I want to start drinking wine, any recommendations?!
Answers: Ive tasted moscato and pinot...and like them.. I perfer sweet wines and I have tried some dry wines and didnt like them...I want a wine that is good for social drinking...that doesnt require to be eaten with a specific meal...and not too pricey
My personal favorite to start people on wine is called "Eiswein", translated to "Ice Wine". It's a sort of dessert wine that is very smooth. It tastes almost like grape juice.
If you are wanting to jump right in to the regular wines, here's my idea for good choices (I know one of the other guys said something similar to me too):
Red Wine: The styles vary greatly across the spectrum, but rather than tell you to try "Merlot" or "Cabernet Sauvingon", I would actually suggest trying something "Demi-Sec" which is "Semi-Dry". If you have this, make sure to have it with a meal in which you are eating some sort of red meat. This brings out the fruitiness of the wine. I would urge you to resist buying the "cheaper" wines that are from odd places. They are ok, but they are not the best places to start from. I recommend a wine from either France, Germany, California, Australia, or even Chile. These places have made a reputation for wine making (especially the French), with good reason!
When you buy a red wine, make sure that it sits for at least a day or two (to allow it to settle). If you can store it in a darker place, preferably with the bottle resting slightly top down so the wine keeps the cork moist, you'll be all set. This should be drunk at room temperature, do not chill and do not put ice in the glass! This will alter the taste of the wine, and in more traditional rings, "destroys" the wine. In addition, when you go to serve it at dinner, after serving it, keep the cork off for a little while before recorking. The wine needs to breathe a little, and this will enhance the quality of it, and allow you to store it longer.
White Wine: I highly recommend a Riesling. There are 2 kinds that are fabulous: one from Baden-Wuerttemberg Germany, and one from Alsace France. This makes an excellent accompaniment to fish (I happen to like Baked Lemon Pepper Salmon, but that's me). The other types are ok, but a Riesling is one of the softer, sweeter, easier-to-drink styles of wine. This is also a great after dinner type of glass. Make sure to drink chilled!
As for Rose/Blush wines, I'm not that well versed in them. I just know that they also need to be drunk chilled.
Make sure that the red wine is served in a glass with a wide body! This will further enhance the flavoring of the wine, and make it easier to palate. White wine can be served in slightly slimmer glasses, but the red needs the full bodied glasses.
White Zinfindel is a great place to start and also very affordable. Great with a meal or by itself. "Dessert wines" are sweet and satisfying to the beginner pallet.
Don't drive while you're drinking it.
i prefer dry flat wines (blush) by white zinfandel....sweet ones make me feel ill.....
*****
here are a few suggestions, though:
reunite' / verdi / boone's / canaii / etc.
they all come in various fruit flavors, too, and reasonable in cost.....extremely inexpensive!!!!
btw, you are a legal-eagle, right???? hope so....enjoy your wine tasting...(smiles)
Start with a good red wine with food. Take your time. Sweet wines are not good except with a dessert course. Zinfandel is junk.
Canei...It's not too expensive
White Zinfandel is not the place to start. I would recommend starting with a sweet white wine like Reisling, Moscato, Gewürztraminer or maybe a Vouvray or Viognier.
Wines from Chile are great and tend to be very well priced. Also, check out what's bottled locally from independent vineyards. You may even get to try a few samples before you buy.
If you're new at wine you might want something sweet like Ernest and Julliano's Zinfandel, or if you like a sweeter red try Gato Negro merlot.
There are lots of wine tasting shows and events where you can try lots of different samples and learn about them.
Your tastes change over time so keep trying new things.
For beginner girls, it would be a Zinfandel, blush or rose`. You'd like a sweet or semi-sweet to start off with and work your way up the wine ladder (so to speak). The good thing is those are the lesser expensive ones as well. They do not need to be drank with any sorts of foods, and some go good with desserts. You can always ask a waitress or bartender for a recommendation too, if out somewhere. good luck.
PS- go to a wine tasting and get to sample lots of different ones, They are great-to be able to pick and choose without paying for each glass!
They make a wine that is bubbly like champane, and it is really yummy, ask ur local liquor store!!! Its sweet too
screw wine drink rum
The magic number that is not on the label is the Residual Sugar or RS. If you research wines on the web or through wine spectator you can generally find this information. Very dry wines have less than 0.1%. Once you can taste the sugar you are up to around 1% and anything above that is so sweet that you start to obscure the flavor of the wine and really pack on the calories.
White wines like Gewurztraminer are around 2% and are a good starter white wine before moving on to the dry wines.
Red wines generally are not sweet although people often describe them as such. If you can find a red wine that is low acid (high pH), low tannins, and good fruit. It will be smooth and appear sweet because you can taste the fruit. Pinots have a tendancy to fit this profile, but not all of them. The tannin effect is reduced with age so if you go for wines like Merlot that are at least 5 years old you should have some luck. Stay away from Cab Sauv for now, it is really tannic when young and still tannic when it ages.
Your plan should be to move toward dry wines as they give you the broadest spectrum of flavors that the sugar in sweeter wines pushes into the background.