Journal of Wine Economics Volume 17 | 2022 | No. 2

There’s a scene in the film “Sideways” in which the four main characters go to an author’s talk at a winery. After five seconds of high-flown blather about the origins of the Pinot Noir grape and an eye roll by Stephanie, the group sneaks off to the winery’s barrel room. The author in the movie is apparently modeled on Oz Clarke, the prolific British wine writer.

If so, Mr. Clarke’s portrayal in “Sideways” seems unfair. Although his descriptions of wine are elaborate and at times overblown, he has been a major force behind the “democratization” of wine. In his latest book, Red & White: An Unquenchable Thirst for Wine, Mr. Clarke describes his introduction to wine as a student at Oxford in the 1980s, and how he became convinced that consumers needed options besides the top wines from France and the sea of mediocre wine that was most of everything else pro- duced in Europe at the time.

He would find his accessible, affordable, and delicious wines in the New World. After graduating from college, Mr. Clarke would land on the BBC program “Food and Drink.” As co-host of this long-running and popular show, he helped to create a generation of British wine-drinkers by introducing them to “exuberant, juicy, fruity wine” from Australia, California, New Zealand, and elsewhere. With the rise of New World wines, European producers would soon follow suit: the New World “showed that France’s domination of great wine could be challenged. California started it. Australia continued it. Now Europe could do it, Italy leading, with Spain, Portugal, and others following behind.”

Red & White is part memoir and part travelogue. Mr. Clarke recounts his first sur- reptitious drink of wine at the age of three, joining the Oxford wine tasting club in an unsuccessful attempt to impress women, and learning the hard way not to store wine at friends’ houses (cases of Lafite ’61 and Pétrus ’64 were among the wines never recovered). Mr. Clarke started as a stage actor, but wine took the place of acting when the wine taster for “Food and Drink” dropped out at the last minute, with the producer of the program reportedly saying, “Get me that actor who knows about wine.”

The bulk of Red & White is a tour through the wine regions of the world. The trip begins, predictably enough, in France. The reader is guided through the French appellations, with sincere attention given to small (the Jura) and less renowned (the Languedoc) areas. Mr. Clarke has an unsurpassed curiosity about and passion for wine, delighting especially in rare varietals and wines whose quality is not yet reflected in prices. His writing combines wine history and science, personal anec- dotes, and descriptions of individual wine-makers. The style is light and refreshing, not unlike a glass of rosé on a hot summer day.

Unlike most books about the wines of the world, France is not the primary desti- nation. I found a 2001 edition of Hugh Johnson’s Wine Companion on my book shelf and calculated that 40% of its pages on wine regions are devoted to France, with only 20% given to non-European countries. Red & White quickly moves from France to Australia, New Zealand, the United States, and Canada, and from there to places expected (e.g., Italy, Spain) and not (e.g., India, Uruguay). Mr. Clarke brings his enthusiasm for wine wherever he goes, but that is not to say his views on wine are uncritical. For example, he thinks that there is too much Tempranillo produced in Spain, yielding much “unconvincing” wine, and that Merlot is overplanted in France, where “loads of the early-ripening Merlot is broiling away in the unsuitable suntraps of the south.” Japanese wine? Drink their beer instead.

Red & White does not have a central thesis, but it does have recurring themes. One is that New World winemakers, and some European producers, have gone too far in their pursuit of ripeness. Mr. Clarke has played a central role in promoting accessible, fruit-forward wines from the New World, but laments the trend toward massive, high-alcohol reds. In his chapter on Australia, he describes the abuse of Barossa grapes “at the hands of the over-ripening brigade crazy for a 100-point wine.” He cel- ebrates wine-makers around the world who are trying to produce wines that make a “statement about the vineyards they came from,” even if that means a break from the traditional European varietals. His view is that the “world doesn’t want any more big, oaky clunkers, but it does want tasty, fresh reds at lower alcohol levels.”

Another theme, which for me is the book’s highlight, is the effect of climate change on wine. Mr. Clarke was an early voice of warning. His keynote address at the 1993 New York Wine Experience, a high-profile event featuring top wine-makers from around the world, focused on the adjustments the wine industry would inevita- bly have to make in a warming world. He spoke of how wine-makers were going to have to change the style of their wines and adopt new grape varieties. He predicted the French system of appellation contrôlée would become obsolete as Spanish varie- ties like Tempranillo made their way into Bordeaux and Syrah was planted in Burgundy. The French producers made a noisy exit from the auditorium, and the Wine Spectator, the host of the event, departed from tradition by not publishing the address in the next issue.

