Not to mention a tasting panel!
Wine terms should have meaning. If a wine opens up with air, it was closed. Not shut down or in a dumb phase.
Wines can go through some weird phases, especially when in barrel or very young. In bottle, the various bottles of the same wine can be out of sync with each other, so some taste fine and some are completely lacking any expression of major components. One example is Ridge held back a library release of the '93 (iirc) Monte Bello until the bottles consistently showed well. When bottles are out of sync I call that mood. Hard to prove, but statistically demonstrable. In barrel, wines can show completely different at different times, but do come back to normal, which is evidence the wine was in some weird phase. Some barrels may be muted while others of the same wine show correct. Some recently bottled wines predictably go into shock and need time to resolve. Others are always fine to go straight to distribution, and some catch you out by needing time.
Some aroma and flavor compounds can get bound up, temporarily changing the molecule to something our receptors cannot detect. If you read Clark Smith, he talks about filtration bruising the colloids of some wines. That sounds woo-woo, but I haven’t heard a better explanation for major components being muted. That’s the loose relationship between molecules being messed up so that somehow what becomes available to your receptors is different.
If you read a wine text book you’ll see that molecules are binding and unbinding again. That seems to happen with both short phasing and long phasing. Short phasing would give you “bottle variation” in bottles that aren’t truly different, which is why I call it bottle mood. That’s like looking at three photos of a traffic light. One red, one green, one yellow. Are they three different traffic lights? A long phase would be responsible for all bottles of a wine being shut down.
2 Likes
Restaurant critics will often have just a bite or two out of each dish, especially if they’re trying a lot of dishes. A chef or food judge will spit, yes.
I don’t know if everyone’s physiology allows proper tasting without spitting. But, there certainly are techniques that allow people to assess and enjoy wines without swallowing. Part of the point is to be able to make good judgement calls not influenced by palate fatigue. A quick sniff, sip, spit isn’t a substitute for following a wine over time, but I can follow a wine while spitting. I mention physiology because the main concern is retronasal olfaction. I can get that without slurping like a pig or swallowing. YMMV.
Yes. It is a prepositive adjective that modifies the noun, but as they commonly go together, they can be both thought to be a single noun.
However, “varietal” by itself still does not become a noun, ie. you can’t use it by itself - it still remains an adjective (unless one could understand from the context that you are using “varietal” as a shorthand for varietal wine by dropping the “wine” part).
The one proper use of varietal as a noun is to refer to a wine made of a single variety and marketed as such. I’m the phrased varietal wine, varietal is in its usual role as an adjective modifying wine. It should not be used as a noun to refer to a grape variety. There’s, that’s my hill to defend, though I don’t expect to die on it.
3 Likes
Correcting non wine geeks about the proper use of varietal will make you unpopular.
5 Likes
You are indirectly implying that good wine is wasted on me: it could well be! But before we get metaphysically carried away: at the end wine is just another sophisticated agricultural product, made (with utmost care) to sustain us. And obviously has to be treated with respect, as much as say bread, but nowhere as much as meat. Everything else is just magical thinking and storytelling.
Does food enhance the wine experience, and the other way round? Different tastes, different answers.
2 Likes
The best rule I’ve heard about TCA comes from @Mike_Evans (though it may be apocryphal):
“If the person most sensitive to TCA at the table says a wine is corked, it’s corked.”
7 Likes
I have had many more disappointments drinking wine relative to the expectations. But the positive surprises more than make up for the disappointments.
I am almost always of this mind. That said, I know that I am so sensitive to it that I start to anticipate it and thus sometimes imagine it, especially on Bordeaux. I try to adjust for this reality and might say “I think this could possibly be corked” in those cases. But if I say “This is corked,” it’s corked.
2 Likes
If a Cabernet based wine exhibits a profile such as cedar, I will sometimes initially perceive the wine as being corked. Usually after a little air, I will realize that it’s not.
1 Like
I’ve always noticed that the person who brought the wine is the most reluctant to agree that the wine is corked.
I know that has been me a few times too, to be honest.
2 Likes
Ok, I finally made it through this (excellent) thread.
