Least useful tasting note term to you?

[CFu]

@Cris Whetstone

@RS Beck

@Cris Whetstone

Yes but you would claim you had gleaned a flavor simply from smelling something?

Absolutely. Especially, if I am referring to something I smelled in nature and then tasted in wine.

People talk about cat pee flavor in some Sauvignon Blancs.

I assume they are extrapolating from having smelled it.

There are plenty of example of this.

We can agree to disagree but I always hear cat pee referred to as an aroma and never a flavor. This is a good example that marries up to what I meant about forest floor.

One time it happened and i will never forget that taste.

[JKim]

@Charlie Fu

@Cris Whetstone

@RS Beck

Absolutely. Especially, if I am referring to something I smelled in nature and then tasted in wine.

People talk about cat pee flavor in some Sauvignon Blancs.

I assume they are extrapolating from having smelled it.

There are plenty of example of this.

We can agree to disagree but I always hear cat pee referred to as an aroma and never a flavor. This is a good example that marries up to what I meant about forest floor.

One time it happened and i will never forget that taste.

[Larry_P]

@JKim

@Charlie Fu

@Cris Whetstone

We can agree to disagree but I always hear cat pee referred to as an aroma and never a flavor. This is a good example that marries up to what I meant about forest floor.

One time it happened and i will never forget that taste.

Since this thread is going downhill fast, I might as well mention I read today in a CT note “a Peter North-like finish”. At least they didn’t time it. Maybe couldn’t read the watch by the time it was over.

[BobH]

@RS Beck

Burning embers, charcoal, BBQ smoke – in my experience, all of these notes come from oak that has been heavily toasted.

I disagree with you here, Rob. I would think that you would find these terms very helpful, because it tells you exactly something that you need to know, and in your case something that is going to tell you to stay away.

[Charlie_Carnes]

Most terms, flowing from the right pen, can be useful. Many terms are overused or incorrectly used. Like a few others mentioned, I hate when a taster basically describe a wine that he hates and gives it a 92 or something similar. I also hate when a wine that is obviously described as flawed is still scored. I think many terms like sous bois or petrichor -two terms I like when used sparingly and correctly- are used as concrete descriptors, but are really meant to be descriptors of perceptions, or maybe a combination of both. Smell and taste elicit all kinds of emotional responses that are hard concretely describe. I certainly don’t mind a good taster with a good pen to use a little license in his descriptions. Hey many of us are probably guilty of being overly ‘enthusiastic’ when describing wines that stir us up in some way. At least I am sure I have over-described wines that move me.

[Brad_Kane]

@Charlie Fu

@Cris Whetstone

@RS Beck

Absolutely. Especially, if I am referring to something I smelled in nature and then tasted in wine.

People talk about cat pee flavor in some Sauvignon Blancs.

I assume they are extrapolating from having smelled it.

There are plenty of example of this.

We can agree to disagree but I always hear cat pee referred to as an aroma and never a flavor. This is a good example that marries up to what I meant about forest floor.

One time it happened and i will never forget that taste.

Next time remove the bladder before you put the cat into the wok, Charlie.

[Roberto_Rogness]

“* Use of obscure varieties of foods (Bosc Pear, Meyer Lemon, Green Fig, et. al.)”

Serena Sutcliffe once wrote a wonderful article about how most residents of urban areas in developed countries can easily distinguish by nose and while blindfolded the difference between diesel, gasoline and kerosene fumes, many different caustic cleaning products and perhaps brands of bath soap yet get pissy when people invoke specific fruits, flowers and vegetables in wine writing.

Her solution: on a regular basis GO to the farmers market or at least the produce aisle as well as a good florist and put your nose into things and pay attention. That’s how you build an olfactory vocabulary. And a good stroll around a working farm with livestock and a walk through several types of forests at different times of year wouldn’t hurt either.

Rant over.

[Roberto_Rogness]

“Next time remove the bladder before you put the cat into the wok, Charlie.”

We have a great food truck out front right now called Asian Cravings and they have two large color pictures of their beautiful dogs right next to the order window. I couldn’t resist asking what sauce they put on them…

[Cris_Whetstone]

@RS Beck

“Approximately 80-90% of what we perceive as “taste” actually is due to the sense of smell.”

http://www.exploratorium.edu/snacks/your_sense_of_taste/index.html

“It is appropriate that we consider taste and smell together because they are so intertwined in our experience that most people are unaware that most of what they call taste is really an olfactory experience.”

http://www.unmc.edu/physiology/Mann/mann10.html

I am fully aware of, understand and believe in these ideas. But we were talking about terms used in note and generally people don’t talk about a smell intertwined with a taste. People very often have notes where the aromas listed are different from the flavors. There is also the simple fact that no matter the interaction taking place within things do not always taste as they smell to us. Saying you have smelled something does not necessarily mean you know what it tastes like and making that assumption would be follow. Go ahead and taste the floor of the forest if you don’t believe me.

