For me, it's not about the food, the ambience, the season, the weather. It's about the wine itself, regardless of where or when I drink it. Alone or in company, at a formal dinner or a casual barbeque, whether the leaves are popping
out or dropping off, whether the temps are freezing or blistering, in rain or in shine, in sickness or in health, no matter if it's red with fish or white with beef, or either with neither, or with no food at all, I just want the wine to smell, feel, and taste
good. Novelty-seeking wine-drinkers, I've read, have discovered that Tootsie Rolls enhance a rich port, candy corn brings out the different flavors in a Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling opens up the colors of a spicy bisque, and popcorn goes well with Chardonnay,
but for me context and condiments are irrelevant.
So is provenance. Whether the wine is from Provence or any other province I find of minor academic interest only. Many wine drinkers and makers are looking for some kind of effable
connection between the wine and land. They anthropomorphize the wine, believing that it strives to express itself and its place of origin. They seek to apprehend the effects of chalky soil or mineral soil or "Rutherford dust." Some
go even beyond that to add a moral dimension, praising the "character" to be found in wine made from "stressed" grapes, those that have to work for their water and nutrients. One critic senses in the wine "the granite that underlies the vines." Another
finds "touchstones of terroir." There is indeed a reign of terroir in the wine world today, with wines often marketed primarily on the supposed virtue of fidelity to place. Two labels from bottles in my cellar (a shallow basket
on the floor of my closet) are indicative. One, a 2011 Languedoc Syrah/Grenache made by Gerard Bertrand, rated 90 by The Wine Spectator, says "Driven by his passion for the Mediterranean lifestyle, Gerard Bertrand reveals all the unique character
of the region's finest wine terroirs. The Languedoc has always been dedicated to winegrowing and is the largest wine region in the world today, with an extraordinary variety of terroirs producing wines that symbolize the South of France.
This wine is rounded and generous, characterized by intense red fruit aromas and mild spicy hints." Surely the same characterization--rounded and generous with intense red fruit aromas and mild spicy hints-- could be made of many other blended reds featuring
Syrah grapes grown in many other terroirs on many other continents. The second is the Columbia Crest Horse Heaven Hills 2011 Red Blend Les Chevaux, which says "Washington State's famed Horse Heaven Hills, named for the wild horses that once
roamed this area, have been home to the Columbia Crest winery for over two decades. Our winemaker blends innovation and tradition to capture this unique basalt and bedrock terroir creating wines that highlight the intensity of these grapes.
Les Chevaux is a special blend of varietals from the Horse Heaven Hills AVA and personifies the legacy of the wild horses that once roamed this fabled area." What on earth, and I mean that literally, could such a legacy be? Are we expected to buy
into the myth that wild horses, free to run and flaunt their flowing manes, are superior to domesticated stock, and conclude that Les Chevaux is a superior red blend because it springs from the same unique basalt and bedrock terroir that tempered
the wild ones? Or that it deserves special credit because it is allegedly true to the ground it was grown on? Such flights of fancy have little relevance for me.
I open a bottle for my wife and me before--but not particularly
for--dinner once a week. Generally it will be a $10-15 bottle purchased at Costco, probably a little wet behind the ears. Always it will have been rated 90 or above by "expert" sources like Robert Parker or The Wine Spectator
or The Wine Enthusiast. I rarely buy any wine whose rating is not available, nor will I buy one rated 89 or lower, although I readily concede that a point or two either side of ninety has little significance. To argue that there
is a discernible difference between a wine rated 90 and one rated 89 is to split errors. Nevertheless, I irrationally insist that 90 is a more rational number on which to base a purchase than is 89. If the wine is a red, I run it through
an aerator to faux-age it, air-boarding it as it were, quickening its pulse and forcing it to exhale more vigorously. I pour about four ounces for each of us, put a rubber stopper in the bottle, suck out the oxygen with a vacuum pump, and pop the bottle
into the refrigerator. Partly for economic reasons but mostly for metabolic ones (my aged body does not tolerate much alcohol at one imbibing), we make the bottle last three days, each glass, alas, a bit less lustrous than the one before. While
awaiting dinner--barbequing, perhaps, or reading, or watching TV in my recliner--I take a few sips. During dinner, I take a few more. After dinner, in my recliner again, I take the final few. Each gets my full attention. I turn away
from task, TV, iPad or dinner plate, and swirl, eye, sniff, sip, roll the wine in my mouth, suck air over it, and swallow in exhalation. The immediate sensual thrill I then pleasurably enrich by reflecting upon the sensations still lingering on nose,
tongue, throat. Like a lepidopterist marveling at the wafting beauty of a butterfly and then netting it and pinning it to a board, I attempt to control and memorialize my experiencing of the wine by passing it through a prism of language shamelessly
borrowed from the label blurb and the evaluative notes of "experts."
