Sherry is the latest thing your grandparents loved that’s come back into fashion. “Like all trends, it’s sort of a repeat of something that has been a part of our history. Now it’s like the hip thing, it seems to have come almost from nowhere,’’ says PAGU wine steward Larry Rubin, who oversees the Cambridge restaurant’s expansive sherry program.

Rubin says Spanish wine in general has enjoyed a huge revival over the past decade and sherry seems to be the next phase of that renaissance. So what, exactly, is a sherry? “It is a fortified wine, meaning that at some point in its process, a higher percent alcohol was added to the lower percent wine. But then it undergoes an oxidation and the amount of oxygen is what largely differentiates the sherry styles; it can be very light, refreshing and salty even, all the way to the stickiest dessert wines that are really desserts on their own,’’ says Rubin.

The expert says that most mass-produced sherry isn’t worth drinking and the “cooking sherry’’ you find in the grocery store is just garbage. However, well made sherries are becoming more widely available, both on restaurant menus and in wine shops, where you will want an expert to take you through the seven different varieties, which range from dry and crisp to very sweet: Manzanilla, Fino, Amontillado, Palo Cortado, Oloroso, Cream and Pedro Ximénez, or PX for short.

If you are wondering what to serve with sherry, that depends on the type of course, but there is a strong tradition of tapas and sherry, and Rubin says the smokiness of la plancha dishes can make a fine pairing. You’ll also find sherry used as an ingredient in cocktails, like PAGU’s Bucket List, which combines Oloroso sherry with sake, rum, and smoked ice. Rubin’s favorite way to enjoy the drink is the simplest, “I really like serving it on its own, it has a startling complexity.’’

PAGU310 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge 617-945-9290, www.gopagu.com

CATHERINE SMART