Our Top Picks to Celebrate National Wine Day February 19 (Any day!)

(Gerry Furth-Sides)  February 18^th is National Drink Wine Day, which is a day each year that celebrates the love and health benefits associated with wine. According to the consulting group BW 166, wine sales in the U.S. topped $72.2 billion in 2018, which was nearly a 5 percent increase over the prior year.

Research points to the fact that it’s a healthy beverage to drink in moderation. What exactly is moderation? According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), moderate drinking is up to one drink per day for women and two drinks per day for men. One drink is defined as being four ounces of wine.

Most people who enjoy having a glass of wine with their meal love the taste, but they may not be aware of the way it’s helping their body. Here are some of the many health benefits that have been associated with making wine a part of your diet:

• Heart health. The National Institutes of Health reports that studies have shown that adults who drink light to moderate amounts of alcohol may be less likely to develop heart disease than those who do not drink at all or are heavy drinkers.
• Gut health. The April 2017 issue of the journal Current Opinion in Biotechnology included the research results of a study on the health benefits of fermented foods, including wine. The study found that fermented foods, including wine, provide health benefits well beyond the starting food materials, and contain living microorganisms of which some are genetically similar to strains used as probiotics.
• Diabetes health. The April 2017 issue of the journal Endocrine reports that the American Diabetes Association and the American Heart Association recommend a Mediterranean diet for improving glycemic control and cardiovascular risk factors in type 2 diabetes. It also reports that studies show that higher adherence to the Mediterranean diet is associated with a 20-23 % reduced risk of developing type 2 diabetes. The Mediterranean diet is one that includes drinking wine in moderation.
• Brain health. Research out of the University of Rochester Medical Center in 2018 found that drinking wine in moderation was associated with reducing inflammation and helping the brain to clear away toxins, including those that are associated with Alzheimer’s disease.

Worthy of the Gran Hotel itself, Albarinõ, the new “darling of the wine world” set the high tone for Spain’s finest, most memorable wines and we celebrate National Wine Day with it today or any time.

Albariño, the new “darling” of the wine world is not new.  It has already earned recognition as Spain’s most notable white wine.    Albariño is identified with five subzones in the Rías Baixas wine region, which spans the western Galician coastline in northwest Spain, north of Portugal.  At its heart,  Val Do Salnés is the wine making capital of the region.

These vineyards offer up a highly approachable wine with a mix of floral, oceanic and citrus aromas, much of this .  On the palate, a good Albariño “is racy” but not sharp, with a sense of minerality derived from the granite bedrock common to the Rías Baixas region.  Albariño also has the tastes of lees (spent yeast), buttercup, peach, nectarine, melon, citrus and even a touch of salty brine, influenced by nearby Atlantic Ocean.

Clean, classic tasting Albariño pairs with all of the elegant España classics, elevating the food flavors with its silvery layers of mineralogy while remaining low in acidity:  Ibirico ham, potatoes and cheeses pair beautifully  because of the creamy rather than buttery quality of the wine.

Indigenous Spanish grape varietals included Albariño, Garnacha, Godell, Palomin fino, Gempranillo, Vergejo, Viura and Xarel-lo from the country’s top regions.   A convenient map is provided to locate over 150 Spanish wines that were poured alongside tapas and food pairings.

Other wonderful Spanish red wines include our favorite Temperanillo.  We’ve purchased  dozen since the event for happy home drinking and for happy friends and family.  Any or all of these drinker friendly fine wines are an occasion to celebrate the vineyards.