Wine of the Week

Even die-hard red wine drinkers will stoop to consider white wines in summer. When it’s hot, a clean, crisp wine is needed--something lighthearted and less weighty since heat tends to accentuate alcohol and oak.

Here’s one idea: Bourgogne Aligote from Ghislaine and Jean-Huges Goisot. Traditionally in Burgundy, Aligote is planted in the poorer vineyard sites and turns out a wine so thin and acidic that Burgundians thought up the idea of diluting a splash of creme de cassis with Aligote to make a vin blanc cassis or kir -- just so they could drink the stuff.

But this Aligote is much too good to use in a kir. Clean and snappy, refreshingly crisp, it is grown outside of Chablis in the village of St. Brix-le-Vineux (St. Bris the Vinous), which, according to vigneron Jean-Huges Goisot, has been making wine since the 11th century, making it the oldest wine-growing village in Burgundy. One reason Goisot’s Aligote is not your normal insipid stuff is that the grapes come from a 95-year-old vineyard cropped at the same level as Meursault. All of which goes to show that good vineyard practices and good winemaking can make something of even the most humble grape.

Bottom line: This is a great summer drink at a great price, perfect with an heirloom tomato salad or a grilled fish.

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About $10.99. Available at Beverage Warehouse in Marina del Rey, (310) 306-2822; Epicurus in Santa Monica, (310) 395-1352; Hi-Time Wine Cellars in Costa Mesa, (714) 650-8463; Larchmont Village Wine & Cheese in Los Angeles, (323) 856-8699; Mission Wines in Pasadena, (626) 403-9463; and Wine Country in Long Beach, (562) 597-8303. If you can’t find this wine, have your local wine store call the importer, Beaune Imports, (510) 841-9815.