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As much as you may want to believe it, wine writers are not making things up. Sure there may be the odd hallucination now and again, but usually they’re simply trying to tell you what wine X, Y, or Z smells and tastes like to them. Emphasis on THEM. Beyond that, we often hear the phrase “everybody’s different” when it comes to wine and that is correct across the board. Here’s how we’re different. In short, here’s the deal:
We all have the same hardware in the form of our brain and neurology. After that, all bets are off. What’s different? Simple answer: everyone’s memories. Your take on Meyer Lemon is going to be different than mine because my memory in the form of internal pictures, movies, sounds, and feelings associated with Meyer Lemon throughout my lifetime is unique–and it’s definitely not yours. While we may agree that there’s something sour and citrus-like in the wine we’re sharing, we’re never going to have an identical experience known as Meyer Lemon. You may think it smells more like pink grape fruit or a catcher’s mitt or a freshly painted garage door for that matter. Further, the wonderful bouquet of flowers I adore in a glass of glorious Grand Cru Alsace Gewurztraminer may utterly repel you because it’s entirely too close to your memory of a tragic drive-by at a Macy’s perfume counter at some point in the distant past. Personal likes and dislikes are important and those are based on memory too.
Context is also important. The how’s, who’s, why’s, and when’s you taste/drink a wine collectively form the trump card in any wine experience. That magic bottle of whatever you enjoyed when your boyfriend proposed will forever be your favorite wine in the entire universe. The mere thought of it will send you around the moon and back to that magic moment–until the break up. Then it becomes the most cursed s#@*&% bottle of wine in the history of mankind. Yes, friends, context is important. Remember that.
Remember also that wine tasting is marginally about actually tasting. It’s primarily about SMELLING as smell accounts for over 85% of the sense of taste. So if you’re passing by the nose on your evening glass of Cabernet going right in for the big slurp, the proverbial cow is already out of the barn. In fact, the cow is so far out of the barn that it took your car to SFO and is now headed to Fiji. On your credit card. Moo.
Olfactory memory is the most powerful form of memory we have because aromas from the glass or any other source go right up our nasal passages to be transferred directly into the cerebral cortex. That means when such-and-such wine writer rambles on about how the pepper and herbal notes in a Chateauneuf-du-Pape remind him of the cassoulet his grandmother used to make when he was a kid during the holidays, guess what; it probably does and that means you shouldn’t wig out over said writer’s musings but should instead try to get to your own memories of pepper and savory herbs to better understand what the writer is trying to express about the wine. Hopefully the next time you taste the same wine or a similar wine you might experience them too. Unless, of course, you find something completely different. Because after all, it’s what the wine smells and tastes like to you that actually counts.
As for the sense of smell, we as a culture generally suck at olfactory memory. It’s not important to us so we don’t practice it and we’re not very good at it. Other than a smack-me-on-the-side-of-the-head tsunami of cow pasture, raw garlic, or did somebody left the burner on the gas stove on, we’re generally not tuned into the olfactory world. There are definitely exceptions and those individuals tend to be in the perfume, wine, and spirits worlds or other professions where one’s expertise is largely determined by smell memory. Thus it’s not surprising when someone with a highly developed olfactory memory writing about their subject is viewed with great suspicion by the public at large.
On the other hand, it’s easily understandable that the poetic meanderings and or descriptions of wine writing can sometimes leave one puzzled, forlorn, and even verklempt. Wine has no inherent vocabulary leaving us as wine professionals to borrow, often tragically, nomenclature from completely unrelated fields. Adjectives such as “murky,” “bold,” “dense,” and even something comical like “explosive” find their way into wine descriptions, not to mention any number of fruits, herbs, and spices (road tar is among my favorites). But when you read that tasting a rare old vintage made some famous wine writer start weeping you should definitely have serious misgivings. I would.
Know that wine professionals taste a lot of wine, some of them thousands of bottles a year. If someone is tasting that much odds are they’re pretty good at it and they should also be proficient at communicating about it in a meaningful way even if they are limited to nomenclature that may seem like Martian to the novice. Keep in mind that this is tasting and not drinking. A professional tasting may sound like fun to you but it’s hard work requiring a hell of a lot of focus, concentration, and inevitable palate fatigue. Still think it sounds fun? Imagine tasting 45 different coffees in 90 minutes, taking notes and then writing about the qualities of each one. I rest my case.
Finally, if the florid wine descriptions still give you agita, consider giving wine writers a break. Even with the zillions of wine blogs and everyone pretending to be a wine expert these days, there are more good writers than ever. Find one whose prose you can live with—even like—and follow them. Chances are their likes and dislikes in wine are similar to yours. But remember that your palate—and what you like to drink—is the bottom line.
Because after all, I made all this up.
Just kidding.
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