Of course, Mr. Clarke has been proven correct, and Red & White is filled with fas- cinating examples of climate change impacts on wine and the adaptive responses by wine-makers. The Yarra region in Australia has become too warm for Pinot Noir and vineyards are being replanted with Shiraz. Mr. Clarke sees the same change coming to the Marlborough region in New Zealand as well. Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon are being planted in southern Germany, and, in Lebanon, harvest dates have moved back by a month over the past 50 years. The highly-regarded 1982 Bordeaux vintage ushered in a more fruit-forward style of wine in the region, which Mr. Clarke declares to be “the first marked by what we now know is the relentless charge of climate change.”

And then there’s the second French invasion of England (the first being the Norman Conquest of 1066). As Mr. Clarke explains, part of the allure of sparkling wine from Champagne comes from the use of barely ripe grapes, which have been difficult to produce in the region in recent decades. Since 1990, the ripening season temperature in Champagne has risen by more than 2° C. French producers have been buying land in southern England, which is cooler than Champagne and has the same chalk soils. Taittinger was the first producer to establish a vineyard in southern England, with Pommery following soon after. Five million bottles of wine, most of it sparkling, are now being produced each year in Britain.

I enjoyed Red & White. Mr. Clarke’s writing is lively and humorous and clearly conveys his unabating excitement about wine. He explains that he has always been able to put his experiences with wine into words. Thus, we get this description of Amarone from Italy:

In the best examples, this gives a wild, slightly unnerving personality to the wine, which often starts almost sweet with fruit that could be anything from plum and blackberry to baked apple, sweet cherry flesh, sour cherry skins and figs and rai- sins baked halfway to paste. But the bitterness – the Amarone (amaro means bit- ter in Italian) – always comes back as black chocolate, as wood-smoke, as the burnt bits on the bottom of a roasting pan, and ideally there will be a splash of meat stock and balsamic vinegar sourness to season the final bitterness, which should be as grippy yet affectionate as the lick of a cat’s tongue.

Maybe not entirely believable, but fun to read.

My main complaint about the book is that it goes on for too long. After the tour of all of the places in the world that make wine, Mr. Clarke turns to a description of each of the major grape varietals, often returning to locations the reader has already been to. By this point, I was ready for the trip to be over and yet, sections with names like “Cabernet Sauvignon and Canada” stretched out before me. Despite the excessive length, I still recommend the book. It’s highly entertaining and full of absorbing information from one of the world’s experts on wine. This is the perfect book for a hot summer day, accompanied by a chilled glass of rosé.

My wife and I were dining out with another couple last summer before the Delta var- iant reared its ugly head. The other couple ordered steak; I chose chicken, and my wife went for pork. As the designated wine person, I was searching through the light reds on the wine list for a suitable compromise when the waiter poured me a taste of a very full-bodied white Burgundy, and suggested that it would go well with everything we had ordered that warm evening. A taste made his claim plausible. I gambled, and he was right!

I agreed to review Big Macs and Burgundy because it promised more such sur- prises, and it does deliver surprises aplenty, of various sorts. This book is an upbeat, approachable collection of basic and not-so-basic information about wine and about the interaction of food and wine, bits of the author’s history, and numerous interest- ing, often thought-provoking recommendations for wine pairings that involve foods ranging from caviar to Cheez-Its. I often found myself trying to imagine (there must be a taste/smell analog to “visualize”!) how this would really taste with that. The style is breezy (more on this to come) but authoritative, and the abundant photographs and illustrations add appreciably to what I found to be a very enjoyable read.

The author, Vanessa Price, starts at the beginning for beginners and those, like me, whose knowledge of wine is based more on accumulated anecdotes than on system- atic study: how grapes ripen, the relationship between acidity and alcohol, and the roles of tannin and sugar. She discusses the influence of climate and terroir and describes the 12 main styles of wine. Turning to food, she explains the relationship between smell and taste and discusses the main elements of taste, adding spicy and fatty to the classic sweet, salty, bitter, savory, and sour.

She then discusses congruent pairings, between foods and wines that share similar characteristics, and contrasting pairings, which involve sensory elements that oppose each other in a way that yields pleasing complexity. Her illustrative congruent exam- ple is Meursault and fried chicken, while Champagne and fried chicken are an exem- plary contrasting pairing. She ends the pairings section with general guidance for developing pairings: think about the dominant components of the food; consider its intensity and heaviness; and then consider the spices, sauces, and preparation involved. And, of course, she reminds the reader that things that grow together geo- graphically generally go together.

