1st wine course lesson: White Wine

Last night, I had my first lesson of the wine course.The instructor, Mr. Cabell, made it really fun to listen to the history of wine, the old world and new world wines and the current developments of wine. It's amazing how he knows so much about wine and of course, we got some tips of how to make wines tastes better and what factors might play a role in the whole experience. Yesterday was the first lesson, so we started with the white wine section. Did you know that white wine can be made from white grapes AND/OR red grapes? I always thought red wine's from red grapes and white wine from white grapes.

The first wine for the evening was: SUNRISE

This is the documentation I found :
Variety: Chardonnay
Appellation: Central Valley
Color: Bright Yellow
Nose: Green apples and tropical fruits aromas such as papaya and pineapply with a backdrop of vanilla.

For those of you, who don't know anything about wine, let me explain what this means. ( Some of it, I only learned it last night. So don't feel sorry for not knowing)
The variety means the grape used. For new world wines, at least 85% of the grapes need to be a certain grape to have the name of that grape on the bottle. Like this one, it has Chardonnay on it, so which means 85% of the grapes used to produce this wine is the Chardonnay grape.
The appellation is the terroir. Yeah I know... I didn't know what it means in the beginning either. Terroir is actually the soil, the geographical factors and temperature and climate changes,....all in all, all the geographical, geological and climate factors that might influence the wine grape.
The color, that's just plain simple what you will see. The nose is what you might smell in the wine.

My personal opinion:
Probably because it was for the first time I really sat down and tried to smell what's inside the wine, I didn't smell anything but pineapple. All the other times, I only smelled the wine if it smells good or not, not actually noticing to what it smells like.
I heard things like, apple, green apple, buttery and all kinds of aromas, I didn't notice any of this at all. That felt kinda stupid, but I'm sure it will get better with time and experience.

The second wine was: Deinhard

Documentation I found:
Quality: Quality wine of defined areas, QbA (Qualitätswein bestimmter Anbaugebiete)
Grape Variety: Riesling
Wine Growing Region: Rheinhessen
Soil: Strong, chalky lime and clay
Tasting: Floral, green apple and citrus fruit, spicy, finely acidic fruit, attractive freshness, harmoniously dry.
Food Pairing: The ideal accompaniment to light, elegant, modern cuisine, in particular fried or grilled fish and Japanese.
Alcohol Content: 12%
Residual Sugar: 7 g/l
Total Acidity: 7,0 g/l
Serving Temperature: 10°-12° C

My personal opinion:
I expected this wine to be sweeter since Riesling is known for it, but still it appealed more to me than the first one. It tasted fruity, crisp and more acidic. It even gave me the feeling of drinking a good sparkling wine, but without the bubbles.

The last one was a not expected one: Intis

Region: Argentina
Appellation: San Juan
Type: White
Variety: Sauvignon Blanc

My personal opinion:
Of course, Sauvignon Blanc is a pretty well-known variety and promotional wise, this variety is positioned as to be a good choice when you want to drink it with white meat. I liked it, because it's also fruity and acidic and that it's easy to drink.

So, with 3 wines last night, it made a very good night!!
I was once taught:

" The best wine is the one you like, for free and in front of you!"

So, what is your favorite white wine?