She don't DO white, like some other women do

Messed up by a Semillon in the mid-80s, she has not touched white wine for 25 years.

Won't do it. She can't prove it was the wine, either. It could have been the guacamole dip, the shrimp, or just a garden variety nausea that bagged her later that evening.  

But now neither her girl friends nor wine guides or me nudging her to give the Inama Soave a sip will budge her to consider it. Since all whites are off limits, even pro seco and champagne, we wind up with a dozen bottles (mostly gifted) in our tiny cellar, aging nicely, but unlikely to find their way to the recycling center.

  Unless they are rare vintages or special occasion gifts, I find new homes for them. I have fed a few to Grandma, who will sip a red wine if it resembles the ones Grandpa used to brew (out of a bucket of blackberries or a pail of plums from his own orchard). She likes them sugar-laden, but on the white side will tolerate a Pinot Grigio if I don't have a sauterne or Gewurztraminer in the house. What some of us consider cooking wine is her cuppa tea.

At Thanksgiving I coaxed her to try a glass of Semillon and it lasted her all afternoon.  This dilemma leaves me with too many whites on the teeter-totter I call my wine cellar --a rustic rack over the armoire in the kitchen. Its contents range from a Pomerol to a couple of Red Mountain chards from Terra Blanca (Washington). I may stuff them in someone's stocking this Christmas...not hers. That morning she's only after chocolate.  

Has anyone considered making a Chocolate Chard?   Stuck on reds, I have plenty to drink, from the 2009 Dante Cabernet--left over after our daughter's wedding in 2009: its berry-riddled finish makes it great with steak in midsummer--to an Owen Roe Cab we've been saving for the right moment, a Dunham Cellars Syrah I consider one of the best wines I've tasted, and a long-savored Napa Valley Cabernet from Heitz cellars due to be opened on our 45th anniversary.   

 That reminds me: too many winesites from too many vineyards make the fatal mistake of featuring photos of wine fields, chateaus, connoiseurs ganged up around a cask like a family reunion shot. You can't drink a winefield, and we're not that interested in your cousins. To help us single bottle buyers who are curious, but not ready to haul home a case, smart guys will put pictures of their best bottles in plain sight. 

That's how most of us remember what we like.