A Month-by-Month Journey: Discovering the Diverse World of Wine Chris Lehoux, July 14, 2024 Click here to stay informed and subscribe to Herald-Dispatch. Click #isupportlocal for more information on supporting our local journalists. Learn more about HD Media A month of learning about wine began with a beer. I had no idea what I was looking at. I had no idea what I was looking for, but Amy Snow at Breathe Wine & Culture in Cross Lanes tolerated my questions and tried to help as best she could. I wound up at Breathe on a Monday afternoon, on the outer fringe of drive time. People were coming home from work in Charleston and the road coming through town was choked with cars. Breathe Wine & Culture felt like a cute little oasis, slightly off the main drag. I’d come for the wine but knew absolutely nothing about buying wine. “Is there something I can help you find?” Amy asked. I shrugged. I had no idea. Less than a week before, I’d been sitting at a table with my family at the Watauga Lake Winery near Watauga Lake in Tennessee. We were waiting on pizza and drinks. Everyone was having a good time, enjoying lunch out on a hot summer day, while I groused about not having any idea what to write about in the coming month. This is routine for me. About half the time, I’m not entirely sure what comes next after I finish a project, but I’d had plans this summer, all of which had been upended after the hernia. There’d even been some concern that I wouldn’t be able to make the annual reunion in Tennessee. I worried that I might not be cleared to drive that far, or if I managed to get there, I would be pretty much marooned on my sister’s couch. The trip was important to me. It’s one of the few times I see most of my family, and my sister, Laura, and her husband, Bart, are gracious hosts at their spacious home by the lake. Laura has a fleet of kayaks, and Bart bought a pontoon boat a few years ago, which seems like the equivalent of a lake-bound minivan. This is what I call my vacation. Most years, I show up, eat, drink, laugh, and goof around near the water with my nieces and nephews. The older relatives are already wise to my brand of silly and give me a wide berth. Everyone has a blast, though I usually only manage to last a day or so. Inevitably, I get an awful sunburn. Then, I spend the rest of the week sulking indoors, near Bart’s mostly stocked bar. I try not to drink the expensive stuff. I’m only a brother-in-law. Still, getting away for the reunion this year was hard. Between recovering from surgery and a second round of COVID, I’d gotten so behind on everything. A new topic to write about in July eluded me. “So, what am I supposed to do?” I asked anybody and everybody. But workable topics were scarce and a lot of people I might get help from were on vacation — like me. At the restaurant, the waitress came around and took our order. Bart ordered a mountain of food for the table and then checked on what we wanted to drink. He asked about sangria. “We have that in bottles,” the waitress said. He shrugged. That seemed fine. “How many glasses do we need?” Bart looked down the length of the table. People raised their hands. He counted six, seven people. He looked at me, the guy who’d been raiding his beer fridge all week. “I’m going to stick with water,” I said. “It’s hot. I’m thirsty. This is good.” Bart nodded. No wine for me. Laurie, my stepmother, asked if I was sure. I was an adult, after all, and sitting at the grownup table. The grownups were drinking sangria. “Yeah,” I said. “I can pass. I’m a beer and whiskey guy. I don’t know anything about wine. I’ve had wine, sure, but I don’t know …” I could count on one hand the number of times I’d had wine. Always, somebody gave me something. I never ordered it. Remembering when I’d had wine was easy. Wine, I thought, was refined, cultured. I read books. I watch public television. I own a vest. I liked culture. I could be refined. But wine did nothing for me. “What kind of wine is supposed to go with pizza?” I asked. Pizza was Italian. Sangria, I thought, was Spanish? That didn’t make any sense. Laurie, who’d been listening to me harp about not having a project, looked at me and said, “Do wine.” It made sense, and I knew people who knew things about wine. Before we got our appetizer, I had sent texts out asking for help. Before Bart picked up the check (he’s really a decent guy), I had received three responses—not bad for a national holiday. One of those who had gotten back to me was Cheryl at Breathe in Cross Lanes. So, on Monday evening I stumbled in looking for a place to start. Cheryl wasn’t there when I rolled in. Instead, it was just Amy and me going through the shelves while I tried to come up with questions. Amy was game to help, though she said the owner knew a lot more. Undeterred, we talked about the different varieties of wine. There was red, white, rosé, and something called rosato, which was a mix of red and white. There was moscato, a sweet, white wine Amy said they sold a lot of, though not as much as cabernet sauvignon. “It’s an earthy, red wine. Very popular,” she said. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I thought I remembered television commercials for the stuff, but I couldn’t say cabernet sauvignon clearly. The words got jumbled in my jaw, underlining why I was so bad at high school French. There was also pinot grigio, a white wine, and pinot noir, a red wine. Neither of us knew what pinot meant. Maybe grape? Breathe had malbec, zinfandel, and chianti, which I correctly guessed was red because I figured Hannibal Lector in “Silence of the Lambs” would probably drink red wine with his fava beans. The alcohol by volume for the wines varied from around 5% to well past 14%, which put it on par with the “black out juice” beers I sometimes buy. The wines ranged in price from about 14 bucks to just under $113, though I’ve seen wines in stores that cost as much as my mortgage payment. I had no idea what any of it meant, what wine went with what food or whether that even mattered. I thought about buying the first bottle that caught my eye, but that seemed like a bad place to start. So, I got a four pack of beer with a cat on the can and figured I’d work it out over the next couple of weeks. Bill Lynch can be reached at 304-348-5195 or lynch@hdmediallc.com. Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language. PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK. Don’t Threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated. Be Truthful. Don’t knowingly lie about anyone or anything. Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism that is degrading to another person. Be Proactive. Use the ‘Report’ link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts. Share with Us. We’d love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article. About the Author: Chris Lehoux Meet Chris Lehoux, an experienced wine connoisseur and dedicated blogger with a deep passion for all things wine-related. With years of expertise in the industry, Chris shares insightful wine reviews, valuable wine tasting tips, expert pairing advice, and captivating tales of vineyard visits. Join Chris on a journey through the world of wine, where every sip is an adventure waiting to be savored! Wine