At a supermarket wine shelf last week, a woman asked me what “Blanc de Noirs” means. She was looking at the label on a bottle of sparkling wine. Next to it was a bottle from the same producer bearing the words “Blanc de Blancs.” She knew the words meant black and white but did not understand their meaning with respect to the wine.
Many consumers — but not all — know that in general Champagnes and other fine sparkling wines are blends of several grape varietals. In the case of Champagne, the grapes are Pinot Noir, Pinot Chardonnay, and Pinot Meunier. Two of those grapes are “black” grapes used for producing red wines, yet Champagne is a white wine. So we explain (or remind) that the juice of these grapes is white, that color comes from skins. A Blanc de Noirs is simply a white wine made from the juice of black grapes.
Such blends help explain why many wine regions do not label their wines according to grape varietals, most commonly so in France. In Bordeaux, for example, Cabernet Sauvignon may be the best known varietal in the regional red wine, but the wine itself will also include quantities of Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and Petit Verdot. Percentages vary from house to house and from year to year. To label it with one varietal could be misleading, and to list all the varietals might prove cumbersome. In the Rhone Valley, including Chateauneuf-du-Pape, as many as thirteen different varietals are authorized, and nearly every Rhone wine includes at least three or four of the authorized grapes.
Even in Italy, Chianti, a red wine, probably includes a dose of Malvasia Bianca, a white wine grape.
So desirable as it seems to put a grape varietal on the label, there is some justification for identifying the wine by region. There is a general tendency world-wide to do just that, but even when a label states clearly that the wine is Cabernet Sauvignon, it’s likely to be blended with small mixtures of other grapes. Reading back labels may (but not always) tell what else is in the bottle.
As the Bard taught us… “What’s in a name” may apply to the wine.
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