Every underdog, by taste.

If Xinomavro is Greece's Barolo, Agiorgitiko is its velvet glove — soft, plush, and impossible not to like. Meet the grape they once called the Blood of Hercules.

Southern Italy's great red grape makes powerful, tannic, age-worthy wines so structured they're called the 'Barolo of the South.' Volcanic, savory, and absurdly undervalued.

Drinks like nebbiolo / Barolo — the dark, volcanic 'Barolo of the South'

Spain's most famous red, Tempranillo, has a quiet parent — a difficult, long-ignored white from Ribera del Duero that's finally being bottled on its own. Meet Albillo Mayor.

Drinks like a structured white Rioja or a savory, textural white Burgundy

Alicante Bouschet is one of the few grapes with red flesh, not just red skin — it bleeds into everything. Why Portugal's Alentejo does it best, plus the cult Aluado and benchmark Mouchão, with tasting notes and where to buy.

Drinks like petite Sirah or a brooding, inky Malbec

The most important grapevines on earth are American — and almost nobody drinks them. The story of the native roots that rescued European wine from extinction, the Texan who saved Bordeaux, and the homegrown underdogs still hiding on our own shelves.

If you like Chardonnay for its body, Antão Vaz gives you the same weight and ripe fruit for less money — a sun-fed white from southern Portugal with real texture.

Drinks like a warm, ripe, textural white with weight and grip — the fuller end of the white spectrum, closer to a barrel-touched Chardonnay than a lean coastal one

The oldest known winery on earth is a cave in Armenia, dated to about 4100 BC. The country is still making gorgeous, fruit-soaked reds for the price of a movie ticket — and almost nobody is paying attention.

Drinks like an old-world, earthy Pinot Noir

If you love Riesling for its cut and its lemon-and-stone tension, Arinto is the Portuguese white you have been missing. Same electric acidity, a fraction of the hype.

Drinks like a dry, high-acid Riesling built for the table and the cellar

If you drink Sauvignon Blanc for the cut, Assyrtiko gives you more of it — bone-dry, high-acid, and tasting faintly of sea salt off a volcanic island.

Drinks like a crisp, saline white with the cut of Sauvignon Blanc and the mineral spine of Chablis

Baga is thin-skinned, fiercely tannic, bracingly acidic, and capable of aging for decades — so good it gets compared to Barolo's Nebbiolo. It's also one of Portugal's great overlooked reds.

Drinks like nebbiolo — high acid, fierce tannin, built to age

Bical is a high-acid Portuguese white with the body of an oaked Chardonnay and the staying power of Riesling. If you want texture without the tropical fatigue, this is the swap.

Drinks like a lees-aged Chablis with a Portuguese accent

If you love Syrah for its black pepper and savory backbone but not the price, drink Blaufränkisch. Austria's signature red gives you the same dark fruit and spice with brighter acid and a lower ticket.

Drinks like a savory, high-acid, peppery red between Syrah and Cabernet Franc — structured but built for the table.

If you love Malbec for its dark color and easy fruit but wish it had more spine, Bobal is the bottle to reach for — a high-acid Spanish red that used to fill tankers and now fills serious glasses.

Drinks like malbec with the volume turned down and the acidity turned up

Bonarda is Argentina's second most-planted red, and it costs a fraction of what its plush, dark fruit should. If you drink Merlot for the softness, this is the switch.

Drinks like soft, plush, dark-fruited Merlot for less

A rare Central Coast red that tastes of white pepper and cranberry, and carries a name that lies twice over. It is not Cabernet, and nobody is certain what it actually is.

Drinks like a peppery, lightly chilled Syrah with the weight and translucence of Pinot Noir

Cannonau is Grenache with a Sardinian accent: the same grape Spain calls Garnacha, grown in isolation into something more savory, and sold for a fraction of the fame.

Drinks like grenache with a Sardinian accent: juicy red fruit, dried herbs, and a mineral grip

Carignan was planted for volume, then torn out by the hectare. The gnarled old vines that survived make one of the Mediterranean's best-value bold reds — dark, brambly, and built on acid.

