An American History of Thanksgiving Wines

Thanksgiving may be touted as a time of history and tradition, but as has been uncovered time and time again, much of what we believe about the holiday is actually a recent construction. This holds especially true when it comes to the wine we drink with our turkey, reports Aaron Nix-Gomez on the wine blog Hogshead, who notes that the wine we drink on America’s booziest holiday has consistently changed since the repeal of Prohibition in 1933.

Because repeal did not come until December 6th of 1933, Thanksgiving of 1934 marks the beginning of America’s love affair with holiday wine. Back then, turkey day recommendations were simple, with wine critics calling for for sherry or madeira across the board. But as the domestic and global wine market expanded so did the tastes of the American consumer, and established wine dogma was broken at every turn swaying from Bordeaux in the 1950s to Chablis in the 1960s. By the 1970s, the very American “if it suits your taste” argument had handily won out. [Hogshead] [Photo: Flickr/Henner Zeller]