Which do you prefer? “Both” is not an option — no easy way out here.
Feel free to vote along lines of place of origin or style — whichever you deem to be more important in the New World vs. Old World dichotomy.
No need to define “New World” or “Old World” — just use your own definition.
If you don’t ascribe to the terms “old world” and “new world” then either ignore this poll, or vote along the lines of what you think I mean in using those terms; if you’d rather be difficult about it, and say you don’t know what I mean, then don’t vote.
It’ll be interesting to see how this shakes-out. My guess: old world wins, but who knows — we could have some surprising results! The more people who vote the better!
New World for me. In a “reverse palate shift” I started out drinking pretty much all old-world wines. Then I moved to California, and found that visiting the places, and meeting the people behind the wines was much more compelling than exploring regions through a wine shop. Then one day I went back to some of my old-world favorites and found they all seemed to taste like dirt and the wrong end of the horse.
But I’m not militant about it. I still enjoy some Rhônes, Sauternes, Port, as well as German & Alsatian whites, and I think in the low-end (sub-$15) France pretty much beats CA hands-down.
I enjoy examples of both, of course, but when push comes to shove, I’ll take the fruit. Also, New World tends to be less expensive for the quality in the bottle, and budget is a major consideration for me.
I guess I drink new world cab most. I drink more Oregon pinot than Burgundy, but it’s getting close. I prefer old world syrah, merlot, and chardonnay. I’d probably lean to new world sauvignon blanc. Old world riesling. Old world sangiovese and tempranillo. Old world grenache, although there are some significant new world competition. By consumption I’m probably 50%. Given unlimited funds though…I’d probably buy more old-world bottles than new.
I thought I was a New World guy what with my icewine addiction and all but was shocked to see that when taking into account my entire sweet wine collection, I actually have more Old World than New World wines in there.
Of course, this does make sense as the Old World has been making sweet wines of various different styles for a lot longer than the New World has been making icewines, late harvests and botrytised wines.
Burgundy and MSR are my favorite wine regions so I voted old world but there are some excellent new world wines I like. My favorite producer these days is Clos Saron which is here in California but the wines are very “old world” in style.
I’d break that down by what price range we’re talking about. In the $20-$50 range, which is probably where most of us drink at least once a week, I agree with Adam. There are a lot of old world wines I rarely or no longer drink because they’ve exceeded that range and to my tastes probably shouldn’t have, and a lot of killer juice can be found in CA for $20-$35 (especially for lovers of Syrah). Sub-$15 is a different story. There are some good CA wines to be found in that range but too many tend to taste spoofed - loaded with RS and oak tannins i.e. aimed at a totally different market. You don’t get that in a lot of low-end French wines from Rhône, Vin de Pays, Loire, etc.
Your inventory is not necessarily an indicator of your drinking or preference. Because old world wines typically require a lot more age, you can do the majority of your drinking in new world wines at the same time that the majority of your storage is old world wines, particularly if you are relatively newer to collecting wines.
That same effect appears in other ways: for example, you may drink a lot of whites and roses, yet have few in your storage, because you tend to drink them much sooner after you buy them than you do red wines, or often you probably don’t put them into storage in the first place. I drink zinfandel fairly often, but my storage quantity is usually low, because I don’t tend to keep them for a long time. I drink Barolo less often than zinfandel, yet I have quite a lot of Barolo in storage, waiting to reach maturity.
Anyways, just a side note about drinking and preference versus what CellarTracker tells you that you have in your cellar.
As far as the poll, I never quite understand the constant need on this board to be so either/or about wine, or to band together in groups that champion one thing in opposition to the other, as though wine were like college football or party politics. To me, diversity and variety are one of the greatest things about wine, and I love good wines from everywhere it is made.
Because place of “origin” has no consistent real relationship to “style” this is an difficult question to address. Which of these clarets are old-world - Smith Haut Lafitte, Corison, Arnot-Roberts, or Ridge Monte Bello. How about Leoville -Las-Cases, new world or old? Lynch Bages?
Let’s go to Pinot - Ceritas - new world or old? Rhys? Copain?
To get a meaningful answer, I think we need a more precise poll quesiton.