By Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg
Wednesday, September 19, 2007

After six months of writing this column, this week we hit the milestone of 1,000 wines tasted on the job.

That sounded like an impressive benchmark until we learned that the staff of Wine & Spirits magazine, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary with a special fall issue, had tasted a whopping 129,485 wines over its history, an average of more than 14 wines a day. Clearly outdone, we thought we'd tap the insights of a source that has been at it 50 times as long, covering 130 times as many wines.

Joshua Greene, Wine & Spirits editor, publisher and president, says he and his staff share a similar sensibility and taste. "Because we taste wines blind, we're much more interested in how a wine tastes than its label or who's behind it," he explains. He also notes their shared interest in natural farming and winemaking. "If you look at the kinds of wines we recommend, we're looking for fresher, brighter, more elegant wines than some of our competitors. They're wines that go with food." Ah, a philosophy after our own hearts.

The magazine's anniversary issue reports on the winners of three different oyster wine competitions, including last year's Old Ebbitt Grill International Wines for Oysters event, which declared 2006 Cono Sur Casablanca Valley Sauvignon Blanc ($12) the grand champion out of nearly 400 wines tasted. The flavors of this light-bodied wine are reminiscent of a softly acidic New Zealand sauvignon blanc with the volume turned down to low. While other, more sharply acidic wines provide a pleasing contrast to briny oysters, this one offers milder, creamier West Coast oysters a perfect match of soft, creamy flavors, making it difficult to tell where the oyster ends and the wine begins.

Surveying the globe, Greene sees Portugal's Douro and Vinho Verde regions as continuing to show tremendous promise, making "incredible" wines that are "probably some of the best values in the world." Another region of tremendous interest to Greene is Western Australia, for Riesling. "I adore those wines," he says, while declining to name a favorite: "I think that most people who are planting good vines in the Mount Barker-Porongurup area are making really good wines.

"One of the interesting things that we're seeing now is more red wines from traditionally white wine areas," Greene says, naming Austria, France's Loire Valley and northern Italy's Alto Aldige.

Greene also has his eye on English wines, especially the sparkling wines. "The geological formation that makes Champagne so incredible," which includes the region's chalky soil, "is basically the same chalk they have across the Channel," he says.

The bad news in Champagne? The weak dollar means higher prices. The good news? The warming of Champagne's climate is providing more consistent vintages and "fantastic" quality. Greene is particularly enthusiastic about the best-of-grower -- also known as artisanal or boutique -- champagnes, which "express a lot of the personality of the little villages where they're grown."

Having awarded the 1999 Vilmart & Cie. Champagne Brut Grand Cellier ($71) 94 points, the magazine includes grower Champagne Vilmart & Cie. on its list of the 10 Best Champagne Brands. Also among the 10 is Taittinger, producer of some of the best champagnes we tasted this summer, including NV Champagne Taittinger Brut La Francaise ($40), which stands up to even the brinier East Coast oysters and fried or salty appetizers.

The magazine's picks of the 25 Best Cabernet Producers include Robert Mondavi, the source of a velvety wine exploding with blackberries and dark chocolate -- its 2004 Robert Mondavi Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville ($45) -- that we tasted the other night with lamb and steak. The lamb proved an even more ethereal pairing with the cooked blackberry and black-cherry flavors of 2005 Rosenblum Cellars Maggie's Reserve Sonoma Valley Zinfandel ($45). Rosenblum wins a nod from Wine & Spirits as America's Best San Francisco Bay Producer.

If you're more interested in scanning the globe for bargains, note the Value Brands list of the 11 producers that have won the most awards for their price-to-quality ratio and consistent performance since the magazine began that feature in 1997. They consist of five from the United States (Columbia Crest, Fetzer, Forest Glen, Forest Ville and Hogue); and one each from Argentina (Trapiche), Australia (Jacob's Creek), Chile (Concha y Toro), France (Georges Duboeuf), Greece (Kourtakis) and Portugal (Aveleda).

Our recent tastings of offerings from several of them turned up four that we particularly like for the price: the full-bodied and -flavored 2005 Forest Glen Chardonnay ($11), the spiced-blackberry-and-cherry- loaded 2005 Georges Duboeuf Morgon ($12), the refreshing and lighter-on-all-counts 2005 Hogue Chardonnay ($9) and the light-bodied 2005 Hogue Late Harvest White Riesling ($9), with its lush ripe-peach flavor.

What to eat with each? You're bound to get ideas from combing the issue's several "Best Wines for . . . " features, which list specific wines to drink with salumi, oysters, burgers, Thai food, shawarma, Philly cheese steaks and tacos.

Want to blind-taste wines, as the pros often do, in the comfort of home? Famed Austrian crystal maker Riedel ( http://www.riedel.com) has introduced a line of jet-black opaque tasting glasses as part of its Sommeliers line. The stylish glasses are a fun way to execute a blind tasting: Not only will you not know what the wine is, you won't get clues from visual characteristics such as color, clarity, brilliance or effervescence. They're pricey, at $15 to $60 a glass through outlets such as Amazon.com and Wineenhusiast.com, but Crate and Barrel ( http://www.crateandbarrel.com) has introduced an everyday black stemless wineglass for $3.

Attention, oyster lovers: Although tickets to this year's Oyster Riot at the Old Ebbitt Grill (Nov. 16-17) sold out in 38 minutes, you can still sample some of the award-winning wines with oysters year-round at the restaurant (675 15th St. NW, http://www.ebbitt.com).

Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page are the award-winning authors of "What to Drink With What You Eat." They can be reached through their Web site,http://www.becomingachef.com, or atfood@washpost.com.