Petit Manseng
puh-TEE mahn-SENG · Vitis vinifera ‘Petit Manseng’
A thick-skinned white from the Pyrenees foothills of southwest France, where Jurançon makes it both sweet and dry. The ‘petit’ is the berries: tiny, tough-skinned, and loaded with acid and sugar at the same time.
/ What it tastes like /
Tropical — pineapple, mango, passionfruit — with honeysuckle and a citrus snap that keeps it from going heavy. Made dry, as the one we tasted was, it comes across rich and full-bodied but stays lively because the acidity never quits. Made sweet, in its Jurançon homeland, those same grapes shrivel on the vine into something closer to honey.
/ Why it works in Texas /
Those tough little skins are the whole story: they shrug off rot in a humid spell, hang late into the heat, and hold onto acid that most whites lose by August. That makes it a natural fit for the High Plains, where the fruit for the bottle we tasted was grown. It can give Texas a full-bodied white with real backbone — and a sweet wine too, if a winemaker wants one.
/ What to eat with it /
The tropical fruit and high acid make it a friend to spice — Thai, Tex-Mex, anything with heat and a little sweetness. Dry, it stands up to roast chicken and rich seafood. Sweet, it is the classic match for blue cheese or a wedge of something at the end of the night.
/ From our visits /