Good Morning!

I have been blitzed with email lately asking about certain wines and one of the questions was What the heck is Vouvray? OK, here is the short answer.

Vouvray is area just east of the Loire Valley in France and the wine is made from the grape called Chenin Blanc. What is most awesome about this grape is the high acid levels in this growing region. If you were to buy a Chenin Blanc from other areas of the world you might easily think it is a Sauvignon Blanc. They both have similar mouth feel. The Loire Valley in France makes wines from the Chenin Blanc grape and these wines can be made to be very sweet to very dry and it can be a still wine or a sparkling wine.

I have only tried the dry and very dry versions of this wine from Loire Valley, I love the acidity of this wine and I opened a bottle of this the other night with a rich, fatty grilled salmon and the pairing worked perfectly.

If you are drawn to try new wines and you like the Pinot Grigio or Sauvignon Blanc look for a bottle of dry Vouvray in the wine department, you can get a good or maybe a great bottle for less than $12.00. If you are looking for perfect pairings for the Vouvray, if you want cheese to match with this try Asiago or Edam. The Asiago will be mild, salty and buttery and the Edam is richer and nutty and the acid will play nicely with the wine.

When it come to protein, I really liked the salmon with the Vouvray we had the other night, but my favorite ever pairing with this wine was Bobby Flay’s Brick Chicken on the grill recipe. You can hunt down the full recipe on food network but the trick to grilling this chicken is how you cut out the spine of the chicken and rub it with olive oil and salt and pepper, then the chicken will lay flat on the grill and you put a brick wrapped in aluminum foil on top of the chicken and then when you flip the chicken over and set the brick on it again. The skin of the chicken is crispy and so flavorful and rich and the acid of the wine is lovely.

I hope this answers your questions about this awesome white wine that can easily be found.

Much LOVE and wine,

Tammi