One of the richest pleasures i have found in wine has been the periodic, unexpected moments where my understanding of the basic tenets of wine culture come into sharp, dramatic focus and “received wisdom” transitions from an abstract idea into direct experiential knowledge. These are the “wine epiphanies” and yesterday, at a small French bistro in Atlanta (Atmosphere), I had my fourth.
My wife and I sat down for lunch and ordered two glasses of wine, a 2013 Cherrier Sancerre and a Pegau blanc (2013 CdR, I think; the list is vague), a beet & chèvre tart and moules frite. We tell the waiter we’ll be sharing everything.
There wines arrive and we both taste each. The Sancerre is refreshing, tropical fruit with a nice tart finish. The Pegau is in comparison fruitless, extremely dry, a bit watery and with a bitter aftertaste. Wife wrinkles her nose and says “flat champagne.” I say “Very French.” (We live in California! That’s code for “don’t open it when the girlfriends come over.”) Equipped with with book-learned bravado, I say “we can come back to this one later.”
It’s mid-afternoon and the restaurant is almost empty, so the food arrives quickly and we’re only halfway through a shared levain and the Sancerre when all at once the lunch arrives The tart is mostly chèvre with dill on puff pastry. The mussels are plump, inviting, and piled high in a custard-colored white wine and cream sauce awash in soft garlic slices and melted butter. The levain goes straight into the broth and the flavor is exceptional; it plays equally well as a seasoning for the meat and bread as it does on the spoon alone.
We are getting rolling on the mussels and bread (the frites are a pass) and then it’s time for another taste of the wines.
This time, it’s a totally different story. The Pegau blanc refreshes the palate beautifully, with mineral water freshness, a touch of drying tannin, and a hint of licorice on the finish. Its 2pm, I’m going to be driving home, and am working hard not to kill the glass.
Back to the Sancerre. It’s a disaster. The fruit is jarring and unrecognizable and the acid screeches.
For a minute, I’m scratching my head. What happened? I don’t recognize the wines. I double check to see if the glasses got switched. Nope. I check in with the wife. Same thing for her.
Of course, it’s the food. I still have to double check the effect a few times and yup it’s the same.
The rest of the day, every few hours, it keeps coming back to me. That was crazy. It’s like the wines totally changed in a matter of minutes. But they didn’t. I did.
I’m starting to obsess about this. What does it mean for all of the wines that I have tasted in the past and passed judgement on? What does it mean for what I should drink tonight? Or buy tomorrow?
I honestly don’t know how to answer these questions and feel that the small number of years that I have spent reading about and tasting wines from around the world leave me entirely unable to address.
I cannot avoid recalling the moments, multiplying in my memory now, when a glass of wine I had embraced was set aside during a meal as suddenly unappealing. Or the wines which I have panned after tasting them alone.
As an American, I learned early “red wine with steak, white wine with fish” and “the somm can recommend a wine to go with your entree.” I have always known in the abstract that pairing matters but, to be blunt, it has not held any more meaning or nuance than the advice that a well-dressed man’s socks should match either his slacks or his shoes. The underlying meaning and logic is totally opaque.
We tend to think of epiphanies as enlightening, but this experience was largely the opposite. Because while I have a new and stark awareness of how pairing effects the wine experience, I now have much less confidence in my own knowledge of how to go about enjoying wine. I am headed down a path that for the moment seems dark and unknown. At the same time, I know that this experience, and what will follow, will take on a new dimension of meaning and insight.
The fact that my wife shared the experience, with the same result, suggests that this experience could be easily reproduced. Undoubtedly it is already a basic part of formal wine education programs and I have just rediscovered it by happenstance. But as is typical for a new convert, post-epiphany, I feel compelled to share the “religion” with you and hopefully advance my exploration through a conversation here.
I invite those who are knowledgable to suggest interesting pairing exercises and related insights (rules of pairing?) in this thread.
Cheers and thanks for reading the long post
![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}