Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
the food, of course, but nothing more.
This is a shame, because French wines offer a wide range
of pleasing characteristics. If you know a bit about them, you
will enjoy being able to pick and choose from the wine list.
And i nding new wines is not only fun, it is a course in French
geography. Most wines are named for the places they come
from in France, not the grapes from which they are made. We
offer a 'tour' of France, in the next chapter, by wine region.
Learning some wines by their place names, and i nding
ones you particularly like, are part of the fun of being in
France. Except for those
Grands Vins
of AOC which are hard
to i nd and horribly expensive anyway, French wine is very
accessible and delightfully varied in character.
Learning about the wines of France should be a light-
hearted, haphazard trial-and-error experience, strictly for
pleasure. There's no such thing as a 'wrong' choice for a
wine with a meal. The rule of thumb is white wines with
white meats (turkey, chicken, i sh, veal or pork) and red
wines with red meats. But you don't have to follow it. The
French don't take usually take their wines too seriously and
neither should you.
How to Choose Wine at a Restaurant
Say you are going out to dinner at a respectable, reasonably-
priced Paris restaurant. Your wine list, usually located at the
end of the menu, will probably look something like this:
Vins Blancs (White Wines)
Sancerre
Muscadet
Pouilly-Fuissé
Chablis
Vin de la Maison
Vins Rosés (
Rosé
Wines)
Tavel
Provence
Vin de la Maison
Search WWH ::
Custom Search