As I pointed out in the other thread: Salt kills bitterness better than sugar.
I’d be surprised if any of us are super-tasters. And as Jancis and others pointed out, hyper taster is probably a less loaded way of naming something that really isn’t good.
I put milk in my coffee but I love spicy and hot food. And I gladly eat sour gummies as a treat at the movies (not that I’ve been to a movie in years now).
Larry- I think this was fun and interesting, keep you chin up.
The strongest correlation finding this exercise shows seems to be between WB-ers and those who like to argue.
I got the same ones 6 months ago. I tasted all of them so it seems to say I’m a super taster. Most of my kids did too - I think one of them didn’t taste one of the three. My wife didn’t taste them so I guess the kit can at least show variability from one person to another.
That said as to the poll… I drank my coffee black for 20+ years but recently usually add milk. I drink almost entirely double IPAs. I like strong and/or bitter cocktails - Boulevardier is a favorite. I like spicy food (this one is great AGPC - Purple Hippo Hot Sauce – Angry Goat Pepper Co. enjoyable on pretty much anything without totally killing other flavors… for a “10/10” try their black bison). I like tannic cabernets - I’m always disappointed by ones that are fruity without any clear tannin.
I respect Larry and Marcus. They both have an approach that works for them. My impression developed from visiting Los Ovilos last April is that it attracts crowds of casual wine tourists from LA up for the weekend. I’m guessing some of them are pretty serious about wine but often come with friends and family who are less serious like Jack in Sideways. Larry’s coffee analogy probably helps make a connection with these folks and demystifies wine. Marcus on the other hand probably doesn’t attract too many casual wine tourists taking a wrong turn off of 3rd street.
I am still trying to figure out why Larry wants to put people in boxes.
I’m now remembering that I started a similar thread about wine and coffee years ago, but I was just way less annoying in how I did it.
Well yeah, this is Wine Berserkers not Wine BestFrienders!!!
Plus Larry thrives on this shit. I have it on a good source that Larry has been heard to quit, “I definitely hit the hottest thread of the new site, it is destined for the Hall of Fame sticky and wine boards immortality. This is my open letter.”
First off, thanks to Larry for this and the coffee poll. It generated a lot of fun discussion.
But neither thread has left me with a better understanding of whether there is any association between coffee and wine preferences. The presumed link via identification of super-taster status as described in the OP seems very tenuous, if present at all. Too many vague qualifiers to know how reliable the findings were.
I’m not criticizing Larry’s poll. It’s probably impossible to do a scientifically valid poll on WB. I would like to know more about the Cornell study described in the OP. Has it been published in any sort of peer-reviewed scientific journal? What exactly did the authors study? The association between wine and coffee preferences, or coffee preferences and super-taster status, or wine preferences and super-taster status? What methods did they use? What, specifically, we’re their results? With numbers. The description in the OP contains so many vague qualifiers that it is impossible to tell if the associations are random or actually significant.
Larry, do you have a link to the report?
Boxing Helena is the most terrifying movie I’ve ever seen. Just with that picture I’ll have nightmares.
Very similar. Except I like sweet wines with high acid while disliking desserts that lack such balance. Have a hard time eating chocolate below 75-80% cocoa these day as too sweet.
How it is that I love high acid wines and pretty much hate high acid fruity/citrusy artisanal coffee is a mystery for the ages. French roast or smooth espresso drinks with milk all day, every day.
Maybe Larry could team up with a coffee roaster from Los Olivos and do a coffee and wine pairing.
Here is one example from the Cornell authors (Ms LaTour’s late husband also participated in some of the earlier work). It’s in the Journal of Advertising Research.
-Al
That’s another version of suggesting that the vast majority of people not on WB are weaker than they really are.
Like Larry’s “research”, it’s an unfair prejudice. And given international news media companies decades old understanding of “if it bleeds, it leads” it’s also probably not true. Conflict is everywhere these days, and while many of us are tired of conflict, it sells more than it repels.
Nice sleuthing Al. That’s a pretty sparse abstract and I don’t see a full text version available online. No findings or results. Just mentions 3 other studies which aren’t specifically cited.
Looks like marketing stuff with maybe not much science behind it.
But Alfert doesn’t drink black coffee…
Fu doesn’tdrink coffee…
David Bueker drinks Folgers and I drink single origin high end coffee, or lattes, or espresso, but never Folgers. However we have a remarkable correllation between producers and wines we drink.
In Larry’s tasting room he has a VERY strong correllation from casual polling in regards to the correllation between coffee beverages and wine preference. 80-90%, which means that for the four examples I just mentioned, he needs 16-18 WBers who closely correllate with the study and no one else who does not align with it. Even with the very loose questions and Larry leading people’s answers I don’t see that number here.
His assertion in that regards is that WBers are different…that panders to our egos and could even be true that it’s because this group is relatively educated in their coffee and wine decisions, but it’s absolutely remiss not to ask whether or not the polling questions at Larry’s TR are influencing the responses.
TR visitors are in a highly suggestible state. And producing questions that do not bias information is difficult and requires serious discipine to get real information. I don’t see that here.
Do I like to argue? Guilty as charged. But I really dislike backing opinions with “research” that doesn’t actually give me valid information. This thread was interesting to see how different everyones choices in beverage are, and not surprising in that way. But with regards to the allusion to palate preference for wine being relatable to coffee preference, I am as ignorant as ever. Other than that I take Larry less seriously than I did two days ago.
As I said, neither you nor anyone else on the board is likely to be a supertaster since, if you were, you would prefer what the rest of us think of as bland or tasteless food and drink. Nor would you want to be since, again, if you were, your tasting notes would be useless to the rest of us here as we would not taste the same thing you did when we were tasting the same wine. Being a supertaster is not a superpower for a wine geek who wishes to communicate with others but a virtually disqualifying drawback.
Damn! You are bring me way down. Momma, and Todd, have always said I’m special.
If you’re directing that to me, please note that I mentioned “supertaster” once in this whole shenanigans, and that was to distance myself from the term.
My posts have nothing to do with that term or me being one. They’re about poor science. I’m 54, and my career at this point moving forward is determined by how well my knowledge of my craft will be able to insulate me from the degeneration of my palate as I age. It makes no sense to me, and is dangerous to my business, to chase ego over truth.
That said, by your definition here and above, which was interesting, my two kids are super tasters and the likeliest correllation that I can think of for “supertasters” would be age.
I don’t know why you think it was directed at you? I was replying to Alfert and making a general statement about people on the board.When I want to address a specific person, I generally do so explicitly.
