Restaurants : The Wine List

Looking like a work-in-progress, the World Cafe’s two-page list uses two formats: vintage dates on one sheet, no vintage dates on the other. With a menu that includes spicy foods from the Far East and the Caribbean, as well as pizza and pasta, you’d expect a more varied wine list.

Instead, it’s basic boilerplate: All of the 16 white wines are either Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc--no Gewurztraminer or Riesling to marry with the spicy dishes. There’s just one Zinfandel for the pizza, one Pinot Noir for the seafood, one Chianti (and a mediocre one at that) for the pasta.

But there is good wine, and the prices are generally fair. Good values include Ferrari-Carano Fume Blanc, $19; Cuvaison Chardonnay, $25; Fetzer Mendocino Cabernet Sauvignon, $22, and 1985 Freemark Abbey Chardonnay, $30.