Drinks like old-vine Zinfandel with more acid and a savory, herbal edge

Carmenère is the Bordeaux grape France nearly lost and Chile spent a century growing by accident. If you like Merlot, this is the plusher, herb-streaked bottle you should be drinking instead.

Drinks like a plush Merlot with a savory, herbal edge

Carricante is the high-acid, mineral white grown on the slopes of Mount Etna, and it rewards a cellar the way great Riesling does. If you chase tension and length in white wine, this is where to look next.

Drinks like a bone-dry volcanic white with the nerve of dry Riesling and the salinity of Chablis

If you reach for Merlot because it's soft, red-fruited, and easy, Castelão does the same job with more savory character and a smaller bill.

Drinks like an easygoing, earthy Merlot with a savory Portuguese streak.

Catarratto is the most-planted white grape in Sicily, and for a century it hid inside bulk vats and Marsala. Grown for flavor instead of volume, it makes a crisp, lemony white that costs less than the Pinot Grigio it can replace.

Drinks like a leaner, more savory Pinot Grigio with an actual citrus spine and a whisper of Mediterranean herb.

Cesanese is the peppery, dark-fruited red the Romans have kept mostly to themselves. If you love Syrah's savory side but not its weight, start here.

Drinks like a lighter, softer Syrah with the pepper turned up

If you love Pinot Noir but flinch at the price, Cinsault is the light, perfumed red that gets you most of the way there for a fraction of the cost.

Drinks like a light, perfumed red you can chill on a warm evening.

If you drink Pinot Grigio for its ease, Coda di Volpe gives you the same low-effort white with more to say: soft, round, and finished with bitter almond.

Drinks like a rounder, softer Pinot Grigio that trades bite for an almond finish

Counoise is the grape most Châteauneuf-du-Pape drinkers have swallowed without knowing it — a light, peppery red that hums with acidity. On its own, it's one of the freshest reds the southern Rhône makes.

Drinks like a light, high-acid red with Pinot Noir's freshness and a crack of black pepper on top

In a forgotten corner of Lombardy, three native grapes make rustic, lightly fizzy reds — and one stubborn legend, Lino Maga, turned them into a cult wine called Barbacarlo.

Drinks like a peppery, rustic cross of Barbera and Gamay

Duras is a savory, black-peppered red from Gaillac in Southwest France — a structured, spice-driven bottle for anyone who reaches for Syrah. And no, it has nothing to do with the Côtes de Duras appellation.

Drinks like peppery, structured Syrah from Southwest France

Once the most-planted grape in Germany and possibly the oldest white in Europe, Elbling has shrunk to a sliver of the Upper Mosel. Tart, electric, and barely exported — the ultimate Old-World underdog.

Drinks like a featherweight Muscadet or a bone-dry, saline Vinho Verde

If you love a textured, oak-kissed white and resent what white Burgundy now costs, Encruzado is the grape to know. It is Portugal's most serious white, and almost nobody outside Portugal is asking for it yet.

Drinks like an oaked white Burgundy, without the Burgundy price

If you like a crisp, textural white but you're tired of paying for the Chardonnay name, Erbaluce is the swap. It gives you apple, citrus, and a spine of alpine acidity for a fraction of the fame.

Drinks like crisp, unoaked, high-acid white with mineral cut

If Pinot Grigio has stopped saying anything to you, this ancient Campanian white says more for the same money — lemon, pear, and a mineral snap from volcanic soil.

Drinks like a Pinot Grigio with more to say — brighter, with pear and a mineral edge

If you love Syrah for its pepper and savory grip but flinch at the price, Fer Servadou from Marcillac gives you the same dark, herbal snap for a fraction of the outlay.

Drinks like a leaner, more savory Syrah with an iron edge and a peppery snap

Fiano is a 2,000-year-old Italian white with the acidity of a grape half its age — nutty, saline, and ageworthy. Why it's the underdog white to know, plus the sparkling curveball that's rewriting what it can be, and where to buy.

Everyone drives north for Barolo and Brunello. Campania, in the shadow of Vesuvius, makes a red as serious as either and a white that ages for a decade — for half the money and none of the hype.

Frappato is a pale, floral, low-tannin Sicilian red you can chill in July. If you love Pinot Noir but not its price, this is the bottle to reach for.