What follows and constitutes the bulk of the text is an amiable mixture of auto- biographical anecdotes, bits of wine information, and, mainly, lots of short discussions of recommended wine pairings. The autobiographical anecdotes reveal that the author was raised in a fairly devout Southern Baptist home, took a shot at acting, and fell in love with wine more or less by accident. The wine information includes discussions of methods of making sparkling wine, Burgundy rankings, the origins of Super Tuscans, swirling and decanting, styles of Sherry, storing wine, Pinot Grigio versus Pinot Gris, the Judgement of Paris, and more. I will bet that even readers of this Journal will learn something from all this.

As the book’s title suggests, many of the pairings it presents involve inexpensive foods for which (I think) almost nobody carefully selects a wine. Examples from each of the book’s 16 chapters may give some sense of the wide range of sometimes very quirky pairings the author recommends and the usually sensible rationales she gives for them:

• Subsistence Pairings: We are advised to pair cheap pizza, one of the cheap eats considered, with Montepulciano D’Abruzzo, for its acid and tannin.
• Southern Comforts: Cote Rótie’s robustness is said to make it a good match for BBQ Brisket & Ribs, a Southern staple.
• Extra Value Meals: Red Burgundy is paired with MacDonald’s Big Macs, per the book’s title, but the author argues that the more intense meatiness of a Quarter Pounder calls for a bigger Super Tuscan.
• Roadside Attractions: Among the snack-rack options considered, Smartfood, that cheddary popcorn, is paired with a light Bourgogne Blanc.
• Fast-Food Fixes: The author argues that the tannin and acidity in an Italian Rosato perfectly cut the fat in hot dogs. She also recommends wines to drink while binging particular TV series, for example, Côtes du Rhône with This is Us to match the show’s diversity and because it’s “as cockles-warming as the Pearsons, without all the tears.”
• Wine with Breakfast: The bubbles in a demi-sec Champagne are said to cut the heaviness of French toast while its sweetness harmonizes with the sweetness of this “debauched” dish. (My wife points out that a mimosa made with a cheap sparkler does the same trick.)
• Trader Joe’s, A Love Story: I confess to a weakness for Trader Joe’s Mandarin Orange Chicken, which is paired with Clare Valley Riesling from Australia because of that wine’s fresh citrus, minerality, and abundant acid.
• Secrets of the Bargain Basement: This chapter suggests cheaper wines that can substitute for more expensive wines in a few pairings, like substituting Minervois Rouge because of its “serious firepower” for Châteauneuf-du-Pape with Pad Thai.
• Crave the Date: Among foods served on special occasions, Thanksgiving left- overs are paired with Chinon for its acidity, fruit, structure, and soft tannins.
• Dinner Party Duets: The focus here is on appetizers like Jalapeño Poppers for which the author recommends Spätlese Riesling for its sugar to soften the Poppers’ spice and its acidity to counter their grease.
• Boring but Beautiful: Among the healthy foods discussed, the Sweetgreen Harvest Bowl is paired with Bordeaux Blanc because both are blends of “com- peting forces.”

• What to Pair with Greens: Italian Pinot Grigio is paired with Tuna Niçoise, for example, because its saltiness can “manage the cooked eggs,” while its freshness can “slice through sensitive tuna like a laser.”
• The Standard Bearers: This chapter is devoted to classic pairings, including one of my all-time favorites: grilled salmon and Oregon Pinot Noir. No explanation necessary.
• Frightful Delights: One of the foods that some find frightful is steak tartare, which is paired with Châteauneuf-du-Pape Blanc (or, perhaps, a Côtes du Rhône White) for its big body, low acidity, and arresting aroma.
• Expense-Account Prep Course: Among the high-end dishes discussed is pressed duck at Daniel’s, paired with Cornas, the “biggest, baddest, roughest, and tough- est” Northern Rhône appellation.
• Surf and Turf: Lobster rolls, a beach classic, are paired with Bandol Rosés for their strength, delicacy, “cool spiciness and lean, tropical-fruit spine.”As some of these examples may suggest, the writing style, described by one Amazon critic as having a “millennial-chic vibe” may strike some readers as a bit too breezy and over the top. For instance, Barolo is described as “the Tony Soprano of Italian wine,” and on steak au poivre, the author enthuses, “Together with Pomerol, this, my friends, is the Immaculate Conception of wine parings, the Orgasmatron of meat and grapes, the ‘You complete me’ of pampered mouth holes.”This really is a serious, clearly written book, so it can be jarring when the author seems to be trying hard to be cute.

