what:
white grape varietal
as produced in Northern California
where:
(outdoors at)
Café du Parc
1401 Pennsylvania Avenue
DC
when:
midsummer
character:
California Chardonnay is the Mae West of white wines. Golden blond, full-bodied,
full-bosomed, with that distinctive come hither voice, and (why
yes) the curves of those nice round come a bit further hips; she
is what both her fans and critics claim she is—a bombshell. As for
finesse? She can manage it when she so chooses. Elegance? On her night,
certainly. Yet perhaps she said it best herself when she said that when
she’s good she’s good, but when she’s bad, she’s
better. And that she is. As full, as rich, as thoroughly American as Chardonnay
gets—she gives all that she has, all the time, and apologizes for
absolutely nothing.
tastes like:
Mae West telling
Cary Grant, “Why don’t you come up and see me sometime?”
pairs nicely with:
Route 1, any top-down vehicle with a bench seat, and early Ella Fitzgerald
(on the low-grade radio of any top-down vehicle with a bench seat); backyard
dinners, rooftop receptions, and any gathering in which one is compelled
to forewarn the neighbors about the possibility of excessive noise; panel
tastings, wine ratings, judging competitions, and any other way one can
take the Old World class system of quality assessment and turn it into a
New World one-v-one bareknuckle fight to see who’s The Best; the kind
of loud, assertive, somewhat crass American woman who is every bit as loud
assertive and crass abroad as she is at home, the kind of American woman
foreign men complain about in public, and the kind of American woman (the
same kind, naturally) who foreign men rather strenuously court in private;
the single fat bead of condensation on the side of a beautiful woman’s
chilled wine glass, following that bead as it slides gently down the nice
round curve of its glass, and sunshine.