Here, forthwith is objective, unequivocal wine wisdom of such crystalline clarity and truthiness that even the most contrary of Berserkers will see the light… 
-
Coravin, even if used properly is only sort of ok for sort of preserving wine, but its not great and not good for long (days, not weeks/months).
-
Bordeaux is overrated, (except for Cheval Blanc, in which case, more please…).
-
Burgundy is NOT overrated, but it CAN be a minefield, even for semi-experienced dweebs like me. Yes Virginia, there’s “le plonk” in the Cote d’ Or too
-
What @Andrew_K said about white Burgs
-
Burgundy is worth the tariff.
There’s a reason why it’s a compliment to refer to some great Barolos or Rayas grenache, or some OR or CA wines as “Burgundian”. -
Reasonably priced, delicious Burgs in both colors are out there.
Go ye, and explore. There was a time when no one had heard of Raveneau either… -
The best wines, the ones that spark joy, are often surprises- outliers that stand out in a crowd; the different one, the one I didn’t expect to like (see #2, “Cheval blanc”, but also Prum WS, Etna whites, pear freakin’ cider, Chenin and, and, and…)
-
Wine paired well with food is better than wine alone. Everyone can stop arguing about it now. You’re welcome.
-
Blind tasting is useful and fun. Be told
-
This post will end the thread, such is the inarguable power of my perfect wine truths
11 Likes
Thanks, though to give credit where it is due, I was paraphrasing something that Robert Callahan wrote on Prodigy a long time ago.
That’s interesting. I find myself pretty sensitive to TCA so I am always like, “sorry, it’s effed. Don’t drink this.”
I like number 8. I hate drinking wine by itself - unless it’s sparkling.
2 Likes
Is it unpopular to say a significant reason people enjoy wine because they enjoy feeling drunk?
It feels like the elephant in the wine room so to speak
3 Likes
It’s not in the top 100 of reasons I drink wine.
4 Likes
ok let’s hear those 100 reasons please 
1 Like
Oh I totally understand, but there are definitely other ways of doing things.
Example:
Amongst the 11 Trappist monastic breweries producing beer, Westvleteren has been nominated as “best beer in the world” more than once with their Westvleteren 12 bottling. Holding true to Trappist philosophies of simply producing enough to meet the financial needs of the monastery and the charity works that they support, Trappist monasteries have typically been adamant that pricing remain low and accessible, and volumes are typically steady and don’t rise to meet consumer demand in any way.
As you can imagine, being called the best beer in the world a few times skyrocketed demand in the early 2000s, and the monks had to come up with a way to equitably distribute their beer. They have a strict policy that the beer is not for resale (although of course you’ll occasionally find it in a bar or shop in Belgium for x3 it’s normal cost), and sales occur now in two ways:
You can now register for a personal account and sales of the beer open up several times a month with intermittent home delivery within Belgium, or much more commonly, pick up at the Abbey door. Prior to January 2025, it was only personal pick-up at the abbey. The beer sells for 4.70 euro a bottle from the monastery, and there is a limit on how many bottles can be purchased. I had a bottle for 18 euro at a bar in Belgium, and I saw it in a shop for 50 euro a bottle.
So what’s my point? Good wine is certainly harder to produce than good beer, and great wine probably even more so than even great beer. And I accept that the owners of DRC haven’t taken vows of poverty nor are they a major charitable institution in their community. Nonetheless if DRC remained at say, $350 with pickup at the cellar door only, an online lottery/restricted sales/waiting in line would almost certainly give me a better shot at obtaining a bottle than the current pricing which for me would be a major financial outlay for… a bottle of wine. Even if I could only reserve a bottle weeks in advance and then had to fly over to pick it up, that would still be cheaper and way more fun and a much more interesting story than working countless hours and then hoping one day access to a bottle would just fall into my lap at the same time I’ve held onto this money “just in case.”
Anyway, by now I’ve made this sound like I’m bothered by this much more than I really am, lol. It’s all a part of the fun, and if I never have DRC or plenty of other wonderful wines I shall remain perfectly content with all of the wonderful wines I have gotten to share and enjoy. If one day I’m privileged enough to be given the chance to try one of these special bottles, than great, and I will be very grateful to whatever gracious person has given me that opportunity!
Have I died on this hill yet? 