The average wine drinker...and why he fancies himself an expert?

[Roberto_Rogness]

I thought their “secret ingredient” (which even led to a trade secrets law suit with KJ vs Jed) was 5% unfermented muskat.

[Steve_Saxon]

@Kevin Shin

@Brady Daniels

[quote=“Kevin Shin”.

Having a good palate is a god’s gift and it is a necessity in evaluating wines.

It must be great that the hand of god has reached down and touched you.

[Peter_C]

@Kevin Shin

@Brady Daniels

@Kevin Shin

Another aspect of wine appreciation is having a good palate which a lot of experts do not have, a lot of data + no palate = BS. I know a few.

I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Randy Johnson probably thought strikeouts were the best thing in baseball, while Jason Elam maybe emphasized long kicks in his sport. I suspect the state department values diplomacy, and the military, the ability to effectively apply force. Teachers might tell you that education is a good use of taxes, and talk on and on about the children, while social workers might have a different area of passion.

In the world of wine appreciation, you value a good palate. Let me guess, are you are good at blind tasting?!?

It’s just one part of the game, buddy. And those of us condemned with average palates can achieve expertise in our own way; hopefully it’s not all BS. Perish the thought of us referring to ourselves as “experts” though.

I don’t do blind tasting often but when I do, I always do better than the top pros.

LMFAO!

[Brady_Daniels]

@Steve Saxon

It must be great that the hand of god has reached down and touched you.

Hey, your quote parsing made it look like I said that. Please fix.

[Terence_T-Bone_Livingston]

@Peter C.

@Kevin Shin

I don’t do blind tasting often but when I do, I always do better than the top pros.

LMFAO!

There is NO WAY I’d be able to distinguish Dos Equis from Modelo blind. No way.

;-D

[Humberto_Dorta]

Wtf does having a good palate mean? Thats just a term of endearment as far as Im concerned.

[Jay_Miller]

@Doug Schulman

I have suspected that I notice it more with wine because it’s one of the very few topics where I might be able to spot BS when it’s presented convincingly.

I think you’ve hit the nail on the head here.

[PeterR]

Well, I’m not sure the “average” wine drinker fancies himself as an expert. He might even be a she. When we started www.winenabber.com, we ran focus groups to find out how much information the average wine buyer would need in order to feel comfortable about buying wine online. When we scratched beneath the surface, we found out the average wine buyer is terribly intimidated by the process of buying/selecting wine. And in the case of our business, they only were interested in wines deals for which we could provide professional ratings and comparative prices.

My general observation is that some people who are truly expert in something, think that this confers upon them the mantel of “expert” in all other things. Ergo they opine about things of which they know next to nothing and appear bogus and are an embarrassment to themselves. I recall being out to dinner with a friend who happened to be a CEO of some business and knew little about wine. He promptly asked the somm for a bottle of Le Montrachet (we had brought a bottle of Puligny Montrachet to his house for dinner one night), and the somm had the kind heart to whisper in his ear that he might want to make another selection. So it goes.

[mike_pobega]

@Kevin Shin

I don’t do blind tasting often but when I do, I always do better than the top pros.

The crazy thing is that my opinion of those who have a gifted palate like Faryan Amir-Ghassem¡, Tom Maskell, Joe Howe and Tom Wheltle is based on casual wine dinners as I have rarely done blind tastings with them. Others like Herwig Janssen and Kelly Walker, my opinion is based on blind setting.

Having a good palate is a god’s gift and it is a necessity in evaluating wines. You can certainly y compensate a bit but there is a limit. I have seen the famous critics as well as the passionate wine lovers who simply can tell apart a red from a rose yet they want to lecture others and that is what bothers me.

[Dave_English]

I hate it when as the only wine tragic in my group, any mention of wine at a party/function my friends declare I’m a ‘wine expert’ which makes me want to crawl under a rock - every negative thing spoken about in this thread about ‘experts’ gets immediately foisted upon you.

[GregT]

As far as the idea of a “good palate” - I’ve seen people who fancy themselves knowledgeable about wine eat things like Snickers and KFC and Big Macs. You either have a palate that recognizes inedible crap or you don’t.

