Featured Article: To Find the Wines of Summer, Just Say Quaffable
Terms like ‘refreshing,’ ‘easy drinking,’ ‘crisp’ and ‘light’ have all been offered as synonyms. Our wine columnist dove deep into the category and came up with 5 categorically quaffable wines (also great values) to drink right now.
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What does “quaffable” mean? When I went in search of a quaffable wine recently at Bogey’s Bottled Goods in Southold, N.Y., partner Zach Glassman met my request with a raised eyebrow. “ ‘Quaffing’ is such a fun word,” he said. “You don’t often hear such eloquence on Long Island!”
As a one-time resident of Long Island, I took the tiniest umbrage at Mr. Glassman’s response, but I understood what he meant. I love the words quaffing and quaffable. They are fun and capture the character of summer; to me, a quaffer is a wine that does the same. But while I’ve always found these to be useful descriptors, not everyone seems to agree. Often, retailers will translate “quaffable” to terms like “easy drinking” and “refreshing.”
Danny Roosevelt, head of purchasing at Parcelle Wine in New York City, told me he doesn’t consider “quaffer” a “customer-facing word.” In his view, it isn’t “universally meaningful.” Mr. Roosevelt might recommend a “light, refreshing red” or “crisp, salty white,” both of which he considers synonymous with quaffer.
He sent me his list of quaffing wines, red and white, from all over the world. One of his favorites is one of mine too: the 2020 Tiberio Trebbiano d’Abruzzo ($16). I already had a couple bottles at home, and I brought one to dinner at Divina Ristorante, my friend Mario Carlino’s (BYO) restaurant in Caldwell, N.J. “Quaffable?” Mario repeated when I described the wine. The native of Calabria, Italy, shook his head. I poured Mario a glass. He liked the wine but had his own words to describe it. “This is vinello leggero,” he said. Translation: light wine. It meant he considered the wine pleasantly drinkable, if somewhat cheap.
When I emailed Jason Jacobeit, co-proprietor of Somm Cellars in New York, to ask for his picks, he suggested a couple of village Chablis that “went down easy” and were “vividly fresh.” Two of his favorite producers, Charlène Pinson and Bernard Defaix, were priced a bit higher ($30 and $36, respectively) than my own favorite quaffing Chablis: the 2020 Gilbert Picq & ses Fils Chablis ($20), a fresh, lively and eminently drinkable wine from a producer who is also quite good, if somewhat underrated.
While Mr. Jacobeit’s fiscal sweet spot for quaffers was a bit higher than mine, Donna Garvey’s was more closely aligned. Ms. Garvey, a salesperson at Gary’s Wine & Marketplace in Wayne, N.J., does use the q-word when talking to customers, and she believes a quaffable wine shouldn’t cost more than $15. It should also be “universally likable” and taste good with or without food, in her view. I bought a couple of Ms. Garvey’s favorites and particularly liked her pick of the Gruet Brut Rosé ($15), a sparkling wine from New Mexico made mostly from Pinot Noir. A red berry-fruited Champagne-method wine, it’s a slightly frothy, just-dry-enough pink sparkler that is indeed suitable for drinking alone or pairing with food.
While the Gruet has broad distribution, some other $15 quaffers I tasted are a bit harder to find—but worth it. The 2021 Alkoomi Rosé ($12), from the Frankland River region in Western Australia, was dry yet wonderfully juicy. The 2020 Domaine de la Rosière Jongieux Blanc ($15), a white wine made in the Alpine Savoy region of France from the Jacquère grape, was pure mountain crispness.
While $15 is about as low as I typically go with a quaffer, Mr. Glassman at Bogey’s suggested an even cheaper wine: the 2021 Thresher Sauvignon Blanc ($10), from Chile. Marked by a pleasing sweet-tart flavor, it was mouthwateringly crisp and happily devoid of the herbaceous green notes that sometimes mar a cheap Sauvignon. It was so light-bodied it was better as an aperitif than as a food wine.
My friend Sue liked the Thresher Sauvignon Blanc for this very reason. “It’s a lot like water,” she said (something the Thresher winemaking team might not like to hear). She had her reservations about the word quaffer, however. “It sounds very King Henry the 8th,” said Sue, who is English herself and happened to be spot-on historically. An online etymology source I consulted said “quaff” dates back to the 16th century and originally meant “to drink or swallow in large draughts.”
Sue and I didn’t drink large draughts of any one quaffer, but we did try several, including reds from countries around the world. I don’t often think of red wines as quaffers—save, perhaps, for Lambrusco. The Lini 910 Labrusca Lambrusco Rosso ($18) from Emilia-Romagna is one of my summertime go-tos. Low in alcohol (11%), fruity but dry, it’s fizzy enough to be refreshing and substantial enough for food. I love it with barbecue.
A good quaffing wine isn’t the cheapest wine but rather a modest wine, well-made, from a good producer.
A couple of the reds recommended to me were a bit too much in terms of alcohol or tannins or oak to qualify as quaffable in my book. They just didn’t go down easily enough. A couple that did were produced from fairly obscure grapes. The soft and fruity 2020 Las Liebres Colonia Bonarda ($15) from Mendoza, Argentina, is made from the Bonarda grape (Mendoza’s other red grape besides Malbec). The 2020 Les Athlètes du Vin Grolleau ($20), a Loire Valley red made from the Grolleau grape, didn’t look much like a quaffer. The deep purple color suggested something tannic. But on the palate the wine was juicy and bright, and there was just a touch of earthiness behind the red-cherry fruit. And it was also low in alcohol (12.5%).
Another quaffing favorite came from the Rheinhessen region of Germany and the talented winemaker Florian Fauth. The 2020 Seehof Weissburgunder Trocken ($25), his most “basic” dry Pinot Blanc, is a wonderfully snappy white with an intense, even tangy mineral edge.
In the end, a fairly wide range of wines in our tasting qualified as what I’d define as quaffable. So how might you identify one when ordering in a restaurant? My friend Alan had an interesting answer. “They’re not at the bottom of the wine list,” he said. “They’re the next level up.”
That’s exactly it. A good quaffing wine isn’t the cheapest wine but rather a modest wine, well-made, from a good producer. Alan elaborated, and I couldn’t have said it better: “A quaffing wine is one you don’t really talk about, but you smile while you drink it.”
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