Drinks like drinks like a chilled, wild-strawberry Pinot Noir with a Sicilian accent.

Freisa is the pale, perfumed Piedmontese red that smells of wild strawberry and rose and shares a bloodline with Nebbiolo. If you like Pinot Noir but want more grip and a lower price, start here.

Drinks like a firmer, wilder Pinot Noir

If you like Sauvignon Blanc but want less grass and more salt, drink Friulano — a dry, pear-and-almond white from northeast Italy that a courtroom forced to change its name.

Drinks like old-World Sauvignon Blanc with the green edge sanded off — softer, saltier, finished with a twist of bitter almond.

Hungary's most famous grape spent centuries behind sweet Tokaji. The dry version is the reason to pay attention: high-acid, smoky, and built to age.

Drinks like a bone-dry, smoky Riesling

If you like Pinot Noir for its lightness and grip rather than its price, Gaglioppo is the Calabrian red you have been missing: pale, high-acid, savory, and a fraction of the cost.

Drinks like pinot Noir with a savory, herbal streak; sometimes a lighter Nebbiolo

Nearly extinct fifty years ago, Godello is now one of Spain's most exciting whites — a textural, mineral Galician grape that drinks like white Burgundy for a fraction of the price.

Drinks like a textural white Burgundy or an unoaked, mineral Chardonnay

Forget sun-baked Rioja for a moment. In the green, rainy northwest of Spain, two nearly-extinct grapes — Godello and Mencía — came back from the brink to make some of the country's most elegant, best-value wine.

If you want a white with the weight and structure of a good Chardonnay but a smoky, saline edge instead of vanilla, Greco di Tufo is the bottle. It is one of southern Italy's few whites built to age.

Drinks like a leaner, saltier white Burgundy with a phenolic bite

Pale as a rosé, light as Pinot Noir, and more tannic than either has any right to be. Grignolino is Piedmont's contrarian light red — the one that argues with you.

Drinks like pinot Noir with a firmer handshake

Grillo spent a century hiding inside fortified Marsala. Freed as a dry still white, it gives you Sicilian citrus, green almond, and sea salt for the price of a middling Pinot Grigio.

Drinks like drinks like a rounder, saltier Sauvignon Blanc

For a century Grolleau made cheap pink wine and took the blame for it. A handful of Loire growers are now bottling it as a fresh, chillable red, and that is the version worth chasing.

Drinks like a light, chillable Loire red in the orbit of a cool-climate Pinot Noir or a Loire Gamay.

Grüner Veltliner is the crisp, high-acid white to reach for when Sauvignon Blanc starts to bore you — same zip, but with a twist of white pepper and a mineral spine no supermarket Sauvignon can match.

Drinks like a crisp, peppery white with Sauvignon Blanc's zip and a stony spine that carries food better than most

If you love the perfume of Gewürztraminer but not the weight, Hárslevelű is the dry white to chase — lime blossom and honey with acidity that keeps it upright.

Drinks like an aromatic dry white with the floral lift of Gewürztraminer but real acidity holding it up

If you like Sauvignon Blanc for its bite, Hondarrabi Zuri gives you the same electric acidity with a lick of sea salt and a faint spritz, usually under 11% alcohol.

Drinks like a crisp, low-alcohol white with a faint spritz and a lick of sea salt

Juhfark is a high-acid white grown on a single Hungarian volcano, and the good bottles stay fresh for a decade. If you love Riesling for its tension and stony bite, this is the rarer, smokier cousin worth hunting.

Drinks like a fiercely mineral, smoke-streaked white with Riesling's nervy tension and a stony, almost salty grip

If you love Pinot Noir but not its price, Kadarka is the light, spicy Hungarian red worth chasing. It gave Bull's Blood its backbone and rarely costs more than a mid-shelf bottle.

Drinks like pinot Noir with a peppery, paprika edge

Albania makes wine from native grapes almost no one outside the Balkans has tasted — Kallmet, Shesh, Pulës, Vlosh. With near-zero exports, it may be the last truly undiscovered corner of the wine world.