  I have two bones to pick with the pairings themselves. First, while the author makes a nice general point about congruent versus contrasting pairings, for most foods she recommends only one wine—most commonly (I think) a congruent pair- ing. It would be good sometimes to have a suggested pairing of the other sort. Second, while most of the pairings sound attractive, I expect many readers will never try many of them—either because they are simply not going to buy a wine to go with Cheetos or Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia or Honey-Nut Cheerios, or because they cannot find the recommended wine, like the Tedeschi Vineyards Sparking Pineapple from Hawaii that’s paired with the honey dipping sauce for Chicken McNuggets or Clare Valley Riesling. I would rather have had pairings for a few lamb dishes than for Cheetos, and a few more “if you can’t find or afford that, try this” suggestions for wines would have been welcome.

  But to be clear, I do highly recommend this book to experienced oenophiles and wine newbies alike. It is a light, entertaining read that conveys a great deal of useful information, and most of the suggested pairings are fun to imagine trying.

This classic reference book, first published by Hugh Johnson in 1971, is now available in 16 languages, with 4.7 million copies of previous editions having been sold. In tell- ing us where wine grapes are grown, it is an essential and unrivaled part of every wine lover’s library. It is also a natural companion to Robinson, Harding, and Vouillamoz’s (2012) seminal book on which varieties are grown commercially (Wine Grapes, reviewed in JWE, Vol. 8(2), 2013), as well as to Robinson’s Oxford Companion to Wine (the fifth edition of which will appear in 2022).

A better understanding of the geography and terroir of each region helps the con- sumer identify where tonight’s bottle came from. For newcomers to wine, the first 40 pages of the book cover wine’s history, how vines are grown, how wine is made, and how it is consumed. Just as important, the Atlas helps vignerons assess their place in the ever-evolving wine world. This book is thus also for them, as well as others just wishing to keep up to date with where the world’s vignerons are located.

The Atlas has been revised every six or so years since it first appeared, with Jancis Robinson joining the project beginning in 2001. If you already have an earlier edition, should you indulge in this new one? For anyone who refers at least occasionally to it, the answer is almost certainly “yes.” It is worth its modest price for the new set of spectacular photos and unique colored topographical maps alone. As well, much has changed since the 7th edition came out in 2013, including a greater focus on soils, climate change, and more-sustainable methods of production, a greater interest in less-familiar varieties better suited to a warming, drier climate, and a broader range of wine styles. While diversification away from the best-known international wine- grape varieties does not show up in the world’s bearing area statistics yet, the increas- ing export focus of many producers in many countries ensures wine consumers—for whom this Atlas is produced—have never had such a wide range of wines to choose from in terms of region or sub-region of origin, grape variety, wine style, quality, and price (Anderson and Nelgen, 2021).

The text and many of the maps have been revised for this edition, and the maps are color-coded to identify sub-regions or various qualities within each region. For major regions, their maps are accompanied by small boxes of basic information on the latitude, elevation, two climate variables, and the top two or three varieties grown. Those readers looking for more-detailed varietal and climate information on any of more than 700 of the world’s wine regions can turn to a freely available compendium (Anderson and Nelgen, 2020). For the convenience of Atlas readers, that compendium includes a concordance table linking its regional names with those used in the Atlas.

André Mack’s career path is highly unusual: a Black child born into a military family who became a waiter/wine server/sommelier at two good restaurants in San Antonio, a sommelier at two of the best restaurants in the world—the French Laundry in Yountville, California, and Per Se in New York City—and then the founding owner/winemaker of Maison Noir, an Oregon winery.

The cover of 99 Bottles advertises it as an “entertaining, unconventional wine guide,” but the book really is more of an autobiography—the author’s account of his unique career path told through 99 vignettes of two to four pages each about events along this journey. The book is a wine guide only in the sense that each vignette involves some beverage—usually wine, but sometimes bottled water, juice, beer/ale/malt liquor, or distilled spirits. Most vignettes describe the beverage associ- ated with the event, but often this description is brief and not an important part of the story. In many cases, the beverage is simply a member of the vignette’s supporting cast.