Most wine education teaches you France through the obvious lens: Burgundy, Bordeaux, Champagne. But there’s an entire Alpine world that New York sommeliers discovered before Paris did, and most wine lovers have never heard of it.
Wink Lorch has spent decades doing what no one else was doing: becoming the world’s foremost authority on the wines of the French Alps. Not because it was a cleaver career move, but more because when she drove past those mountain vineyards on ski trips in the early 90s, something pulled her in and never let go.
In this episode, she breaks down why Savoie got lumped together with Jura for “editorial convenience,” how a catastrophic 1248 landslide directly shaped the region’s most-planted grape, and why the best wines in these mountains are still almost invisible on restaurant lists across America. She also gets specific: which grape to start with, what label trap to avoid ordering in a ski resort restaurant, and why low-alcohol Alpine whites may be the most climate-future-proof wines in France. The classic regions are crowded, overpriced, and varietal-labeled to death. Expand your tasting journey and reap the rewards.
Expect to Learn:
• Why the wines of Savoie and Jura were grouped together for decades and why that framing is actively misleading if you want to understand either region
• The 13th-century landslide that wiped out an entire population and directly determined which grape variety dominates the region today
• The one label detail that separates a crisp, low-alcohol Alpine white from a rich 14% Roussanne Why obscure Alpine grape varieties like Jacquère and Altesse may be better positioned for climate change than the classic French varieties everyone else is planting
• What’s actually worth looking for in the US market right now, and what a wine and cheese tour of Savoie and Jura actually looks like on the ground
Links:
• More about Wink Lorch (www.winetravelmedia.com/about)
• Buy Her Books (www.academieduvinlibrary.com/wink_lorch)
• The Savoie & Jura Wine and Food tour: June 28 – July 5 2026 (https://www.commonwealthwineschool.com/shop/p/wine-and-cheese-in-jura-and-savoie-france-june-28-july-5-2026)
Service starts now.
Follow the show: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/0f7LAx6NdrwnMn8ii6i7FD) , Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/me/podcast/serves-you-right/id1806172471) , YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@Servesyouright)
I talk to people in and around the service industry space. I’m looking to hear from the people I wish I could have talked to when I was coming up in bars. Said another way: I am trying to make sense of this wild, beautiful mess that can be a life working in bars, and help others that are feeling similarly confused and/or lost. Check out the Podcast Website Here (https://servesyourightpod.com/) and get in touch with me!
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