Drinks like a perfumed, high-acid Carpathian red — Kadarka by another name

If you love the perfume of Gewurztraminer but not the sweetness, Kisi is the dry aromatic white worth chasing — floral and honeyed, often made in clay.

Drinks like an aromatic white that grew a skin and went bone-dry — Gewurztraminer's perfume with grip instead of sugar.

Lagrein is a deep, tannic red from the Italian Alps that gives you Cabernet's weight and structure with a cooler, more mineral edge — usually for less money.

Drinks like a cooler, more mineral cousin of Syrah — dark and structured, but with an Alpine tension Cabernet rarely shows

If you love Syrah for its savory, herb-and-pepper side more than its muscle, Limnio is the older, quieter answer — a Greek red the ancients were drinking while Rhône Syrah was still centuries off.

Drinks like a savory, herb-brushed Syrah with less weight and more lift

If you love Pinot Noir but resent the price, Listán Negro is the light, smoky, high-acid red hiding on a chain of Atlantic volcanoes — grown on ungrafted vines older than most wine regions.

Drinks like a smoky, high-acid Pinot Noir grown on the side of a volcano

If you drink Sauvignon Blanc for the bright, aromatic snap, Loureiro gives you the same lift with a floral streak Sauvignon rarely reaches, usually for less money.

Drinks like a crisp, floral coastal white built for warm afternoons

Magliocco is a thick-skinned Calabrian red built on black fruit, spice, and firm tannin. If you drink Syrah for its savory grip, this is the underdog to chase.

Drinks like a savory, peppery Syrah with southern Italian grip

If you love the perfume of Gewurztraminer but not the weight, Malagousia is the aromatic white you have been missing. Peach, jasmine, and citrus, with acidity Gewurztraminer usually forgets.

Drinks like a fuller-bodied aromatic dry white, floral like Gewurztraminer but with fresher acidity and no residual sweetness

Most people meet Mavrodaphne as a sweet, Port-like dessert red. The news is the dry version — a dark, savory table wine that stands in for Syrah at a lower price.

Drinks like a savory, sun-baked stand-in for Syrah when dry; a Port alternative when sweet.

Mencía was nearly written off as a producer of thin, jammy plonk. Then a handful of growers found old vines on steep slate slopes — and turned it into one of Spain's most elegant, fragrant reds.

Drinks like a fragrant, mineral Pinot Noir or Cru Beaujolais

If you drink Syrah for the black pepper and the savory edge, Mondeuse gives you both from a colder mountain and a lower price.

Drinks like a cool-climate Syrah with the volume down and the acid up.

Love Gewürztraminer's rose-petal perfume but not the spelling, the sweetness roulette, or the Alsace price? Moschofilero gives you the same aromatics, bone-dry, from the high plateaus of Greece.

Drinks like a bone-dry Gewürztraminer — rose petal and citrus, but fresher

If you like the perfume of Gewürztraminer but not the weight, Mtsvane is the drier, greener answer from eastern Georgia — floral, quince-scented, and built for the table.

Drinks like gewürztraminer's perfume with a drier, greener, more savory edge

Piedmont is red wine country, and its best-kept secret is white. Nascetta gives you the weight and depth of a serious Chardonnay without the oak, the price, or the crowd.

Drinks like an unoaked white with the weight of white Burgundy and the salt of a coastal Greek white

Négrette is the perfumed, low-tannin red of Fronton, just north of Toulouse. If you love Pinot Noir for its lift and its lightness, this is the swap almost nobody has told you about.

Drinks like aromatic, low-tannin light red like Pinot Noir, but more floral

On the slopes of Europe's most active volcano grow some of Italy's most thrilling reds — pale, perfumed, and ageworthy, often from ungrafted vines older than your grandparents. Meet Nerello Mascalese.

Drinks like high-altitude Pinot Noir or red Burgundy

País is the grape Chile spent a century trying to forget, and it makes some of the freshest, cheapest light reds you can pour right now. If you drink Pinot Noir or Beaujolais, this is your next bottle.

Drinks like a rustic, old-vine Pinot Noir or Gamay

In the Pyrenean foothills of Aragón, three native grapes were nearly farmed out of existence by international varieties. Parraleta, Moristel, and Alcañón are the survivors worth seeking.