But regarding the OP - I’m not sure I agree with the premise. In NYC they used to have a commercial about heating oil vs natural gas. How did they sell it? “It’s just better.”

No facts, no marketing, just an opinion based on absolutely nothing. Used to make me puke every time I heard it.

And that kind of thinking is not uncommon, at least out here. Seems like everyone has absolute standards and opinions regardless of any knowledge. I had a guy tell me “It all tastes the same anyway.” He’s a super-successful lawyer and was certain of his opinion. Another guy, a PhD in something, told me that he’d been to a professional tasting once and they served almonds because the pros needed the almonds to clean their palates. So he advised me to get almonds because that’s what all the pros did and that’s what he does.

Wine is just one of many such areas. And for what it’s worth, and I’m really truly not trying to be a dick, I’m far from convinced that the vast majority of posters on this or any other board know all that much. Some most certainly do. But there’s frequently a lot more certainty than knowledge bandied about.

[Rick_Gregory]

@GregT

As far as the idea of a “good palate” - I’ve seen people who fancy themselves knowledgeable about wine eat things like Snickers and KFC and Big Macs. You either have a palate that recognizes inedible crap or you don’t.

But regarding the OP - I’m not sure I agree with the premise. In NYC they used to have a commercial about heating oil vs natural gas. How did they sell it? “It’s just better.”

No facts, no marketing, just an opinion based on absolutely nothing. Used to make me puke every time I heard it.

And that kind of thinking is not uncommon, at least out here. Seems like everyone has absolute standards and opinions regardless of any knowledge. I had a guy tell me “It all tastes the same anyway.” He’s a super-successful lawyer and was certain of his opinion. Another guy, a PhD in something, told me that he’d been to a professional tasting once and they served almonds because the pros needed the almonds to clean their palates. So he advised me to get almonds because that’s what all the pros did and that’s what he does.

Wine is just one of many such areas. And for what it’s worth, and I’m really truly not trying to be a dick, I’m far from convinced that the vast majority of posters on this or any other board know all that much. Some most certainly do. But there’s frequently a lot more certainty than knowledge bandied about.

YOu do realize that at the start of your post you make an absolutist statement and at the end you take people to task for faux certainty.

Most of the regular posters here know far more than an average person about wine and most of use are well aware that wine is a slippery, malleable, subjective thing. That doesn’t translate to ‘everything is the same’ though. Do we project certainty? Sure, because if you qualify everything to death it’s annoying. Of COURSE my opinion on what makes good wine is my opinion… I don’t state that every time, because I hope it’s obvious. Am I or is anyone here always right and never mistaken? Don’t be silly. Do we know FAR more that your attorney friend? Hell yes. Don’t be silly. And I’m sorry, but your vague statement does, in fact, sound dickish becuase you of course implicitly set your self up as a judge of how much people here know.

IN any event the issue isn’t average wine drinkers’ knowledge but why some people who don’t really know that much either think they do or pretend that they do. The latter is easy to answer - people put on fronts to impress others and knowing wine is one of the socially recognized ‘sophisticated’ things to know about. The former is usually some manifestation of “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” I think. They’re told X by some expert and they either believe it or extend the context outside of where the expert meant for it to apply.

[Brady_Daniels]

@Rick Gregory

YOu do realize that at the start of your post you make an absolutist statement…

Only a Sith deals in absolutes.

[Peter_Chiu]

Very well said…and Rick .

[JIMCOH]

@Dave Butner

@Michael Lewis

@R_Olson

People typically do not go on and on and on about other topics about which they little or nothing, masquerading as an expert (I am talking about smart, otherwise educated people here). Just the opposite in fact.

I was with you until this part of the post. People blabber about all kinds of stuff they know nothing about, wine included.

Exactly what I was going to say.

Add me to this growing list.

[JIMCOH]

Sorry - repeated argument - I was to impatient to read through the entire thread!

