A few years back, Pinot Grigio replaced Chardonnay as the number-one selling white wine in the USA. As a result, prices for established, reliable Pinot Grigio skyrocketed, and a slew of unknown Pinots — of varying degrees of quality — flooded the market. The popularity of the wine became so great that many California wineries have renamed their wines made from Pinot Gris as “Pinot Grigio”. Today, there are shelves filled with that popular Italian white wine, some very good, some not so good, most of them overpriced. Which is too bad, because Pinot Grigio tends to be an easy drinking, food friendly wine.

But hey, there’s plenty more white wine flowing in Italy that tastes great, matches well with a variety of foods, and can be had at reasonable prices. One of them is this wine from Tuscany, Antinori Bianco.

This Bianco (Italian for “white”) is a blend of four grapes: Malvasia, Trebbiano, Chardonnay Toscano, and Pinot Bianco. You may have heard of some of these grapes before, as they are commonly found throughout Italy. If you are not familiar with them, don’t worry — you don’t need to know anything about them to enjoy the wine. All you need to know is that if you like Pinot Grigio, you’ll probably like this wine as well.

Tasting Notes: Antinori Bianco

Clean, simple nose of citrus and white fruit. Clean, fresh, and zesty with citrusy flavors of lime and lemon. Also touches of pear, apple, and mineral. Acidity is medium to medium-high, plenty for food matching but not too much to enjoy alone. This is a simple white that has advanced polish and a surprisingly lengthy finish. Have it as an aperitif, match it with all kinds of apps, pair it with simply broiled or lightly battered / breaded white fish, chicken breast, sushi, pork. A fine alternative to Pinot Grigio. The suggested MSRP is $12, but I’ve seen it at less than ten bucks in some stores — which makes it a great value and a good everyday drinker.

a-7 t-7 b-9 fc-10 v-8 ~ 91 Points

Website: Villa Antinori

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