Chuckanut
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
Burgundy and Merlot....
A good Burgundy is an absolute pleasure!
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Burgundy and Merlot....
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Here is a fun Freakonomicsish story from the New Yorker about wine tasting Does All Wine Taste the Same? : The New Yorker
It includes this snippet about the red vs white study at the University of Bordeaux. Apparently none of the experts did a spit take with the fake red whine and proclaimed "Allors, zees ees faux!"
Putting red food coloring in white wine adulterates it. How do we know that some unknown chemical reaction isn't taking place? Or being prevented or changed?
I can't imagine the home brewers in the group would frown on allowing somebody to put a coloring agent in their beer, right?
You can at least tell whether the wine is from the northern or southern hemisphere by swirling it around in your glass. If it swirls clockwise....I do not think I can tell if a Cab is from South America or from Australia, but then I have never really cared. I drink quite indiscriminately when it comes to wine.
I think it's a waste of time to train your palate to recognize the subtle differences in red wines. The problem with doing so is that once you develop the ability to distinguish between the different varieties, you will just want to spend more money on them.....
If you spend enough time learning, you might get to the point where nothing less than $40 bottles of wine will do. Why would you want to do that? It just raises the ER budget unnecessarily.
Before this goes much further, just get the vacuum wine stopper from Crate & Barrel. Probably a lot cheaper (haven't looked at the Argon idea), and works very, very well. DW and I use it at least twice a week to get two dinners out of a bottle.I've really developed a liking for Sonoma Dry Creek Valley zins. They have a spicy/peppery aspect to them I really like.
The only thing that kind of bummed me out was...I'm single and live alone, so if I open a bottle, I feel compelled to drink the entire bottle. I've never been able to stopper it up and leave it a few days because it doesn't taste right to me afterwards. Just the other day, I bought a can of argon wine preserver from BevMo and only drank a half bottle, sprayed it, and had the rest a couple nights later, and it was great. Tasted like I'd just uncorked it. Now I'm thinking I can enjoy a glass most nights with dinner, and let a bottle last a few days rather than binging on an entire bottle myself.
I would definitely recommend keeping a can of wine preserver handy. Would also help with trying different wines on different nights and mixing it up some.
I recently bought another bottle, but this time was not at all impressed. Why? There's a lot of variations with a generic wine like this, as the bottler buys from different vintners for different batches. And even with name brands, there's of course vintage difference from year to year.
I had never cared for wine prior to about 1996. All I'd had was cheap red wine from grocery stores, which did nothing for me. Then, I was on a business trip with some coworkers to Santa Rosa, and one of them made a reservation at a steak house and ordered a bottle of nice red wine. I tried it and have been hooked ever since.
White wine doesn't appeal to me as much - I definitely like reds more. I've been through several red phases. First was cabs. Then, I was on a pinot kick for a while, until I figured out that pinot is such a finicky wine that I had to go through 7 or 8 bottles of "crap" (not really crap, it just didn't excite me) before I found one I really liked. Now, I've been on a zinfandel kick for several years.
I've really developed a liking for Sonoma Dry Creek Valley zins. They have a spicy/peppery aspect to them I really like.
The only thing that kind of bummed me out was...I'm single and live alone, so if I open a bottle, I feel compelled to drink the entire bottle. I've never been able to stopper it up and leave it a few days because it doesn't taste right to me afterwards. Just the other day, I bought a can of argon wine preserver from BevMo and only drank a half bottle, sprayed it, and had the rest a couple nights later, and it was great. Tasted like I'd just uncorked it. Now I'm thinking I can enjoy a glass most nights with dinner, and let a bottle last a few days rather than binging on an entire bottle myself.
I would definitely recommend keeping a can of wine preserver handy. Would also help with trying different wines on different nights and mixing it up some.
I never expect a vintage wine (from the same winery) to taste the same from one year to the next. Always have to sample before committing!In a wine thread a few months ago, I told of a Chardonnay that I liked enough to soak the bottle and keep the label so I would know to get it again. I often buy inexpensive bottles in grocery stores as I travel, and do not remember where I buy them. I also do not drink whites all that often. Anyway, in that post I told of how I looked for that bottle in the stores that I normally frequent such as Trader Joe's, Fresh-n-Easy, Safeway, etc... and failed to find it. I should have looked on the Web, but somehow did not think of that. I finally found it: a very inexpensive bottle in a chain store.
I recently bought another bottle, but this time was not at all impressed. Why? There's a lot of variations with a generic wine like this, as the bottler buys from different vintners for different batches. And even with name brands, there's of course vintage difference from year to year.
And then, it might be a psychological factor with me too. Now that I know it's inexpensive, I do not have as much regard for it.
By the way, the Trader Joe's two-buck chuck is three-buck chuck outside of CA. As a daily table wine, it's OK with me.
I'd say that's a pretty discerning palette. And it took a while to develop that experience as well.I like pinot noir. If there is a especially dry growing season, I stock up on several varieties from that year.
Those vacuum wine stopper thingies work very very well.
A friend who also like red wine tried the following taste test: Same wine served:3. Wine aerators - some will scoff at them, but I personally can attest that I have noticed a difference after pouring red wines through an aerator. The aerator helps to quickly, subtly 'soften' the body of the wine so it's slightly smoother when you drink it. The alternative is to open the bottle to let it 'breathe' for 30-90 minutes (or more) before you drink it. You can find expensive ones, but I stick with the $22 variety on Amazon
Amazon.com: Trudeau Aroma Aerating Pourer with Stand: Kitchen & Dining
It sticks right into the bottle. No drips, nothing to hold! (just rinse it out after using it so the wine doesn't stain it over time)
A friend who also like red wine tried the following taste test: Same wine served:
1) from the bottle after standing open for 15 minutes
2) through an aerator immediately after opening
3) from a decanter after standing 15 minutes, and
4) after a minute mixed in the blender then into the decanter.
The blind tasters all choose them in reverse order: 4) best, 1) worst.
Then he tried option 4) for differing qualities. The difference in age of the wine disappeared.
I agree. That probably assures the industry that the $40 price point will not be replaced by $25 and a blender! But the success of aerators seems to indicate there is some hope. Plus once the whole bottle has been blended, you pretty much have to drink it all...I'd have a really hard time running a $40+ bottle of wine through a blender. Even if it did appear to taste better, I'd feel I was doing something sacrilegious to it.
3. Wine aerators - some will scoff at them, but I personally can attest that I have noticed a difference after pouring red wines through an aerator. The aerator helps to quickly, subtly 'soften' the body of the wine so it's slightly smoother when you drink it. The alternative is to open the bottle to let it 'breathe' for 30-90 minutes (or more) before you drink it. You can find expensive ones, but I stick with the $22 variety on Amazon
Amazon.com: Trudeau Aroma Aerating Pourer with Stand: Kitchen & Dining
It sticks right into the bottle. No drips, nothing to hold! (just rinse it out after using it so the wine doesn't stain it over time)
Our favorite winery area to visit is the Columbia River Valley in Washington state, from near Yakima all the way to Walla Walla. Amazing big reds. Better value than CA in general.