Rose wines are just fun

We seem to be getting over our hang-ups about pink wine. And that's a good thing, though perhaps with a (slight) downside.

U.S. sales of imported rose wines increased 42 percent in the past year, according to a study commissioned by the Provence Wine Council. A self-serving survey, perhaps, because Provence is the land of rose. But an enlightening one, because it shows how American perceptions of wine are changing.

No longer does pink wine mean the sweet pablum of white zinfandel. We have embraced the idea of rose as a dry semi-white wine with red characteristics. A good rose can be an ideal end to a sweaty workday and an electrifying start to a summer supper. It can transform your mood from glum to cheerful in a single sip, transferring the cares from your shoulders to the setting sun as it seeps into the horizon.

We love rose because we are becoming more comfortable with wine. The world's greatest wines engage our intellects as well as our senses, but rose will have none of that. It is pure, unadulterated fun. While a high-scoring cult wine may offer gobs of this and layers of that, a well-chilled rose captures the summer sun, whether reflected off the Mediterranean at a plaza cafe along the Cote d'Azur or off a backyard swimming pool in the American suburbs. Rose is the essence of summer.

What is the downside of all this? As roses become more popular, more of them become available in our market, and their quality varies. The good news about that bad news is that as I've tasted my way through a bunch of roses now on retail shelves, I have found very few inferior ones, just a lot of pleasant ones. And some exciting ones.

So what should you consider in an Old World rose?

Vintage matters, but not as much as you might think. The common wisdom is that rose is best the year after the harvest, so you'll see many 2008s on retail shelves this summer. But many 2007s are drinking beautifully right now, and because of the market bias for young rose, their prices may be discounted. Don't overlook them.

Color really doesn't matter. Roses range from a vibrant, translucent red to an ethereal pale hue. Some people say the palest roses are the best, but that is a matter of taste. Tavel, a town in the southern Rhone Valley, is known for deep-colored, vibrant roses, while Bandol, a bit farther south along the Mediterranean coast east of Marseille, produces wines of a light, delicate color. Both can be excellent.

Rose is either an intentional creation or a byproduct of red wine production. A winemaker who intends to make rose will pick the grapes just as ripening begins, when they retain vibrant acidity and sugar levels are not too high. If a red is the goal, the winemaker picks the grapes later, when sugar levels are higher, then bleeds off a portion of the juice immediately after crushing to concentrate the flavors and color in the remaining juice. In the past, that bled-off juice was discarded or sold to make bulk wine, until wineries realized that rose was marketable.

Those latter roses are often called "saignee," from the French word for "to bleed," even though that term applies to the technique by which all roses are made. They are often quite pleasant. But they rarely offer the excitement and liveliness of wines that were intended to be pink.