Drinks like a high-acid Mediterranean red — a lighter Mencía or a Cru Beaujolais

If you drink Pinot Grigio for the crisp and the citrus, Passerina gives you more of both for less money. It is central Italy's bright, saline coastal white, hiding in plain sight.

Drinks like crisp, saline Pinot Grigio with more citrus zip

Pecorino is a crisp, mineral Italian white with real structure — and no, it has nothing to do with the cheese. If you drink Pinot Grigio for the refreshment but wish it had more to say, this is the swap.

Drinks like a crisp Italian white with more grip and structure than Pinot Grigio.

Pelaverga is a pale, light-bodied Piedmont red with a distinct crack of white pepper. It is the wine to reach for when Pinot Noir has priced itself out of your week.

Drinks like a lighter, peppery Pinot Noir you serve with a slight chill

Perricone is the tannic, savory Sicilian red that growers nearly abandoned. It gives you Zinfandel's dark-fruit weight without the sugar-jam finish.

Drinks like a leaner, more savory Zinfandel with the jam turned down and the grip turned up

Piedirosso is a light, savory red from the volcanic soils around Naples — bright red fruit, an iron edge, and gentle tannin. If you like Pinot Noir but not its price, this is the bottle to chase.

Drinks like light, savory, mineral Pinot Noir with a volcanic edge

Pignolo is a dense, deeply tannic red from northeast Italy that came within a few vines of extinction. If you love a structured, ageworthy Cabernet, this is the underdog worth chasing.

Drinks like a dense, deeply tannic Friulian red built for the cellar, the northern-Italian answer to a serious Cabernet.

If you love Pinot Noir but want it lighter, spicier, and a few dollars smarter, Pineau d'Aunis is the pale Loire red that pours cold and tastes of cracked white pepper.

Drinks like a peppery, featherweight Loire red you chill down and drink like Pinot Noir

South Africa's signature grape is the most unfairly maligned red in the wine world. A 1925 crossing with a bad reputation — and, in the right hands, a smoky, structured red worth defending.

Drinks like a smoky Syrah crossed with a brambly Zinfandel

If you love Zinfandel, you owe its Croatian cousin a look. Plavac Mali is the offspring of Zinfandel and an old island grape, and it drinks bolder, darker, and often cheaper.

Drinks like a ripe, high-alcohol Zinfandel or Primitivo

Pošip is the textural, saline Croatian white that gives you Chardonnay's body and Viognier's perfume without the price or the oak fatigue. Start on the island of Korčula and work outward.

Drinks like a textural Chardonnay or a Mediterranean white

Poulsard is the palest serious red in France — a translucent, low-tannin Jura wine that tastes of strawberry and forest floor. If you love Pinot Noir, this is the next door to open.

Drinks like a paler, wilder Pinot Noir

If you like Pinot Noir for its red fruit and high acid, León's Prieto Picudo gives you the same lift with more grip and a lower price.

Drinks like a firmer, wilder Pinot Noir with more grip

If you love Nebbiolo for its tannin and acid, Ramisco is the ungrafted, sand-grown red from the Atlantic coast that gives you the same spine for a fraction of the fame.

Drinks like a leaner, salt-washed Barolo grown on a beach

Refosco is a deep, savory Friulian red that pours plum and violet over a spine of bright acid. If you like Cabernet but want more energy and a lower price, start here.

Drinks like a dark, savory, high-acid red built for the table

If you drink Pinot Grigio for something crisp and dry, Ribolla Gialla gives you more of everything: sharper acid, real citrus, and a second life as one of Italy's most talked-about orange wines.

Drinks like a lean, high-acid alpine white — citrus and pith when made clean, nutty and textured when made on the skins.

If you drink Pinot Grigio for the crisp, dry, food-friendly part, Rkatsiteli gives you that plus a spine of acid and a lineage older than written language.

Drinks like crisp, high-acid, food-friendly white; amber qvevri versions turn nutty and grippy

If you drink Sauvignon Blanc for the zip and the lemon, Robola gives you the same tension with wet limestone underneath. It grows on one Greek island, on rock so bare the Italians called it wine of the stones.

