“In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is freedom, in water there is bacteria.”

-za Benjamin Franklin

So you’ve decided to heed ole’ Ben’s advice, ditch the water and start drinking wine to show everyone just how wise you are. Now you’re standing alone in the wine aisle of your grocery store with thousands of labels staring at you and you have no clue what you are looking at. They may as well be written in a foreign language; in fact, some are!

First of all, congratulations on becoming the world’s newest oenophile. Wine labels, when you know what to look for, can actually tell you a lot about the wine inside the bottle. From the label, you’ll know the producer, the brand, the varietal, or grape, the alcohol content, the growing region, the year and the bottler.

When learning how to read wine labels, the grape variety is usually the first thing people look for. Most new world wines (California, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, etc.) will include the grape (chardonnay, merlot, etc.) on the label which makes life easier. However, European countries like France, Italy and Spain (old world) will use regional names like Burgundy, Chianti or Champagne on their labels. Each region, by law, allows only specific grapes to be planted there, so the wines are named for the vineyard or village they came from rather than for the grapes.

Also, most agree the place the grapes were grown that is most important to the quality and characteristics of the wine. The French term “terroir” refers not only to the type of soil in which grapevines grow, but other factors that can influence the character of the grapes, including climate, wind, and altitude. On New World wines, you’ll spot regions like Napa Valley or Sonoma listed on wine labels to help give the wine its place.

Next issue, we’ll discuss the name of the wine producer, the vintage and alcohol content; what these means and where you can find them.

Oh, and by the way, oenophile means wine enthusiast.