Great Tasting Wines!

by Alex A. Kecskes

From the far corners of the world, there are literally hundreds of wines with unusual names. For example, there’s a Chardonnay called Fat Bastard and a Sauvignon Blanc called Cat’s Pee on a Gooseberry Bush. These two wines are best sellers and are two of the amusing names you might come across in your travels. All told, there are more than 230 unusual labels from as far removed from “wine country” as China, Thailand, and thirty-two other countries offering vintages dating from 1972.

Available every day throughout Greece, Retsina is a style of wine you won’t find anywhere else. Aged in pinewood barrels, the pine resin imbues what is often described as an acquired taste. If you’re visiting South Africa, try Andrews Hope, the inaugural vintage from The Spice Route Company. It received its name from the home of Jabulani Ntshangase, South Africa’s first Zulu vineyard owner.
 
Back to familiar wine tasting haunts, you might treat your palate to The Cataclysm from J Lohr Winery in San Jose. The label — resembling the graph from an earthquake monitor — tells the story of this unlucky vintage: Caberbet Sauvignon from one of Napa’s premiere vineyards. Harvested on 17 October 1989, the day of the San Francisco earthquake. The traumatised vines were then chainsawed and replaced by Merlot: the ultimate in stressed vines. Hasta la vista Cabernet! The back label with the trembling vine giving up its fruit needs no words.
 
A pleasant dry fruity blend of Trebbiano and Malvasio varieties, Est! Est!! Est has quite an interesting history. In 1110, Bishop Johann Fugger’s servant was sent ahead to find suitable inns to stay and was told to mark the doors of those with truly excellent wines.  When the Bishop finally arrived at a small hilltop village of Montefiascone, overlooking Lake Bolsena, he discovered one inn whose door was marked Est! Est!! Est. The Bishop imbibed and the wine was so much to the Bishops liking, he stayed there until the end of his days. He even specified in his will that a barrel of the wine should be poured over his tomb annually on the anniversary of his death.

In Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, wine maker Serge Hochar painstakingly creates Chateau Musars, an exceptional world-class wine from a blend of cabernet sauvignon and local grapes. Even during the fierce civil strife that gripped Lebanon, grapes were gathered under the bullets and rockets of local warlords. The winery was repeatedly cratered by shells, and delivery trucks ran roadblock after roadblock. Nonetheless, wine aficionados around the world were able to enjoy the delightful taste of Chateau Musars.

What? A wine called Fat Bastard? True. It’s a southern French chardonnay that has rapidly become the biggest seller in the U.S. Its unfortunate name arose when Guy Anderson was visiting French winemaker Thierry Boudinard. The plan was to launch a new brand, but they were in search of a worthy wine and name. They then embarked on a wine tasting journey, sampling every available wine. Thierry, who had just returned from a wine making stint in Australia, sampled a surprisingly robust chardonnay. Showing off his new vocabulary, he turned to Guy and said, “Taste zis fat bastard!”

(Try Fat Bastard from Wine.com)

When Kenwood Vineyards set to launch its premium Artist Series collection in 1975, its label featured a tasteful reclining nude, for which it quickly became known to local Sonomans as the ‘Naked Lady’ label. Unfortunately, the new collection had a short initial bottling, for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms claimed the label was obscene and indecent, so only 50 cases found their way to market. Kenwood protested, whimsically resubmitting the label with a reclining skeleton. But the Bureau nixed this as well. Then, in 1997, the ‘Naked Lady’ was resubmitted. Prudishness gave way to the new liberalism of artistic expression and the label was approved. Now, a decade after its rebirth, one of the world’s most renowned collections of wine can once again be enjoyed by all.

For classic film buffs, there’s Marilyn Merlot (no it’s not a misspelling). Each vintage features a different image of Marilyn Monroe and a unique label design. The Marilyn Monroe image, licensed to Nova Wines by Marilyn Monroe’s estate, has as its beneficiaries Anna Strasberg, widow of famed acting coach Lee Strasberg, who was Marilyn Monroe’s friend, and the Anna Freud Center for Child Psychiatry.

Now for the name you’ve been waiting for—Cat’s Pee on a Gooseberry Bush. How did this moniker come to be? It all started when TV’s zaftig Jilly Goolden described the experience of drinking New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc as not unlike ‘diving into a gooseberry bush.’ Some believe the rather socially awkward name came from her colleague Oz Clarke who coined “cat’s pee on a gooseberry bush.” And so it goes that this description became the name for a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, now one of the biggest selling wines in Britain. In a surprisingly prudish attempt to scrub clean the name, the second word in the name is spelled ‘Phee’ in the U.S. Silly Americans.

By any other name, a rose is just a rose and a wine is just a wine—enjoy!