Drinks like sauvignon Blanc traded its grassy edge for wet limestone and a squeeze of lemon

Roditis is a pink-skinned Greek grape that makes a crisp, lemony white for less than most Pinot Grigio. From old vines above Patras, it has more grip than the bottle it replaces.

Drinks like pinot Grigio with more grip

If you love Pinot Noir for its perfume and its featherweight grip, Rossese di Dolceacqua gives you the same pleasures from a cliffside corner of the Italian Riviera almost nobody stocks.

Drinks like pinot Noir with a Mediterranean tan and a handful of wild herbs

If you drink Chardonnay for weight and texture, Rotgipfler gives you both without the oak — a rich, spiced Austrian white grown on barely 110 hectares worldwide.

Drinks like a full-bodied unoaked white with the weight of Chardonnay and the spice of Grüner Veltliner

If you love Pinot Noir for its perfume and light touch, Ruchè is the Piedmont underdog you haven't met — floral, peppered, and soft-tannined enough to drink young.

Drinks like a perfumed, light-bodied Piedmont red — Pinot Noir's aromatic cousin, floral and soft-tannined

If you love Pinot Noir for its lightness and perfume but not its price, Rufete is the Spanish grape to chase. It is pale, floral, and grown on granite mountainsides almost nobody outside Salamanca has tasted.

Drinks like a high-altitude Spanish cousin of village Pinot Noir — pale, perfumed, and built on acidity rather than weight.

From the Umbrian hill town of Montefalco comes the most tannic grape in the world — a near-black, age-defying red that spent centuries as a sweet communion wine before going dry.

Drinks like a young Barolo or Tannat, but even more tannic

If you love Pinot Noir but not its price, Sankt Laurent is the bottle to chase. It shares Pinot's blood, its silk, and its dark cherry, for a fraction of the money.

Drinks like a darker, more savory Pinot Noir

The oldest wine country on earth makes a red grape with crimson flesh — just like Alicante Bouschet. If you've never had a Georgian wine, you've been missing 8,000 years of the story.

Drinks like malbec with a wild, savory edge

Savatiano spent decades as the grape behind cheap retsina. Old-vine, unresinated bottlings from Attica now make one of the better-value textural whites you can buy.

Drinks like a textural, faintly herbal dry white with more weight than zip

Schiava is the most-planted red in Italy's German-speaking Alps — pale, light, low-tannin, and almost absurdly easy to drink. It also has one of the most curious names in wine.

Drinks like a featherweight Pinot Noir or chilled Beaujolais

If you love the black-pepper snap of Syrah, Schioppettino gives you the same compound with more lift and a fraction of the fame. It came back from about 70 surviving vines.

Drinks like a leaner, higher-acid northern-Rhone Syrah with the volume turned down and the pepper turned up

Most people think Madeira is sweet. Sercial is its bone-dry opposite — electric, citrusy, and so high in acidity it can age for a century or more. Here's what Sercial Madeira tastes like, how it differs from the sweet styles, and the bottles to start with.

Drinks like a bone-dry, electric Fino sherry (but immortal)

A pale, low-tannin red from North Macedonia that farmers nearly abandoned. It survived because a handful of growers refused to pull the vines.

Drinks like a pale, chillable Pinot Noir

Catalonia spent forty years pulling Sumoll out of the ground. The growers who kept it now make one of Spain's most convincing answers to Pinot Noir.

Drinks like a pale, high-acid light red you should chill — where a village Pinot Noir or a serious Gamay lives

If you love Cabernet for its backbone and dark fruit, Tannat gives you more of both for less money. Uruguay turned a punishing French grape into its national red.

Drinks like a darker, more muscular Cabernet Sauvignon

If you love aromatic whites but find Moscato too sweet and Gewürztraminer too heavy, Temjanika is the dry Balkan Muscat cousin you have been missing.

Drinks like a dry Muscat or a fresher Gewürztraminer

Teroldego is a native of the Italian Alps that makes deeply colored, dark-fruited reds with real ageing potential — from a single tiny plain most wine drinkers have never heard of.

Drinks like syrah or a dark, savory Zinfandel

If you love a rich, textural white but want something with more spine than most Chardonnay, Timorasso is the bottle to chase. It nearly disappeared, and it drinks like it has something to prove.

