You say Grigio, they say no-no

Years ago, when I was an aspiring wine nerd, I went to a food-and-wine conference in Italy, and in the course of interviewing a winemaker from the Piedmont, home of Barolo, Barbaresco, Barbera, and other serious red wines, I asked about white wines. What was their place in the scheme of things?
He smiled. He shrugged. He cleared his throat. Finally, he said, “Well, they’re very useful for getting red-wine stains out of the carpet.”
He wasn’t the only Italian winemaker who thought so – that was the prevailing view for many years in many places. Oh, New Yorkers sort of liked Soave (after Frank Sinatra said it was his favorite wine), and lots of fish-shaped bottles of  Verdicchio went straight to North Beach in San Francisco, and people everywhere who were timid about wine drank Frascati, but it was just a few drops in the wine ocean. No one saw the tsunami gathering strength out there ‘til it hit: Pinot Grigio. The first wave came from Italy, and now has met with an American fightback (besides California, there’s some in Washington state, and one from North Carolina won a gold medal at a respectable competition in Dallas).
What? I always visualize a Tony Soprano-style incredulous scowl: What? Pinot Grigio as the hottest thing, the rising star, slayer of Sauvignon Blanc and White Zinfandel? What? Pinot Grigio? That lightweight? You gotta be kidding me!  And another voice in my head says, “If only, sweetheart, if only.”
In England, where I live, it was a trend, but a less-than-tidal wave. In the last year, people have been saying that Fiano is the new Pinot Grigio (Fiano started in Campania, the ankle of the Italian boot, but the big push now comes from Sicily, which is now making almost as much wine as Australia and is often  known as “the California of Italy.” (Whether this is a compliment, or just another offer we can’t refuse, isn’t clear.)
On vacation in Italy this August, I was in Liguria, on the coast south of Genoa, on what the local Chamber of Commerce touts as “the Italian Riveria,” an area so devoted to fish that the only meat I saw was prosciutto  – white-wine country. Obviously, this was the place to discover what sort of white wine Italians like to drink.
The local wine is mostly made from the Vermentino grape, which almost became the new Pinot Grigio a couple of years ago, but couldn’t quite get there. It may yet come off the bench and win the game, but I wouldn’t risk the rent money on it. Still, it’s tasty enough, more than passable, especially when you’re on vacation, eating grilled fish and gnocchi in the place where pesto sauce was invented. Every wine list we looked at led off with plenty of Vermentino, and some Pigato, the other local grape. None bothered with Gavi, the white wine of neighboring Piedmont, nor Soave. Here and there, we saw a teeny bit of Verdicchio.
What most restaurants and the only wine shop had from outsiders was Fiano from Campania, and a whole lot of different wines from Friuli, which is up in the cool northeast corner of Italy, and where most of Italy’s best whites (including its only distinctive Pinot Grigios) come from. Everywhere we went, to the exasperation of my wife, I interviewed the waiters: What do people mostly drink? The local wines, I was told. Do they drink Pinot Grigio? Oh yes, signore. Italians? Oh no, signore—the English, the Germans, the Swiss, Americans, it’s very popular with them. Grazie, ciao.
So there it is, unscientific but emphatic; you can go a long way just to cross the street. One night, in my excitement, I gestured and splashed some tomato sauce on my son’s white shirt. The waiter handed me a napkin and gestured at the ice bucket. I dribbled some Vermentino on it and dabbed the spot, which disappeared. He smiled, I smiled. I’d come full circle.
Brian St. Pierre is an American writer who lives in England. The Sun welcomes readers’ comments at feedback@sonomasun.com.