I have been belly-aching about the need for a serious contender to the oceans of Sauvignon Blanc which have been washing over us all for the past few years – yes Cloudy Bay has done for Sauvignon Blanc what eBay has done for home shopping, but seriously there has to be the occasional break from the cat`s pee and cut grass of your average Marlborough quaffer – and so I hooked my rusty wagon to the Pinot Gris movement.

I have mentioned before the statistic of the average consumer of wine in the UK currently being 25 to 35, female and an avid happy-hour consumer buckets of Pinot Grigio (the Italian version of Pinot Gris).

Consumers in this neck of the woods are still firmly entrenched in Sauvignon Blanc as their white poison of choice and there is a lot of good stuff around (Dog Point SB is still our biggest white wine by volume at $34.95).

The Australian wine industry as a whole appears to be a little bemused by it all – and the general feedback from the Aussie gurus of the vine for the large part can possibly be summed up in a quote I read from James Halliday: ” Drinking Pinot Gris is like painting white paint on white canvass” – harsh words indeed.

The thing about Pinot Gris for the most part is that the mundane examples lack good acid. It is the acid which forms the backbone over which delicate and perfumed Gris can hang – resulting in a sophisticated, fresh and minerally sort of wine which can still let you know who’s boss.

One wine guy in the US coined a whole movement in wine appreciation when he described a good Grigio as having the flavour you would experience after licking wet rocks – rumour has it that it has sent legions of avid Baby Boomers into their kid’s sand pits in search of the latest taste sensation.

As Pinot Gris ages it will become more perfumed and fragrant, and after downing it’s predecessor 2007 last week am happy to say gets better and richer – just how life should get…

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