Drinks like a white Burgundy with more grip and a saltier finish

Torrontés smells like a dessert wine and drinks bone dry. It is Argentina's signature white, and the best of it comes from vineyards climbing toward 10,000 feet.

Drinks like a dry Gewürztraminer with brighter acidity and a lighter step — all the perfume, none of the weight.

Touriga Nacional is the backbone of great Port — but the secret is what it does as a dry red: powerful, violet-scented, age-worthy, and still a fraction of the price of the famous names it rivals.

Drinks like cabernet Sauvignon with a violet, floral lift

If you drink Chardonnay for its weight and orchard-fruit roundness, Treixadura gives you the same body from Galicia for a fraction of the ask.

Drinks like an unoaked white Burgundy with more grip

If you drink Pinot Noir for its lightness and lift, Trepat is the underdog worth chasing — a pale, high-acid Catalan red that only recently started showing up as a still wine instead of a splash of color in rosé Cava.

Drinks like pinot Noir

Trincadeira is a dark, peppery, herb-streaked red from Portugal's Alentejo. If you love Syrah for its savory bite, this is the underdog that gives you the same for less.

Drinks like savory, peppery Syrah

Trousseau is the pale, savory, light-bodied red that natural-wine lovers chase across the Jura. Here's the twist: it's the same grape Portugal has grown for centuries under the name Bastardo.

Drinks like a pale, savory, wild-edged Pinot Noir

A grape that nearly vanished after phylloxera, revived in the 1970s to become Spain's favorite white. Zesty, herbal, and built for the table — Rueda's Verdejo is the everyday underdog.

Drinks like a Spanish Sauvignon Blanc — zesty and herbal, with a bitter-almond twist

Verdelho lives two lives: a tangy, medium-dry fortified Madeira and a dry still white full of lime and tropical fruit. The still white is the one to reach for if you drink Sauvignon Blanc.

Drinks like a dry white with Sauvignon Blanc's zip but riper tropical fruit and a fuller body

Italy's most serious native white hides in plain sight. Verdicchio gives you citrus, a savory almond finish, and enough acidity to age a decade for the price of a weeknight bottle.

Drinks like a crisp, textural white with a savory almond finish

Vinhão is a near-black, bracingly tart red from Vinho Verde, poured cold and built on acid instead of weight. If you want Syrah's color and pepper without the heat and heft, this is the contrarian's answer.

Drinks like syrah's ink and pepper with the acid snap of a wine half its color, served cold

If you drink Sauvignon Blanc for the crisp, high-acid snap but you're tired of the grassy note, Vitovska gives you the same electricity with sea salt and stone instead.

Drinks like a leaner, saltier Sauvignon Blanc with the grass swapped for stone

Vranec is the dark, full-bodied red that North Macedonia built its wine identity on. If you drink Cabernet for the weight and the black fruit, this is the same appetite for less money.

Drinks like a bold, inky Cabernet or Syrah

There is a serious white hiding inside your Cava. Poured still, Xarel·lo gives you the weight, texture, and aging you look for in white Burgundy, at a fraction of the price.

Drinks like a textured, unoaked white Burgundy or a serious Chardonnay

Xinomavro is tannic, high-acid, and so ageworthy that wine pros compare it to Barolo. It's also Greek, hard to pronounce, and absurdly underpriced — which is exactly why you should be drinking it.

Drinks like nebbiolo — the 'Greek Barolo,' tar and roses

Greece has made wine for four thousand years and still sells it for a fraction of what France charges. Its two great reds — Xinomavro and Agiorgitiko — are among the best-value serious bottles in the world.

Zibibbo is Muscat of Alexandria grown on a windblown volcanic island closer to Tunisia than to Palermo. It smells like a fistful of orange blossom and finishes with sea salt.

Drinks like an aromatic white with the perfume of Moscato but a drier, saltier, sun-baked finish

If you love a full-bodied Chardonnay but want more spice and less sameness, Zierfandler is the Austrian white to chase. It's rich, ageworthy, and almost nobody outside Gumpoldskirchen has heard of it.

Drinks like a weighty, spiced Chardonnay with more nerve and a longer memory