Wait a minute…who is this guy? My comment was directed at what I thought was Matt Kramer. I have never heard of this guy - and I just re-read the article.
Larry - we are not that desperate to bring content, here.
Sorry - Howard. Would love to meet you some day and see if we find common ground. Your turf or mine.
Wow. That is one crappy article. Were they trying to fill space?
My comment was directed at what I thought was Matt Kramer.
![[rofl.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/a/a7452fcd8e675af869f8da01174474a545b03944.gif "rofl"){kind=small}
Go ahead and nail Kramer anyway. He writes the same kind of stuff! He just doesn’t deign to taste much California wine. ![[berserker.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/8/8600bbd4810d342b8fbd4ffb62b4f0026275fd37.gif "berserker"){kind=small}
Matt writes for the Wine Enthusiast and is the Exec. Editor at The Independent in Santa Barbara. He has written for Wine Spectatoras well as Time Magazine.
He’s a good writer - just remember that this is aimed at Wine Enthusiast readers . . .
Cheers.
Since when has Santa Lucia Highlands been known for its big wines? Paso…for sure, RRV…maybe, SLH…no way!!!
I’m surprised the OP didn’t point this out.
you give out participation trophies too? ![[snort.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/b/bdc3944606213c4dca6c1169cf0a166c8bc4f8c9.gif "snort.gif"){kind=small}
Complexity…
When I started purchasing fruit from the SLH in 1997 there was a great deal of talk about the weight of the wines specifically from the Pisoni selection. There were even tests performed to make certain it was actually Pinot Noir.
One would hope so ![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}
It’s a blood-sport, Fu. Competition.
You conFUse my existentialism for socialism, not that I mind the latter, either. 
My post was serious, though.
Wine babble article, for those neophyte drinkers and winemakers ( cringe ) that only know big(big) fruit bombs.
Most of the wines that I thought were really great were both powerful and complex. 1990 Château Montrose, 1996 Harlan Estate, 1985 Château Cheval Blanc, 1982 Pichon Lalande. Certainly, you can have both strength and complexity, or just strength, or just complexity, or neither. People on cellartracker seem to regard strength higher than complexity, at least in terms of points given.
The wine doesn’t “intend” to be anything. It’s people who decide what to plant where, how to plant, how to prune, how to trellis, when to pick, yadda, yadda, yadda.
I found the article to be so overly simplified as to be essentially meaningless. Assuming the question is about my preference as a consumer, I don’t want the same kind
of wine each and every time I drink. Sometimes you’re in the mood for a more powerful Zinfandel with BBQ; sometimes you want a more balanced, elegant wine to go
with other food choices.
Is top German Riesling “strong” or “complex?” A little of both, but not obviously as high in alcohol as most of the wines the writer mentions. I’m going to have seared, sous vide
scallops for dinner tonight and the choice will be Sauvignon Blanc; certainly not the wines mentioned in this article.
It is NOT a “one size fits all” situation whatsoever.
Bruce
it wasn’t my comment, but i think it was intended towards “that is a decision that should be based on the fruit that an individual vineyard provides the vineyard owner needs to make the best call for his vines to produce the best wine possible” and not “only winemakers should make determinations on which is better”
personally, i think that each style can be called for at different times and in different places. a subtle, complex “weak” california zin doesnt sound great to me, but either does a big thick powerful burgundy.
Hard to make a generalization, but most often the above has been my experience as well. A combination of powerful and complex, with balance remaining intact, tends to push my pleasure buttons. But there are times when a less powerful, more ethereal wine will captivate me.
Not that any given individual will react the same as the “average” subject in an experiment, and alcohol level is not the only aspect of “strength,” but posted here as additional food for thought:
What can the brain teach us about winemaking? An fMRI study of alcohol level preferences.
Frost R1, Quiñones I2, Veldhuizen M3, Alava JI4, Small D5, Carreiras M6.
Abstract
Over the last few decades, wine makers have been producing wines with a higher alcohol content, assuming that they are more appreciated by consumers. To test this hypothesis, we used functional magnetic imaging to compare reactions of human subjects to different types of wine, focusing on brain regions critical for flavor processing and food reward. Participants were presented with carefully matched pairs of high- and low-alcohol content red wines, without informing them of any of the wine attributes. Contrary to expectation, significantly greater activation was found for low-alcohol than for high-alcohol content wines in brain regions that are sensitive to taste intensity, including the insula as well as the cerebellum. Wines were closely matched for all physical attributes except for alcohol content, thus we interpret the preferential response to the low-alcohol content wines as arising from top-down modulation due to the low alcohol content wines inducing greater attentional exploration of aromas and flavours. The findings raise intriguing possibilities for objectively testing hypotheses regarding methods of producing a highly complex product such as wine.
In the past we’ve seen some very clear examples of conditioning and conformity, where someone would post notes on some big wine he couldn’t stomach, essentially saying it was undrinkable, but still giving it 93 points. Certain prominent critics give the perception bigger is better. People believe it to the degree they doubt their own perception, dismiss their own enjoyment level, and rate it how they guess one of those critics would. I still see people underrating wines they are clearly thrilled by - afraid hey’d be wrong if they rated a light bodied wine higher than 87 or 88.
Yes. You interpreted me very well. Thank you for that - truly. I don’t know why Howard likes to jump on me, but I am a big girl and can usually take it. I have theories about why some people behave like he just did.
That may be true about critics’ influence, but also, I think that experienced wine drinkers who generally prefer lighter wines can be a little more open minded and appreciate a bigger, well made wine even though it is outside their preferred style.
People who prefer the big powerhouse wines often find lighter wines “thin” and rate them poorly.
I’m generalizing, but this whole thread is a generalization anyways.
Yes, I’ve certainly experienced that. Maybe my best example was a single blind tasting where the general preference of the group would not have been in favor of the Aussie ringer. No question to anyone which wine it was, big and ripe. But, it was masterfully made, complex, intriguing, very enjoyable. Group favorite by a landslide.
The difference is in winemaking approach. Some are just trying to make the biggest wine possible. Their wines tend to have a much narrower appeal than those from people who seem to actually know what they’re doing, making equally ripe wines of great body and depth, wonderful aromatics, verve.
Would be interesting