OK Alison, this is for you.

A while ago, an old friend made me promise I'd start a blog about wine. And for good, or ill, this is the first post in keeping that promise.

Now, what the hell to write? I suppose I'll start with a bit of background. I've been a wine geek for over 20 years now. I've made so many trips to California's wine country that I don't need a map, and know may of the winemakers by name. (Living in the Bay area for eight years helped.) My home cellar is a 500-bottle, glass-doored, temperature-controlled cabinet that is usually stuffed to the gills. WINE WARNING — if you buy a cabinet of any size, YOU WILL FILL IT! Take it from me, that's just how the sickness goes. If you read any of my posts you'll find I'm an opinionated SOB, sorry that's just how it is. As for my pallet, I prefer OLD SCHOOL wines, not the over ripe, over-the-top fruit soup that many of the criticts give big scores to these days. In fact, I no longer read most of them because they've lost their minds over uber-expensive, over-the-top crap. But enough of that, let's get on to something about wine, shall we.

I happen to live in Las Vegas at the moment, so I'm painfully aware that it's summer. It's about 109F today. For me, summer heat calls for lighter eats, and cold, zippy white wines. By zippy, I mean those with bright citrus, green apple or pit-fruit flavors, and bracing acidity. If they also have some minerality, even better. Oh, by "minerality" I mean you get a flavor or stones, chalk, salt etc. Something that reminds you of what the vine is planted in. Yes, good wines have that, trust me. My favorite kind of summer white is Sauvignon Blanc, either from New Zealand, or the Sancerre region of France. These wines have a great zippy freshness to them. They go great with grilled shrimp, smoked salmon, goat cheese & feta, grilled veggies, shellfish, pesto, chicken, etc. And get this, they aren't expensive. OK, some Sancerres can run upwards of $20, but others are under $15. And good Kiwi Sav Blancs can be found for under $9! For example, Trader Joe's has one called King Shag that's about $7.99 that I'll drink any day of the week. When looking at a shelf full of New Zealand Savs, look for the word Marlborough. And don't fear the screwtop! These wines are made to be drunk young, so you can't open them too early.  Some great names are: Kim Crawford, Nobilo, Cloudy Bay, Villa Maria, Oyster Bay, Starborough, Dog Point, heck even that Monkey Bay doesn't suck! Don't worry about the year, NZ Savs are pretty good, regardless of vintage.

You should be able to find a few Kiwi Savs anywhere you buy wine. If you'd rather grab something from CA, try Kenwood's Sonoma Sav Blanc, or St. Supry's. I can also recommend Geyser Peak's, Ferrari Carrano, Mondavi's Napa Valley Fume Blanc and Grgich Hills. These will probably run you more than the NZ wines. Oh yeah, Fume Blanc is another name used for Sauvignon Blanc. It's a marketing name, made up my Robert Mondavi that put Sav Blanc on the US wine map.

Alright, that's probably more than enough for now. Besides, all this stuff about wine has made me thirsty. Luckiloy, I have a Sancerre in the fridge. Cheers!