Tricked? No problem if the blind tasting has a few treats.
It’s true, based on my involvement in a fair number of blind tastings when prices and labels are not known in advance, experienced tasters tend to prefer more expensive wines when dealing in the $5 - $75 range. There are definitely exceptions. Not having done many blind tastings limited to $75+ wines (or drinking that many in comparsion) it’s hard to compare. My understanding is that once a certain quality level is reached, the differences become increasingly minute and the pricing more a function of marketing and perception than quality. Although we might want to believe that the wine itself in a $2500 bottle of LaTache is 10x better than a $250 GC, I have some serious doubts.
I think the people on this board may largely be different from some of the people in the study. Someone made a comment about blinding some whiskey. I did a similar test with a bunch of my non-wine-geek friends. Two shiraz. The first was in the 87-88 point range, was about $21, was monotone, basic, but very smooth and fairly tasty. The second had structure, was very complex, was built to age, had nice acidity, etc. and was in the 96-97 range and $75-85. Every single one of my non-wine friends thought the cheap one was the good one, even knowing ahead of time that one was top notch and the other was mediocre. It was like a 2004 Langmiel Shiraz Valley Floor and a 2004 Elderton Command. The tasters were looking for something smooth, and thought smooth = quality.
I then asked, “which one has more flavors going on?” Long pause…everyone agreed the Command had more going on.
I think determinations of quality depend largely on expectations. We wine geeks have thousands of bottles of experience. At this point, we know what to look for when making a determination of quality. There are telltale signs of quality wine making. Complexity, balance, structure, etc. I don’t think the average Joe equates big tannins in a young wine with a potential for quality. He probably thinks the wine tastes like shit because it’s drying his mouth out.
One of my biggest pet peeves with such studies is that they are uniquely negating. There isn’t a counterpoint that says, ‘50 tasters can’t tell the difference, but some can’ and it is thus inferred that all differentiation is phooey.
The reality, in my experience, is that it is a skill to actually be able to tell the difference. Having tasted literally thousands of bottles from suppliers and wholesalers, I’ve gotten pretty good at blindly guessing most of the details of the wine: where it’s grown (roughly), varietal character, and what they want to charge me for it. I agree with Richard, that when wines get into the Uber luxury/prestige sphere, it is impossible to peg prices; one has entered the fine Art realm. But for wines from $5-50 wholesale, I find that the character and quality of wines are concretely evident.
For many of these ‘all wines above $10 are vanity’ expose pieces, they often choose wines and participants to create their desired results: like feeding Almaden and Dom Perignon to a crowd of novices, and then drawing conclusions that the Almaden is better than the Dom because people preferred it. There’s an example of how expectations shape the end perception…
1995 just called, and it wants its price points back.
Seriously, what “good” wine can you get for $200 in calendar year 2011?
Palmer? Hillside Select? Grange?
I doubt it - not if they have points.
And you certainly can’t get Giacosa, Conterno, Guigal La-La’s, or anything Grand Cru worth worrying about.
Heck, Haut Brion Blanc is trading up around $750 to $1000 these days.
In fact, I’d argue that “$200” represents a really ugly dead zone in the wine business these days, at which price point you very likely would indeed encounter over-hyped spoofulated wine-of-the-moment crap that was indistinguishable from the better $20 wines out there.
It looks like this author is trying to make his living on the theory that because taste is colored by expectations, the purchase of luxury goods is really just a purchase of our own expectations, and therefore a waste of money, There are some tempting shreds of truth there, but his concept really hinges on there being no real difference between a luxury and budget product, which can be demonstrated anectodally, but in the big scheme of things is nonsense.
The author extrapolates one test using 54 “oenology undergraduates” to categorically dismantle any plausibility that A might ever be better than B:
In blind taste tests, long-time smokers can’t tell their brand from any of the competitors and wine connoisseurs have a hard time telling $200 bottles from $20 ones. When presented microwaved food from the frozen food section in the setting of a fine restaurant, most people never notice.
I think simply writing that paragraph shows how far he needs to reach to try to make his point. Noting a couple anecdotes, followed on by a number of unsubstantiated generalizations, tells me his book is pretty poorly reasoned, and the article doesn’t need much of an answer. But I will say, of course I’ve been involved in blind tastings where price was shown to be an unreliable indicator of quality, but I’ve also been involved in non-blind tastings where I was given misinformation about the wines - e.g. cheap wine substituted for an expensive one - and in one specific case I remember nobody was fooled.
