Tongue-Tickling Txakolina

I get into my share of conversations about obscure wines and grapes. But when two different people in two different cities want to talk about Txakolina on the very same day, I take that as a sign to proselytize about this crisp, refreshing wine from the Basque region of Spain, before the heat of the summer is all but gone.

Txakolina or Txakoli (pronounced chock-o-lee-nah or chock-o-lee) and alternatively spelled Chacolí in Castilian, is consumed in great quantities in its northern Spanish home—a region that touches the Bay of Biscay where fresh seafood is plentiful and the catch of the day demands a light and lemony white that often tickles the tongue with a hint of residual fizz.

The region consists of three DOs (denominaciónes de origen) that may appear on labels or wine lists in either the Basque or Castilian spellings: Bizkaiko Txakolina/Chacolí de Vizcaya, Getariako Txakolina/Chacolí de Guetaria and Arabako Txakolina/ Chacolí de Alava. The wines are traditionally poured into tumblers from shoulder height with a bit of a show to accentuate the bubbles.

White Tkakolina is more prevalent but there are also rosés and light-bodied reds produced from a line up of grapes with names and spellings that are easy to forget—Hondarribi Zuri (the main white grape) and Hondarribi Beltza (the main red grape) are supported with small quantities of Petit Manseng, Petit Courbu, and Gros Manseng.

Despite the unusual wine names and the even-stranger sounding grapes, there are many examples available right here in the Garden State. Pick up a bottle or two but be careful—with their lower alcohol, they go down easy.

Tags: Wine