This week's wine: Pinot Gris

Though made from the same grape as Pinot Grigio, here is a wine whose only element of similarity seems to be that it is white. It would take the palate of an experienced Master of Wine to discern what the two actually have in common, but what the Italians do with this prevalent Venetian grape and what the French do with its Alsace version is something that teases my own taste buds.

In northern Italy, Pinot Grigio is produced in bulk, is immensely and often undeservedly popular, but at its best makes a nice dry aperitif or accompaniment to pasta dishes and seafood. It has the attraction of being usually  fairly cheap unless, in Britain, you buy it in a large pub-sized wine glass.

Pinot Gris is more of a rarity which, when produced in Alsace, gains that balance - or some might say imbalance - between sweetness and dryness so typical of the region. Its attraction lies principally in this often somewhat disconcerting feature. Is it sweet or dry  or neither?  At its best it is certainly delicious, poised somewhere between a Riesling and a Gewurztraminer, though it can undeniably become cloying if you drink too much of it.

That, it seems to me, is the problem with the Pinot Gris which Waitrose has added to its wine list. Make no mistake, this 2013 Pinot Gris Reserve produced by Beblenheim from 25-year-old vines is a lovely wine, praised by the enthusiastic Jane MacQuitty of The Times for its oomph and attitude.

But one glass of it as an aperitif is quite enough,  and perhaps another glass with a first course of white asparagus, but thereafter, with my main course, I would want to part company with it.

On the other hand, if you want to stay with the one bottle, a Chinese meal might do the trick. Or perhaps, once again, the sweetness of the wine might pall. At £10.49 a bottle, the price is on the steep side, and I am not sure if I would go for it again.

True, Rod Easthope’s New Zealand Pinot Gris from Naked Wines of East Anglia does not cost much less, but it is better balanced, with more tang to it and, in my opinion, it is definitely preferable. It’s also worth remembering that Australian Pinot Grigio, often cleaner in taste than many an Italian Pinot Grigio, can be worth a try, especially as it is widely available around £7.99.
28 January 2015