@R_Olson

The point I was making was that it seems with wine, moreso than other pursuits, people speak emphatically about factually incorrect things in some misguided attempt to appear sophisticated. As others have noted, people do this w other things but in my experience wine faux-experts are disproportionately abundant. As I have noticed this, I got to thinking if a.) there was a reason for it or b.) I have just had a unique, randomly high sample.

If the answer to my internal question is inherently the former, I was wondering if others could shed light as to why that may be. If the answer is the latter, I apologize for wasting your, and everyone else’s, time. That is all.

The most likely reason for your conclusion is that “Wine” is a subject where you have enough knowledge to recognize a “faux-expert.” They are out there in all areas, we just don’t usually the breadth of knowledge to recognize all of them.

[Rauno_E_NZ]

I think that there are a couple of forces in play. Firstly, in general, people DO tend to exaggerate their knowledge and love holding forth on any topic where they can get away with BSing others whose ignorance is greater. We seem to live in a society (in the West) and at a time when people’s opinions have somehow become sacrosanct - “I’m entitled to mine, which is worth as much as yours, oh and your respect as well by the way, don’t dis me!” - regardless of whether the opinion is demonstrably wrong. Having an opinion has become almost as acceptable as having knowledge, and it’s a lot less effort to come by an opinion… That holds for many fields. Just look at evolution vs creation for how far opinion and belief can go in trumping facts. With wine, individual opinion, even of the most hopelessly ignorant, DOES actually matter (cf say particle physics) because it’s a food and everyone has different tastes. Secondly, chances are you are more often in an environment where you are exposed to wine opinions, so you would expect to hear more of the sort of examples you gave than, say, international copyright law. Thirdly, as others have said, there is unfortunately social status attached to wine knowledge and expertise. That increases propensity to lecture others about it and bask in their admiration. And fourthly, often people talking about wine are half-cut or more… which kinda means that after a couple of glasses a little bit of dheadedness can become a big bit of dheadedness

[Kirk.Grant]

@Glenn L e v i n e

I like that. Can I know something about fine wine, a little about sex, how to start a car and nothing about carpentry?

I think I woke my neighbors. I laughed so loud after reading this…because it is EXACTLY who I feel I am. I think that remembering where I started helps to keep me humble. I’ve caught myself a few times saying things that come across as highly judgemental…which is kind of crazy given that a large part of what started my quest for knowledge was feeling that there was a secret that “those in the know” had that I wanted in on. I started learning about wine so I wouldn’t feel intimidated looking at wine lists when I was out dating. Now that I’ve had the experiences I’ve had…I rarely want to spend the money on wine at about 80-90% of the restaurants I go to. The more I’ve learned and been exposed to…the more I find myself upset with the vast majority of wine lists at restaurants.

I’ve been fortunate to get to experience some of the banchmark wines from multiple regions and countries. However, I think the greatest skill I have is with talking with a wide-range of people and their experiences. It served me well as a wine director and it continues to serve me as I continue to learn more about wine.

[Mike_S_h_o_r]

@GregT

As far as the idea of a “good palate” - I’ve seen people who fancy themselves knowledgeable about wine eat things like Snickers. You either have a palate that recognizes inedible crap or you don’t.

Whoa! No need to elevate wine by belittling the world’s best snack food. If you don’t enjoy snickers, you probably just need to learn the proper serving temperature (-18 C).

And while the average Joe may consider himself a wine expert, some average rich Joes magically consider themselves wine-making “experts.”

[Howard_Cooper]

@R_Olson

I think it s fair to say the discrepancy b/w the average wine drinker and those who frequent these boards is often wider than we may otherwise think. People who are educated on the topic of wine tend to consume and discuss their juice w others of a similar passion and knowledge base…one of the ancillary results of this being that many never really discuss or engage on the topic of wine w the “average” wine drinker.

Honestly, the better question is why does everyone on this board (or most people on this board) think they are wine experts. There have been a bunch of self-congratulatory posts on this thread. I read a lot of very strange tasting notes from supposedly great palates (and probably write a bunch). Certainly the top professionals have better palates than the vast majority of the people on this board - at least the professionals I have met like David Schildknecht, Robert Kacher, Peter Weygandt, John Gilman, Ben Gilberti and a number of others.