“Can 40 million white zin fans be wrong?”
Earlier this year, I had the unexpected pleasure of running into (after too many years not running into, I must add) the coolest of the cool wine guys we have here in the US, the peerless Doug Frost MS, MW. Doug is one of the world’s super accomplished wine guys, carrying the titles of both Master Sommelier and Master of Wine. I think the entire population of the species numbers three on the planet. Nothing, not even the guffaw-laden hilarity which tends to happen a lot in his company, distracts from the professional and intellectual regard I hold for this great guy.
So, it was a lovely surprise arriving at the Philbrook Art Museum (how beautiful a place that is) in Tulsa for the bi-ennial Wine Experience to discover that Doug was replacing a scheduled speaker. When I ran up to say hello, the gracious Mr. Frost, a very proud Dad himself, even remembered my then maybe six year old daughter from an Oregon trip many moons ago to Pinot Camp, way cool.
The really great thing though, was the cut glass clarity of the discussion he presented. It centred on selling wine, educating about wine and food and ultimately enlarging our wine culture. Boy, was he singing from my hymnbook. One line kept recurring.
‘Can 40 million white zin fans be wrong?’
Doug challenged everyone there, almost exclusively wine professionals in different guises – distributors, winery principals (guilty), educators (guilty), restaurateurs, retailers – to lose their elitist, specialist hats for a moment and think about that statistic! Can 40 million people be wrong? Why IS white zin so popular, what IS it that has brought it to this position in the wine world? He then presented some neat statistics for everyone to think about. The fastest growing WHITE varietal in the US? Riesling. Fastest growing RED varietal? Pinot Noir. The American wine drinker, as Doug put it, is leaning towards the light – lighter styles, that is. Bigger ain’t better any more y’all.
‘Simple pleasures are the last healthy refuge in a complex world’ Oscar Wilde
I then remembered a comment from another event earlier in the same week, coincidentally from another Master Sommelier (these guys are sharp). We presented a ZiNG! workshop in downtown Chicago which had been attended by, amongst others, Brett Davis MS from Kentucky (who has since become a ZiNG! affiliate – we are really happy about that) Brett came up to me afterwards and said ‘I was humbled by the simplicity here Trish, it reminded me that I had forgotten to think like my customer’. I marvelled in hindsight that the same message was coming from both these experts and 40 million white zin drinkers.
Simplicity is what we’re looking for.
As human beings most people just want their lives to feel better. That desire is not confined to an age group, or a social stratum, but it is why 40 million people drink pink. That does NOT mean that simplicity is unsophisticated. Perhaps in fact, an appreciation of simplicity is the key to balancing all that other overly sophisticated and busy stuff our lives carry.
‘Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication’ Leonardo da Vinci
I got to thinking about this a lot afterwards, and yes it was over a glass of wine, about what we do, and what it all means to me. Pinot gris does that sometimes, hauls out the inner philosopher.
I am lucky enough to work with a great winery and a greater winemaker who sees this. He makes stunning, selective, Single Vineyard wines that can stop traffic BUT the largest part of what we do are wines that are ‘gimme a glass right now, what a day I’ve had’ wines. They are also the ‘this will so work with dinner, thank goodness I had a bottle here!’ wine when the mother in law or new neighbour drops in unexpectedly. They are pure wines made really (really) well without artifice. Simply very good. You won’t need to be told why you like the style, they’re just delicious. If we were in a ZiNG! workshop situation and doing thumbnails of a nice white zinfandel (high acid, high fruit, medium viscosity, some RS) there would be marked similarities between the pink and any good Oregon Pinot gris.
Although 40 million people currently drink pink looking for freshness, immediate appeal and the ability to comfortably enjoy wine with food (that is SUCH a biggie) lots of other people with discerning, educated palates seek out wines with strong varietal typicity and distinctive regional identity with the same end goal in mind – food-ability.
I had a glass of (Oregon of course) Pinot gris outside last week and I realised that it ticked all of those boxes. That’s pretty cool, isn’t it? So all you pink drinkers out there actually have way more choices than colour dictates, you just haven’t found them yet. We’re going to help you with that, and perhaps that’s what Doug was pointing towards too, the sophistication of simplicity. You will see us refer to that idea often on this site.
‘Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it’ Alan Perlis
When you experience and learn the ZiNG! thing, you’ll know what we mean. Two hours will change your food and wine life forever.
Be well, make life better. Zing! it.