(Claude Auguste / animated pic: runwayml)
There was a time when Europe – indeed, the whole world – knew pretty much exactly what it wanted to drink. And not in the sense of ‘discovery’ or ‘terroir discourse’, but in a very practical sense: what’s on the menu, what people are familiar with, what they order without a second thought. Back then, white wine wasn’t some oenological adventure for natural wine producers, but sheer habit. And this habit had a name.
One of them: Edelzwicker. Alsace. It sounds like a joke today, but it was once a serious offering. Edelzwicker was the wine for anyone who didn’t want to – or couldn’t – make up their mind. A bit of Riesling, a bit of Gewürztraminer, perhaps a touch of Pinot Blanc, but mostly Gutedel and Silvaner – all mixed together, and the cuvée is ready. The name itself is a blend of ambition and a touch of humour. ‘Edel’ (noble), but also ‘gezwickt’ (a play on the German word for ‘pinched’ or ‘tucked in’). In the 70s and 80s, Edelzwicker was on every wine list, from village pubs to upmarket restaurants. Today? Gone. Almost. Only a few die-hards are still keeping it alive. And one version has survived: ‘Gentil’ from Hugel. The Edelzwicker that’s spruced itself up; spruced up enough – and renamed – so as not to be laughed at in the present day.
Next: Entre-Deux-Mers. Bordeaux, but white, please. An entire region that once stood for the fact that, even in the land of the great reds, one can make perfectly decent white wine. Fresh, light, a touch grassy – Sauvignon, Sémillon and Muscadelle – a hint of citrus, always proper, never exciting. Entre-Deux-Mers was the white wine of reason. You’d order it if you wanted Bordeaux, but didn’t want Bordeaux. A compromise – the name says it all. Between the seas, between the ideas. Today, this compromise has largely disappeared from our shores. The market has made its choice: if it’s Bordeaux, then red. And if it’s white, then please, a domestic one.
And then there’s Gavi. Gavi di Gavi, to be precise. Piedmont, Cortese grapes, a wine that was once considered the epitome of Italian elegance. Slim, fresh, with a hint of bitterness on the finish, which back then was considered sophisticated. Gavi was the white wine of the finer trattorias, the perfect accompaniment to fish, to antipasti, to conversations that grew a little too loud late into the evening. It remained a fixture well into the 80s and 90s. Today? Still around, but somehow it has fallen silent. Supplanted by everything that is more aromatic, bolder, more international and more organic. Gavi is still here, but nobody talks about it anymore.
And finally: Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio. The name alone is quite something. The Tears of Christ – someone had to come up with that. A wine with history, with myth, with a bottle that looked as though it had been stolen straight from a sacristy. Slender, tall, often a little too ornate for what was inside. The wine itself: distinctive, sometimes good, often mediocre, but always backed by a grand narrative. You didn’t just drink it; you believed in it a little. Today, that’s over too. Vesuvius still stands, but the tears have dried up.
What all these wines had in common was their function. They were there. They were available. They were part of a system in which wine wasn’t explained, but simply ordered or sold. You knew what you were getting, and that was enough.
Today, everything is different. Wine must tell a story, must demonstrate its provenance, must justify itself. The old categories – those pragmatic solutions – are struggling. They are too simple for an age that demands complexity – or at least claims to need it.
And yet something is missing. That sense of matter-of-factness. That ‘Pour me an Edelzwicker’, without further questions. That ‘Bring us a Gavi’, without anyone knowing the vineyard site. These wines were perhaps not great, never great. But they were part of an everyday life that no longer exists in that form. That everyday life called ‘a matter of course’.