Petite Sirah

[Thomas]

Just as an afterthought, in the early 1970s I lived in Tehran for two years. During the Shah's regime Iranians stuck to their roots and made wine.

I used to drink a dark, red wine called 1001. It was peppery and chewy and it was produced near the famous city of Shiraz, where of course the grape is believed to have originated. If Aussi or Rhone or Calif. S. can come close to what I remember in that wine, I feel lucky--Rhone seems to do it more often than the rest of them.

Incidentally, Iranians near the Caspian Sea (close to vinifera's origins) made marvelous Riesling.