So for $200, in calendar year 2011, you’re looking at Giacosa in an off-vintage like 2005, someone like Vincent Girardin in an off-vintage like 2008, or maybe Jonathan Maltus [Le Dome] in a solid vintage like 2008.
I apologize for the drive-by earlier. I really shouldn’t do that.
I don’t doubt the price points for the wines you’re mentioning…but I was surprised at your lower price cutoff for wine that qualifies as merely “good.” I’m pretty sure you can get undeniably world-class rieslings, ports, Sauternes, Brunellos, aged CA cabs, Chenin Blancs, champagne, etc. for less than $200, much less just “good” ones.
(Does anyone know what portion of the world’s wine supply actually costs upwards of $200/bottle? Even if you cut out the industrial-grade stuff, I suspect we’re talking about a small fraction of a percent.)
Again, my point is that anyone who thinks that “$200” represents the good stuff in fine wine is dating himself [by a couple of decades] - we’re talking about someone who rip-van-winkled right through the asset price inflation of the aughts.
Now if the quote had been “a hard time telling $2000 bottles from $20 ones”, then we’d have something to talk about - at $2000, you’d get almost all recent vintages of almost all the first growths, many [maybe even most?] vintages of Lafleur, Ausone, and Petrus, many vintages of Rousseau Chambertin, entry-level DRC, etc.
But “$200” is a great big dead zone - a no man’s land - in the wine market right now.
Nathan, are you using the term “good stuff” with respect to wines for “investment” or wines for “drinking”? Are you suggesting that wine drinkers who find excellent quality and satisfaction in wines < $200 (presuming retail here) have lost their way somewhere in no man’s land?
Not sure where Nathan is going with this. But I can see the idea a bit. Somewhere in the $40-$60 range price disconnects from change in quality. At that point skilled producers with good terroir really can’t do much more to the wine–they already can farm, limit yields, select for blending, have their choice of oak. Not much sense in paying more because the only real difference is in price driven by marketing and demand.
But if you pay 10x to 100x as much, you can get a label wine few others can afford. That clearly must increase the enjoyment for some enough to justify the cost. The ordinary $100 or $200 bottle lacks the label recognition to impress unless you tell them that is what you spent. First Growth and DRC, everyone knows.
This statement is absolutely preposterous. There are literally hundreds of lights-out bottles of wine that can be had for $200. Your statement limits your perception of quality to what’s on a label, not what’s in a bottle. Just because you can’t buy a bottle of Lafite or DRC for $200 does not mean there aren’t stunning wines at that price point…even in 2011.
2007 Rossignol-Trapet Chambertin, Latricieres Chambertin and Chapelle Chambertin
2007 Jadot Chapelle Chambertin
2008 Clos des Lambrays
2008 Jadot Bonnes Mares
2008 Jadot Gevrey Chambertin Clos St. Jacques
1975 Pichon Lalande
1975 Leoville las Cases
2009 Maison Ilan Chambertin and Charmes Chambertin
2010 Maison Ilan Charmes Chambertin
And this does not even include great value superstar wines like Trimbach Cuvee Fred, Huet Vouvray and JJ Prum Wehlener Sonnenuhr.
If I thought about it for another 5 minutes I am sure I can think of a lot more. If anyone cannot find “good” wines for less than $200, they really should find another hobby.
I do believe it would be difficult to blind taste the difference between a $200 bottle and a $2000 bottle of wine. Maybe the author got his order of magnitude wrong?
I honestly don’t know if I could consistently differentiate “good” wine from “bad” wine if it was mainly based upon price levels for the two bottles. There are some wine styles (okay, over-oaked and sappy sweet) that do not appeal to me at all, and may even be undrinkable, which consistently cost $50 or more. I don’t know if I tasted such a “good” wine blind whether I’d think it was a high-end wine that was not to my liking or whether it was a clumsy, pedestrian wine trying to appeal to the masses. Similarly, the “bad” wine might be simple and lean, which some could think of as cheap but I might find much it more restrained and palatable (with less off-putting characteristics). I think one needs to control for winemaking “style” in these comparisons. Yes, somehow this got turned in an AFWE vs. Fruit-bomb argument. Did you see it coming?
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and Dom Perignon to a crowd of novices, and then drawing conclusions that the Almaden is better than the Dom because people preferred it. There’s an example of how expectations shape the end perception…![[popcorn.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/1/1ca9f29573458cca2424a66a50d6c1261081dd3e.gif "[popcorn.gif]"){kind=small}