What's Wrong With California Wine?

I miss you, California vineyards!

So far there seems to be only a handful of products I'm used to that will be difficult if not impossible to obtain here. The first is California wine. I'd heard that Europe was notoriously snobby about our "upstart" wine industry, but I'd figured that was largely a thing of the past. ABSOLUTELY NOT. German, French, Italian, and Spanish wines are not only plentiful here, but also very cheap by US standards, and that's great - but I'm a California wino, and let's face it, wine varies greatly by region to region. You get used to certain grapes, certain styles. German wine trends towards sweeter and fizzier than I'm used to - they love their sparkling wine (sekt) and it's common everywhere, as is the Italian version (proscecco). As far as white wines go, the familiar Chardonnay and Sav Blanc is hard to find unless you go French - Germans specialize in Riesling largely, as well as some minor white varietals that most Americans have never heard of. They do make dry Rieslings, but it's no substitute for a grassy, herbaceous Sav Blanc! Red wine fans have even less to be excited about. While the Wurttenburg wine region grows more red grapes than anywhere else in Germany, they favor a red grape known as "Trollinger" that reminds me of a sweeter Gamay (which makes France's famous Beaujolais wine). It's slightly carbonated and light, and is far better chilled than room temperature unlike most reds. Nice perhaps in the summer but I'm missing big California Cabs for sure.

When California wine is on the menu or at a store, it's the wineries that even the least pretentious quaffers raise an eyebrow at. I have literally seen Gallo as the ONLY California offering on several wine lists. At the fancy German market, the only California wines were Fetzer and a very expensive Russian River Chardonnay. (Estimated time before I break down and buy it anyway? I give it a few weeks.)

Stuttgart IS famous for it's wine...

Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised, but the wine clerk was predictably snobby about California wines. He first spoke to us in German, then when he realized we were English speakers, assumed we were British. It this a compliment or an insult? Once we revealed ourselves to be boorish Americans looking for the wine of our homeland, he got a little pissy. "Uoo zee heer in Europe, ve are not caring zo much about ze American vines." No shit, dude, I could tell by the fact that you only included 4 bottles of mediocre California wine out of your selection of hundreds. There is quite a bit more South African and Chilean wines available here than Californian. (Not that S. African and especially Chile don't make some great wines, I'm grateful for that at least!) But really, you'd think that for a wine region that is considered to be at least the 2nd best in the world even internationally wouldn't be so snubbed, particularly considering that nearly every major restaurant and wine bar in the Bay Area features a ridiculous amount of European wine. Wanna return the favor, guys?