Tag Archives: Tiefenbrunner

Wine of the week: Tiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio 2021

Yiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio bottle
Tiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio 2021 /$12-$18

Italian white reminds us that pinot grigio doesn’t have to be bland and boring

The Wine Curmudgeon has long had an ambivalent relationship with pinot grigio. On the one hand, I firmly believe everyone should drink what they want. On the other, most pinot grigio tastes like bland club soda.

So what’s the WC to do? Recommend the Tiefenbrunner, of course.

The Tiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio 2021 ($14, purchased, 12.5%) is one of a handful of widely available and higher quality pinot grigios – and that are worth the couple of dollars more than the supermarket brands.

That means this Italian white is much more than the hint of lime fruit and the not quite fizziness that characterizes the $8 to $12 wines that make up most of what people think about of when they buy pinot grigio. Look for some pear fruit and maybe some lime, as well as a wine that is much fuller in the mouth and has a longer and more interesting finish.

In other words, pinot grigio that will please regular drinkers as well as those of us who don’t drink it often.

Chill this and drink it on its own, or pair it with salads or roast chicken breasts – or a salad that includes roast chicken breast.

Imported by Opici Wine & Spirits

 

Wine of the week: Tiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio 2016

Tiefenbrunner pinot grigioThe Tiefenbrunner pinot grigio demonstrates that not all of this kind of Italian white wine has to be bland and boring

The Wine Curmudgeon’s long-standing antipathy for pinot grigio is rooted in sampling too many bottles of the Italian white wine that were overpriced, tasted like club soda, or both. So when I can rave about something like the Tiefenbrunner pinot grigo, more the better.

That’s because the Tiefenbrunner pinot grigio ($14, purchased, 13%) is more than another wine made for focus groups, bereft of flavor and character. It speaks to where it’s from in northern Italy, as well as to a grape that can make aromatic and subtly fruity wine if someone takes the time and trouble to do so.

Which is what happened here. Look for almost floral aromas, plus a little citurs that might seem more likely in an Oregon pinot gris. It’s not quite stone fruit when you taste it – more pear-like. One reason the flavor is so difficult to describe is that pinot grigio rarely tastes like this. Plus, it retains the hint of minerality that even the most bland of its brethren always seem to have.

Highly recommended (and it was a huge hit with my El Centro students). Pair this with almost anything spring related, and especially salads and shellfish.

Wine of the week: Tiefenbrunner Pinot Bianco 2011

? Order by noon Monday for holiday delivery for the cheap wine book

Tiefenbrunner Pinot Bianco Many of us who were liberal arts students in the 1970s spent a lot of time with European history, and one of the things we learned is that national borders were flexible. Unlike the U.S., where we believe in mostly straight lines that are always the same, European borders have changed frequently over the past 500 years. A war, a new ruler, or a dynastic marriage, and part of one country would become part of another without any trouble at all.

What does this have to do with wine? A lot, actually, as only the Wine Curmudgeon would take the time to point out. Northern Italy wasn’t Italian the way we understand it for most of those of 500 years, but part of various German-speaking states, including the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Which means there is a tradition in Northern Italy of wine producers with German-sounding last names making wine with German grapes.

Alois Lageder does it, and so does the Tiefenbrunner family, as the pinot bianco ($15, purchased, 13%) demonstrates. Hence a label that says both pinot bianco and weissburgunder, the grape’s German name (which is pinot blanc in French) on it. Pinot bianco is softer and more floral than pinot grigio, and is much more enjoyable at the lower prices I write about.

This wine is an excellent example of pinot bianco. Look for green apple fruit with an undercurrent of something almost tropical, lots of white flower aromas, and a minerality and acidity that don’t overwhelm the wine the way they can in pinot grigio. That I bought a previous vintage, and paid more than I usually do, attests to the Tiefenbrunner quality. Highly recommended, even at $15.