Grae Gram

Do you remember back to when you were in your early to mid 20′s and you would meet someone, which after one of those “I want to get to know you” conversation over the phone, you were now planning a first date? At the age of 23 to 24, I found myself in the situation of wanting to step up my game, and look for a classy dame who’s conversation could keep my attention over the phone. I realized that if I wanted to go from the minor to the major leagues in regards to women, I needed to do some work on myself. So I decided to take it upon myself to learn more about things further out of my reach financially, more specifically, wines. For some reason I felt as if a woman of a more sophisticated mind frame, all found wine pleasurable. I say all that to say this, rarely did my knowledge of wine help in smoothing out those awkward silent spaces that come about in most first dates. That was until I stopped worrying about the awkwardness and listened to how certain wines allowed for a woman’s body language to speak out loud.

So as I started to recognize that certain wines had the ability to stimulated a woman’s senses I began to narrow the varietals down. Now these wine varietals aren’t full proof, every palate’s different, but these have been my “break in case of emergency” bottles. Hopefully this will help out some of my friends who call me panicking about what wine to get for a prospective date, and also all who are reading this. First, you want to find out how much the lady actually knows about wines, you know, whether they like white or red varietals. If your prospective date is anything like the women I used to date, most of them have a sweet tooth. Also, woman tend to lean towards the lighter wines, some grapes that fit into this category are Riesling, most Chenin Blancs from Vouvray, Gewurztraminer, Muscat, or Moscato d’asti.

All these grapes, mostly Rieslings or the Gewurztraminer are 80 percent dealmakers for women. If after fact finding you realize your date is into reds, try to lean toward fruit forward, and young drinking wines. What I mean is look to more new world varietals like Shiraz from Australia (it’s the same thing as France’s Syrah, but it’s more heavy on the fruit and is better drunk in a younger vintage, at least in most cases.), A fruity Malbec from Argentina will also do the trick, or a pink blush wine known as rose from either Spain or the Rhone valley of France.

I challenge you, both women and men, to go to your local wine shop (whether Trader Joe, Bevmo, or your neighborhood wine merchant), and find these wine varietals. For the guys, please tell me if my advice helped, and for the women, please comment about any varietals I may have missed, that always hit you in that right spot. Again, I’m just here to help, till then, live life one step at a time.

Jaton Gunter - Although not a Sommelier, Jaton Gunter has had a distinct love for wine for almost seven years. Assured that more money doesn’t always mean the best quality, he figures, if people love wine but have problems paying for bottles because of high costs, why not share his journey of low cost wine together? Feel free to comment on any of the wines he singles out and visit his blog at: http://goodwinescheap.blogspot.com/