is a dramatic over simplification, since the dryness will depend on how much sugar was in the grapes to start with. Grape sugar varies with grape type, region, climate, if the vines were facing North South East or West, type of soil, whether it rained a couple of days before harvest - and 1001 other things. I am afraid that Dick's suggestion is still the best one, and the cheapest way to find what you like is to go to the producers and have a "degustation" (tasting). Tell your host what sort of wine you are looking for. Find what you like and reward your host by buying a couple of his bottles (so many Brits fail to do this that we get a bad name at the caves). Then look for similar on the supermarket shelves - which may well be cheaper - but not necessarily so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eslier Posted April 21, 2006 Share Posted April 21, 2006 Yes, I agree, Cabernet d'Anjou is a good choice and, also from the same region, you could try Coteaux de Layon which is a medium (ish) white wine.Although supermarket Cabernet d'Anjou is around 2€ a bottle, if you visit some wine merchants you will find better ones at anything up to around 4€ a bottle. Better still, if you are anywhere near the Anjou region (near Saumur in the Loire), go and visit a number of the makers and try their wines. You will find the sweetness and quality of the Cabernet can vary quite a bit between different makers and from year to year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexis Posted April 21, 2006 Share Posted April 21, 2006 Just goes to show...I would have described both Cabinet d'Anjou and Coteaux de Layon as sweet. Not in the Sauterne/Montbazilliac catagory but sweet.Not that I don't like them you understand.For our honeymoon we had a mini-tour of the Loire valley caves...I mean tour of the chateaux.Mind, I don't grimace when I drink my Muscadet now so I must be getting drier taste buds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dwmcn Posted April 25, 2006 Share Posted April 25, 2006 We buy Monbazillac as a desert wine or just for drinking because it is not as sweet as Sauterne or other dessert wines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBC Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 Any rosé "gris" ,such as Listel, is nice and dry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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