IT’S EARLY ON A THURSDAY EVENING at Vintage Wine Shop in Reno, and patrons are just settling down to a flight of four wines and platters of dainty noshes to accompany them. The amber-hued room is a portrait of oenophilia at its most decorous: A vineyard representative makes his way quietly among the tables, thoughtfully answering questions, and the sound of murmured conversation drifts up toward high ceilings hung with chandeliers and wrought iron ornaments.

This decidedly languorous, Old-World atmosphere is interrupted by two markers that signal that this tasting is, in fact, a thoroughly contemporary affair. The first is the sushi, offered alongside the more traditional bread-and-cheese plates; the second is the small plastic wine card that’s resting near each customer’s place setting, never far from reach. At Vintage, customers serve themselves by slipping a pre-paid credit card into the steel hull of an Enomatic wine dispenser, to create a personalized tasting. Opened bottles stay drinkable for weeks courtesy of a nitrogen displacement system that prevents oxidation, and Vintage owner Dawn Ligon says that customer response to this high-tech operation has been “Awesome; people love it.”

Welcome to Reno’s new wine scene, where wine shop owners are kept busy meeting the rising demands of their growing, and increasingly sophisticated, consumer base. Wine tastings at local shops, winemaker dinners at restaurants, and events such as the monthly Riverwalk Wine Walk mean that area wine enthusiasts don’t have to look far for a bottle to taste, and someone to talk to or something new to learn about wine.

Ligon, who opened Vintage in December of 2005, says that this burgeoning scene is partly driven, as so many U.S. trends are, by the spending power of baby boomers.

“I think a lot of this is the baby boomers, wanting to have a bar to go to and not have it be only 25 year olds there,” she says. “I’m 42; I used to go out to bars, and I felt like the ‘cool old lady.’ I wanted some place to go for me. I think that the interest in wines is because of the boomers wanting to go out, and choosing wine bars to be their place to go.”

Young scene

It’s not just the boomers who are enjoying Reno’s wine renaissance. Downtown on First Street, Jungle Vino is catering to a younger crowd. The patrons there may not have $50 to drop on a single bottle, but they are nonetheless eager to refine their palates and educate themselves. According to manager Ty Martin, Jungle Vino's wine list reflects its clientele's interest in accessibility.

"We have 35 to 40 wines by the glass, with a few bottle selections," he says. "We have a great group of regulars who are really into trying to learn about all this."

A self-proclaimed "cocktail guy," Martin is relatively new to the wine scene himself and says he understands the enthusiasm of the recently converted. With so much to learn, and so many local businesses now catering to wine hobbyists, a Reno oenophile need never be bored.

"There are people coming out of the woodwork who have always been into wine," he says. "But before there was nothing for them in Reno; now there is. It's such a great drink socially, because everybody is going to taste something different in a bottle and want to talk about that. It makes for a fun scene."

SERIOUS COLLECTORS

If Jungle Vino represents the neophyte wine enthusiast, Whispering Vine Wine is here to serve serious collectors. Open since 1998, the shop has a variable inventory but consistently carries 40 0 wines just in the $10 range, with the many more expensive labels stocked according to availability and demand.

In the five years he's worked there, general manager Brian Lalor says he's seen a marked increase in wine interest, reflected in the store's roughly 20 percent growth each year for the last four years. What accounts for this growth, he says, is a combination of factors all originating in Northern California: the ease with which people can learn about wine on the Internet , our proximity to Napa-Sonoma, and the steady migration of Bay Area residents t o Northern Nevada.

WINE DEVOTEES

People in the Reno of today apparently do know a great deal about wine, and with new knowledge comes more exacting demands. Collector Jay Short has been a wine enthusiast for 12 years and has amassed a private collection of around 400 bottles. The Reno-based attorney says that, far from feeling deprived by living in a smaller-market town, he finds Reno's offerings comparable, if not preferable, to what he sees in larger cities.

"I have another office in Las Vegas, so I spend a lot of time down there," he says. "The wine stores there have more of a retail drive. There isn't the tasting culture and atmosphere that I find in Reno. What you can get here is on a par with the biggest stores in the Bay Area, and the prices are competitive."

As he takes a contemplative sip of his wine, a small smile creeps across Short's face.

"If you love wine, Reno is a great place to live," he says. Whispering Vine customer Phil Silver echoes Short's assessment of the area's wine scene and compares it favorably not just to Vegas and the Bay Area, but to the entire western United States. A Tucson IT consultant who regularly does business here, Silver says he buys all his wine in Reno.

"Living here, you're very fortunate," he says. "This is a wine culture, this is a wine city. I think that Reno versus the rest of the West, you find a selection, a knowledge that is hard to find other places."

SIPPING SOPHISTICATES

Also hard to find, according to Vino 100's Cathy Blair, is the sincere enthusiasm that Reno's wine drinkers bring to the task of self-education and the pleasures of tasting. Vino 100 stocks 100 wines in the $25-or-less range, and Blair says her customers run the gamut from newly minted wine aficionados to lifelong collectors. Differences fall away when people come together and are reminded of what got them into wine: the joy of it.

While the typical Reno wine consumer may not have a vast personal collection on which to draw for their enjoyment, what they do have is a hometown where wine is taken seriously, tastings are widely available, and retail selection is comparable to that found in larger cities. With everything that's going on and consumer enthusiasm at an all-time high, it's tempting to say that Reno's wine culture is peaking. Washoe Wine Co. proprietor Matt Marcewicz disagrees with the notion that what we're seeing now is a temporary, trend-driven moment.

"America is finally really becoming a wine-drinking country, much more than it was in the past," he says. "The wine scene right now is exciting, it's dynamic, and it's still growing."

RESOURCES

Jungle Vino, 248 W. First St., 329-4484
L'uva Bella Wine Gallery, 13925 S. Virginia St., Unit 248, 851-1110
Vino 100, 748 South Meadows Pkwy., Ste., A6, 851-8466
Vintage Wine Shop, 6135 Lakeside Drive #117, 824-9463
Washoe Wine Co., 465 South Meadows Pkwy., 852-4414
Whispering Vine Wine , 3886 Mayberry Drive, Unit D, 787-WINE (9463)

Camille Hayes is a former food writer for the Reno Gazette-Journal.

WlNE MAKING REGIONS TO WATCH

• AMADOR COUNTY, CALIF.

Jungle Vino manager Ty Martin is enthusiastic about the wines coming from tiny gold rush towns such as Fiddletown and Plymouth, where the climate is similar to Italy's. "Native Italian grapes like Barbera perform wonderfully there," he says. Off the beaten path for most California wine lovers, Amador is inland from Napa-Sonoma, just west of Alpine County. This makes Amador an easy day trip for Reno-based wine lovers, and Martin says a visit to the area's up-and-coming vineyards is well worth the trip.

• CHILE

This South American country produces wines that are stylistically similar to the French, according to Vino 100's Cathy Blair. The availability of land and comparatively cheap labor allow the region's vintners to pass on value to customers. "Chilean wines offer an extremely high ratio of value to price," she says. "Chile produces about 20 different varietals; their No. 1 selling varietal is cabernet, and their hidden gem is Carmenere."

• AUSTRALIA

Although Australian wines, particularly Shiraz, have been known in the United States for years, Whispering Vine's Brian Lalor says the country is "still a force to be reckoned with." He attributes the wines' popularity to the wide range of prices available, anywhere from $10-$200, and a style of wine that's appealing to American consumers. "They make a new world, California style, which is a big, oaky, fruit bomb, basically. California wine drinkers like it."