I have fought long and hard for the once step-children
Rosés of the world. By that I mean that
I’ve raised more than a few eyebrows at formal dinners in our home over the last
ten years by serving a Rosé as a means of educating those bon vivants who associate anything pink with white Zinfandel. Thankfully, I no longer need to promote dry
well-crafted Rosé because these wines are now well-loved by many. But, I’ve seen a change in the Rosé landscape
in the last months and the warning signs trouble me.
Has Rosé now morphed into a brand? There are now lipsticks capitalizing on the
colors used to describe a Rosé wine. I
just learned this morning that Target is launching it’s own line called Yes Way Rosé. This
weekend I was told that a well-known Vodka producer is now making Rosé
vodka. Are complex Rosés being replaced
by poor quality pinks that can be offered in restaurants for $3-5 bucks a glass
to the masses, rather than $9-10 glass of a well-made Rosé?
The other day in the supermarket I saw a case of Rosé with bottle top
closures that were the same as those on beer or a soda-pop bottle. The Rosé was $3.49 per bottle. You don’t even want to know where it was
made. A few months ago I was at an event
in which they served $4 a bottle Rosé from Trader Joe's (BTW: I do like TJ’s Rosé from Provence for $7-8 a bottle), but
this one was insipid. I took one sip and
quietly through the remainder of the glass out.
There was definitely no there,
there. No aroma. No taste.
No structure. No finish. No nada.
It would be a travesty to see lovely well done Rosés
loose out to pink plonk. Have we made a
full circle? Are we going back to the
future of White Zin but without the sugar under the guise of Rosé? I hope not.
No comments:
Post a Comment