How To Be A Wine Guy

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

Maybe you’ve wondered how I’ve acquired such vast wine knowledge? Such expertise. Such opportunities to sample old vintages. I’ll tell you in one word: bamboozle.


It’s as simple as that. For example, how is anybody supposed to really know Burgundy? You can taste until your tongue rolls up like a broken window shade and it won’t help.


Do you want to know how to differentiate between, say, Savigny-les-Beaune “Serpentieres” and “Narbantons”? Do you want to taste perfectly mature, pristine examples from the grower’s cellar at no cost to you? Of course you do.


To acquire true wine expertise you can taste numerous examples at vast expense over a period of decades. Then maybe, just maybe, you’ll get a grip on it. (Actually, you won’t. My experience confirms the old saw, “The more you taste, the less you know.”)


So here’s what you do. You’re in some dank cellar somewhere. You’re struggling with French or Italian or the jargon of California winespeak (“We sourced this wine from the lower part of the upper bench at just the right pH”).


When the time comes for the Tasting, you project floods of modesty and self-effacement (this is hardest part for me). You say that, really, if the grower would be so kind; if he wouldn’t mind, you would like to taste the wines blind and say where they came from.


Upon hearing that, it’s all the grower can do to keep from grabbing his cell phone and calling his neighbors in from the fields to watch you make a fool of yourself – which you surely will.


It helps to understand that most of the world’s best winegrowers are farmers. They’re close to the land. Theirs is an earthy sense of humor. They like old-time carnival shows where, for a quarter, you can throw a ball at a target and, if you hit it, some hapless victim is plopped into a vat of water.


The idea here is to make yourself that hapless victim. If you’re in France, Italy, Spain, or Germany, the winegrower is elaborately courteous, replying with something like, “But of course, monsieur.” (Americans are more blunt: “You gotta be kidding,” is the usual response.)


Now the fun starts. Six glasses are put in front of you on an upended barrel. The light is dim. The wines are barrel samples with about as much apparent difference between them as yesterday’s bank balance from today’s.


You swirl. You sniff. And you spit with a certain definitiveness. (Really good spitting is something I’ve never mastered. This is a pity, because people always credit a good spitter with having a great palate.)


Eventually you hold forth. Here, you let slip your veil of modesty. You verbally stride forth, saying, “I think this first wine is the Serpentieres because it has that ethereal delicacy I always associate with this vineyard.” This, of course, is nonsense. You haven’t a clue.


But you persist, going down the line, declaring with professional certitude the distinctions of each wine that unmistakably make it such-and-such vineyard. By now, the winegrower can barely contain himself. He’s practically hopping from one foot to the other like a schoolboy with an overfull bladder. He can’t wait to gleefully tell you how wrong you are.


And, boy, are you ever wrong. In all the years I’ve been pulling this stunt, not once have I ever been right.


Finally, the moment arrives. The winegrower, with the sort of false dejection seen at the best funerals, declares that he’s so sorry, monsieur, but the first wine is not Serpentieres. “No, monsieur, it is the Jarrons vineyard. You see, Jarrons has a rich, meaty quality due to the high clay content, etc.”


While the grower is expansive with an eloquence and articulateness you couldn’t get from him if you asked a direct question, you are scribbling like mad. Word for word, you download this distilled wisdom of generations of winegrowers.


Then comes the best part. After explaining how you missed all the wines, the grower will then take pity on you. “You know,” he says.” It’s very hard to see these differences with young wines. Let me show you some mature examples.”


With that he goes off to the dark recesses of his cellar, bringing back an armful of filthily lovely old bottles just so you can, someday, get it right.


Can you really ever get it right? Not likely. But you’ll get to taste a lot of swell wines – as long as you don’t tell ’em Matt sent you.


HERE’ S THE DEAL


SCHRAMSBERG VINEYARDS BRUT ROSE 2002 No sparkling wine is more sniffed at, in the wrong sense, than a rose bubbly. To stuffy old male sensibilities of a certain era a rose champagne was a frilly thing. “Good for the ladies,” Colonel Blimp might be heard saying at his men’s club. Those days are thankfully gone. A rose sparkling wine is, in fact, one of bubblydom’s great pleasures. Personally, I prefer a really good rose bubbly over most others. Why? Because it can taste like wine. Too many sparkling wines are as austere as Melba toast and about as satisfying. A good rose sparkler, plumped with a good proportion of pinot noir in the base wine, delivers real fruitiness and depth. Schramsberg Vineyards Brut Rose 2002 is an exemplar of this delicious breed. It is rose bubbly as it should be: lush yet dry, delivering a berryish fruit with real finesse. This is an exemplary bottling that’s worth seeking out and, happily, is widely available. $29.95


The New York Sun

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