A rosé by any other name

Apparently rosé wines are all the rage and I've been living under a rock, feeling supercilious about my pink wine-drinking friends. Rosés have been gaining in popularity and after a depressing time in the 80s and 90s, the new millennium has seen a rebirth in the popularity of pink wine. Admittedly, my sources were initially limited to Rick Steves and Jamie Ivey, but as with most of the digressions of my life, I ended up researching rosé wine prior to writing this post.

I was watching the Rick Steves’ travel videos about France and in one of the towns he has lunch with a friend. He says that he enjoys the fine rosé wines of the region for lunch because they are dry, crisp, and best served quite cold. It was intriguing to me because my relationships with pink wines have come from Mateus rosé during college, California white zinfandel (use it up while it's still young), and more recently, pink champagne. During last spring’s trip to Sonoma, I bought three bottles of pink sparkling wine from Schug Carneros Winery. Although enjoyable, none of these wines would make it to my top ten.

I realized that one of the travel books I had checked out from the library was called Extremely Pale Rosé: A Very French Adventure, by Jamie Ivey. I was deep into eighth grade student journals, but Rosé kept calling my name. I didn’t give in, and finished Hunger Games (a YA science fiction) for book club instead, but when Friday arrived, I was ready to dive into a barrel of rosé. I read this excellent book all weekend, and although I’m not quite done with it, I know that it is safe to recommend to both armchair travelers and those among you who like wine. It’s well-written, witty, has lovely descriptions of French scenery and culture, and best of all, may lure you into trying some new wine.

The search for the palest rosé in France was the story line of the Ivey book, and it kept me asking questions about winemaking and ruefully considering my lack of fluency in the French language. I learned that the French vignerons are very snooty (what else is new?) about their wines, and many don’t even consider rosés to be an acceptable type of wine. They are, however, quick to compare their method of making rosé to the California version. All grape juice is essentially clear, but wines are colored and flavor is added by the amount of time a wine spends soaking with the skins. Very dark wines have lots of color from the purple and red grape skins and white wines from contact with the green or yellow skins (or no skins at all). French rosés are made by essentially dying the wine through contact with the red grape skins, but the contact time with rosés may be as little as a few hours. The amount of time the wine is with the grape skins also affects the tannin content of the wine. Some California blush wines are created by just mixing red and white together to form pink, but the white zinfandel process is similar to that of the French.

Since the North Forty was going to a BYOB Mediterranean restaurant called the Couscous House on Saturday night, I thought this might be a fun place to try a French rosé to see if it would hold up to the strong flavors of Algerian cuisine. I went to the local liquor store and found that there were only four bottles of French rosé available. I chose the cheaper one ($8.99) just in case it was terrible, and went off to Chicago armed with two bottles of my Printemps D’Eulalie.

To make a long story short, some of us enjoyed the rosé and some didn’t. My Riesling-loving friend liked it, but my die-hard red wine friends did not. It was light, a little dry, and held up nicely to my meal. It didn’t hurt that my new friend Omar chose an amazing entrée for me that was not even on his menu. It was kind of like an Algerian chimichanga – shredded roasted chicken and raisin couscous mixed together in a luscious curry sauce and then put in a phyllo covering, deep fried, and garnished with confectioners’ sugar. The rosé wine was the perfect foil for this dish.

I highly recommend Couscous House if you want a Chicago neighborhood restaurant with good food that is a great value. I enjoyed both Hunger Games and Extremely Pale Rosé for different reasons, and I think I will go back to the liquor store and try the more expensive rosé that I didn’t buy on Saturday. I know I enjoyed this little French wine detour we took, so join me in trying some rosé from your local supplier and read Extremely Pale Rosé for a pleasurable romp through France’s vineyards. Bon voyage!