As the sweltering heat of summer begins to set in, sometimes all you really need to get through it is a bottle of cold, crisp white wine. Let’s be clear about what we mean by this – you’re looking for a wine that is easy, not one to ponder over. There is space for ponder worthy whites, that you’d gladly devote your time to, but not here, not now. It’s too damn hot. Here all you really want is something to ease the heat and help get a nice little buzz going. It still better be made well and delicious, but no one needs to wax poetically about the contents inside the glass.
A bottle of Herdade Do Esporão Verdelho 2015 serves this need expertly. This isn’t a bottle you’re going to hold on to for a few years, it’s a bottle you’re going to crack open now and enjoy, basking in all the refreshment it has to offer. Made in Portugal from a grape – Verdelho – that is normally used for Madeira, this wine is bright and lively, basking in citrus with a touch of minerality that makes it the ideal bottle to pull out of the fridge on a really hot day. It’s a bottle meant to pop and pour.
That’s really all you need to know. We like to think of this wine like adult lemon or limeade, exactly what you need, exactly when you need it. And at less than ten dollars a bottle, it’s basically as cheap as the lemonade you used to buy from the neighborhood stand when you were a kid. You can’t beat that.
