(PD) - Three decades ago, I wrote a column about how complicated wine was becoming.

In 1986, wine imports to the United States were growing so fast that one bottle of every four sold in the United States came from another country.

So imagine what it must be like today, as wine imports have grown to more than one bottle in three, the number of American wineries has grown rapidly, and wineries all over the United States are creating new looks to old favorites.

The examples are so many it’s hard to know where to start.

French wines once were largely regional and based on specific varieties, with Bordeaux and Burgundy leading the pack. Today we are inundated with a lot of blended whites and reds, many of them from the Rhone Valley, as well as from regions of France that few people have ever heard of.

Italy, with its many hundreds of grape varieties, now offers us not only chianti, barolo, and pinot grigio, but the new darling of Italy, sparkling prosecco. And collectors still love their brunellos. Now Sicily, Umbria, the Veneto, and 20 other locales in Italy are offering us bargains, albeit obscure ones.

Thirty years ago we had virtually no wines from Austria, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina, and just the rudimentary first bottles from politically unstable Chile. Today we have exciting wines from all those countries. New Zealand in particular has become a bit of a superstar with many whites and reds gaining acclaim.

Now look at the changes in the U.S. wine business.

Oregon and Washington were making wines in the 1980s, sure, but both were still in relative startup mode. Washington may have been ahead in terms of overall quality then, but Oregon was making great strides with its pinot noir. Today, Oregon has won acclaim for pinot noir, but has added sterling examples of pinot gris, riesling, and pinot blanc. And Washington’s recent success with merlot and syrah has added luster to the state’s cabernet sauvignon image.

At the same time, we have seen a revolution in excellent wines from New York, Virginia, Michigan, Texas, and even Ohio, Pennsylvania and, most recently, Idaho. And now new grape varieties from upstate New York and even Minnesota are enticing new consumers.