[Cris_Whetstone]

@JKim

@Charlie Fu

@Cris Whetstone

We can agree to disagree but I always hear cat pee referred to as an aroma and never a flavor. This is a good example that marries up to what I meant about forest floor.

One time it happened and i will never forget that taste.

I want to know if Charlie won that fight or not.

[Michae1_P0wers]

Its funny how subjective this all is I guess. While I seldom use most of these terms (but seldom write the lengthy TN’s that some do), I still find that many of these terms create a mental “image” for lack of better word, and therefore are useful. As to whether my experience will validate this image is another issue entirely. The prime example is those who get up in arms about minerality. Some people will argue at length about the existence of mineral flavors, or lack thereof. I will concede that many “flavors” have so much to do with smell. And there is ample physiological reason for that. But in many ways you taste a pencil as much as you smell it, and that is why we have so much overlap. It seems a silly thing to be so regimented about when you get right down to it.

I do find the term “moreish” to be a bit ridiculous when used by most people.

[Frank_Murray_III]

Cool topic. I write a lot of notes and it’s often a challenge to help bring forward a sensory experience but struggle with it sometime as I do, I am using some of the terms above. Burning embers—ever sat around a campfire or smelled earth that has been aflame? The former is closer to me as the descriptor, a feature i have found in some of the Copain syrahs. same with melted licorice. Can I say I have actually sat around and melted licorice, then recorded a sensory memor of it? I haven’t (although I probably tried in high school…enough said!). Minerality? I use it, will keep using it. Tell me some of the Chablis wines don’t have a distinct rocky taste, washed over with a purity? You mean you haven’t tasted to Frenchie’s point a mineral water? Ain’t that a minerality experience? Crushed rocks? Yes, I would say a stretch but in tasting wine, it’s often as much for me a connection to something not verbal that becomes verbal. As a kid, didn’t you hammer rocks to see shit explode or have a laugh to see how many directions the rocks would fly into? Didn’t that hammering effect create a bit of dust? There is a kind of smell that some wines throw off that smell, well like rocks that someone just hammered that shit out of and that’s what it smells like.

Is all this a stretch? Perhaps again yes but it’s each person’s unique experience and the way they connect to that experience, an effort to make something a narrative. I’m having a little fun here with this post but I write a lot of notes and I need a vocabulary for it.

So, what’s my post worth here, a 79?

[Craig_G]

@Frank Murray III

So, what’s my post worth here, a 79

It smelled a bit funky at first, but it blew off.

[RS_Beck]

@b hudak

@RS Beck

Burning embers, charcoal, BBQ smoke – in my experience, all of these notes come from oak that has been heavily toasted.

I disagree with you here, Rob. I would think that you would find these terms very helpful, because it tells you exactly something that you need to know, and in your case something that is going to tell you to stay away.

I agree.

[RS_Beck]

@Cris Whetstone

People very often have notes where the aromas listed are different from the flavors.

Yep – and both descriptions can be derived from previous olfactory experiences.

80% to 90% of what is perceived as taste is actually an olfactory experience.

So, smelling a forest floor is not much different from tasting it.

A wine could smell like forest floor and taste like lead pencil and both descriptors would stem from previous olfactory experiences.

The fact that the wine tastes different than it smells is irrelevant to these facts.

[Charlie_Carnes]

@Frank Murray III

So, what’s my post worth here, a 79?

I’ll give a mid 90s-ish, since I fully agree.

@Frank Murray III

Can I say I have actually sat around and melted licorice, then recorded a sensory memor of it? I haven’t (although I probably tried in high school…enough said!).

The problem is- or was- what with all of the black licorice and banana peel readily available, I never got a chance to put a little sous bois in my pipe and smoke it.

[Sean_Kennedy]

[quote=“Frank Murray III”]Can I say I have actually sat around and melted licorice, then recorded a sensory memor of it? I haven’t (although I probably tried in high school…enough said!).


You mean you don’t remember all that licorice we melted back in the day. Oh wait, the qualifier was record a sensory memory of it. All I can say is anything in your notes that say melted, I will not doubt you.

[Frank_Murray_III]

@Sean Kennedy

@Frank Murray III

Can I say I have actually sat around and melted licorice, then recorded a sensory memor of it? I haven’t (although I probably tried in high school…enough said!).


You mean you don’t remember all that licorice we melted back in the day. Oh wait, the qualifier was record a sensory memory of it. All I can say is anything in your notes that say melted, I will not doubt you.

Yes, and when I wrote that comment in my post last night, it was you who I was thinking of as my reference model. It was probably that party we did over on Myra Avenue.

[Cris_Whetstone]

@RS Beck

@Cris Whetstone

People very often have notes where the aromas listed are different from the flavors.

Yep – and both descriptions can be derived from previous olfactory experiences.

80% to 90% of what is perceived as taste is actually an olfactory experience.

So, smelling a forest floor is not much different from tasting it.

A wine could smell like forest floor and taste like lead pencil and both descriptors would stem from previous olfactory experiences.

The fact that the wine tastes different than it smells is irrelevant to these facts.

Right.

[Mark_C_Johnson]

unctuous