Yes, the mercury has risen, the muggies are threatening, and the food most of us crave has likely become lighter. So why extol the virtues of a wine of only moderate acidity, low tannin, and pronounced, round fruit?
Because it’s good. Really good. And that’s why you drink wine in the first place, right?
I was recently reminded of why I love this grape so much upon opening a bottle of the Summers 2005 Charbono from California’s Napa Valley. This is a wine of gorgeous lush berry fruit, a texture more akin to the velvet of something with far more bottle age than one with only three years on it, and a subtle sense of mushroomy earth underlying it all that gives it a sense of depth and demands another sip. And another. And then another.
And why not? It’s summertime, after all.