You know the feeling. The sun is beaming, there’s a soft breeze, waves are gently crashing nearby, and the salt from a recent dip in the ocean is baked into your sunscreen-soaked skin. When all of these elements conspire together to make it seem as though you never had a job and will never in fact return to one, the only thing to be done about this level of euphoria is to reach for a vacation wine.
va·ca·tion wine
/vāˈkāSHən wīn/
noun
- A wine that anchors you in the moment, sharpening your senses and dulling your worries, all with one crisp sip.
Admiring a light frost crawl across your glass as it’s filled with a quaffable wine is textbook vacation vibes. It signals that your OOO auto-reply is shielding you from meeting invites and just-bubbling-this-back-ups, and that maybe your idea of moving to the Mediterranean coast isn’t so far-fetched after all. And while the aforementioned seaside scenario is a stellar example of where a vacation wine hits its stride, a vacation wine is more like a state of mind, to be enjoyed wherever and whenever you please (though preferably on an actual vacation).
“What I’m drinking while away is much less particular than when I’m back at home,” Parcelle Founder Grant Reynolds says. For the NYC-based sommelier, it’s more about what he’s not drinking. “I’m avoiding anything with too much flavor and too much alcohol. I like to do stuff while on vacation rather than just get drunk, nap, and repeat, so my approach to vacation drinking is all about a long lunch, having the coordination to safely go for a swim following that lunch, and then still being in good form for a proper dinner.”
The prerequisites of a vacation wine are few, but enhancing the moment is non-negotiable. “A vacation wine must be cold, crisp, high acid, low oak integration, and taste a bit like the salty ocean,” Las Jaras Co-founder Eric Wareheim tells us from his vacation in Formentera, who shares his insights while sunbathing on the rocks overlooking the turquoise sea. “We brought some Jamon, some hard cheese, and an Albarino from a responsible winemaker. (Organic but not funky, no bullshit.) I listen to the waves crashing against the rocks and the cool water hits my face and I kiss my glass of wine and cheers to goddess for offering up such a wonderful spot to sit ’n’ sip.”
This sense of gratitude and unrestrained ease permeates the vacation wine drinking experience. It’s less about the wine being expensive or impressive, and more about setting the right tone. “Vacation wine is like being greeted warmly by an old friend who is not going to ask you too many difficult questions about your day,” says Madeline Miller, who is the sommelier at Misi and considers vacation wine a rather sacred category. “It’s crispy and acid-driven, maybe not the most complex but always deeply delicious.”
Vacation wine should also have a transportive quality about it—both in terms of grounding you in the present, and reminding you of vacation wines past. “Wine aromas can be a strong force in memory recall,” Pharmacie du Vin and Cafe Stella wine director Sarah Plath says. “One sip of peachy, floral Sardinian Vermentino can provide a quiet reprieve from a dark winter in New York and take you back to a recent trip abroad.”
Though buyer beware: a vacation wine doesn’t always translate to regular life. “If you’re drinking a local wine while abroad, it will not taste as good when you try it back at home,” Reynolds warns. “As a sommelier, I’ve seen many hearts broken when a customer realizes what was best about the wine they had on their honeymoon was the setting and occasion rather than the raw material itself.” But, that’s the fun of it, of course. “Part of the joy of vacation drinking is that life should be so carefree that as long as the wine is ice cold and requires little concentration, it’s the right choice,” he adds.
Leaning into this argument—that what constitutes a vacation wine isn’t really about what’s in the bottle but more about the setting—is a recipe for a memorable travel experience. “I think of wines produced locally to your destination that seamlessly sink into whatever the moment demands; the pure and simple synergy between a local wine and a local cuisine that can only be experienced in the place itself,” Penny wine director Ellis Srubas-Giammanco says.
So, as summer tiptoes into its cruel closing months when the weather is still top-notch but email subject lines like “fall sweaters” begin to invade your inbox, steer the opposite direction and go on a vacation as an act of rebellion.
Need a couple of ideas? “There’s no debate: Take me to Pantelleria to savor every drop of my ultimate vacation wine,” wine writer and presenter Wanda Mann says. For Primal Wine founder Guido Cattabianchi, the ultimate vacation wine would entail a return to his native Valpolicella, Verona for a glass of crunchy Valpolicella Classico paired with cold cuts or sandwiches. “I would have a picnic with my family in the higher hills, under a cherry tree, and the landscape would smell like cherry trees when cherries are ripe, so leaves, bark, and tree sap—and it would also smell of wildflowers.”