From remembrances of wine descriptions past, I have a large, jumbled lexicon of nouns ( butter, oak, toast, nuts, raspberries, strawberries, apples, citrus, melon, violets, coffee,
black tea, tar, leather, truffles, peaches, sage, cocoa, vanilla, yeast, cigar box, cedar, earth, eucalyptus, green olive, for example) and adjectives (honeyed, jammy, plummy, tight, raw, burnt, prickly, flinty, tannic, faded, soft, herbaceous, foxy, mouth-coating,
bright, energetic, crisp, textured, layered, floral, for example)--to rummage through in search of mots justes. One or more of these is likely to apply and deepen the experience. Of course our vast, slippery, fleeting conscious experience
defies our complete apprehension. No matter how we try, in wine tasting as in all aspects of life, there are flickering perceptions and sensations, quantum fluctuations, that elude our linguistic grasp. But with the help of a word-stock
and the analysis of critics, we can latch on to some of them. It is satisfying to bring language to bear. This cabernet is like black tea, tar, and leather. Yes! As well as a stream of sensations in which to wallow, the wine is a puzzle
to be solved, a code to be broken. Without words, I can sense but not apprehend. With a word filter I can capture, and communicate to others if I wish, one or more aspects of the wine. I only know what I can articulate. Or do I?
Language frees me to know and to speak. Or does it confine me? If I find tea, tar, and leather, have I thereby limited my experience? Have I allowed a myriad of perceptions and sensations to rush by in my zeal to gain a bit of control? Have
I given birth to a mouse, one that roars? Admittedly, the power of naming can simultaneously open and close. If I come upon a host of yellow flowers in a Wordsworthian field, do I appreciate the flowers more because I know them to be called
daffodils? If I can say this boulder I'm walking by is granite and those flecks in it are quartz, is my experience the richer for it? I'm going to say yes. And if I can apply, say, four or five different nouns and adjectives to the wine,
rather than just one or two, does that enhance my experience? Yes. Does it mean the wine is of high quality? Yes. Let's consider two Costco-purchased wines, a 2013 Au Contraire chardonnay from Sonoma's Russian River Valley and a 2012
La Crema chardonnay from the Sonoma coast. Of the Au Contraire, which The Wine Enthusiast rated a 93, the bottle label says "Just another California chardonnay? Au Contraire! This Russian River Chardonnay is bright green-gold
in color , with enticing aromas of lemon, pear, and apple followed by a floral note of jasmine. Well-integrated French Oak lends a hint of brioche and toast. On the palate, there is a focused purity with balanced acidity and minerality; the finish
is refreshing and elegant. Ideal with shellfish, cream sauces, roasted chicken, cheeses, and zesty vegetable dishes." Of the La Crema, which rated a 91, the laconic bottle label says "Cool climate vineyard. Artisan Winemaking.
Exquisite Chardonnay." I pour a splash of each. Au Contraire is indeed green-gold in color; La Crema, coincidentally enough, also green-gold (so many chardonnays are!). Employing the label's lexical filters in order, I enjoy the green-gold
as I swirl the wine, but cannot believe that color has any bearing on quality. Green-gold is no better, no worse, than plain gold or yellow or butter or daffodil or watery urine. And surely the wine would taste as good to the sightless as well
as the sighted. I swirl again and sniff the Au Contraire. The aroma is clean, untainted by traces of anything unpleasant, and fruity. I fail to scent lemon and pear, but I do get apple. I don't get anything as exotic as jasmine. I
do catch a hint of oak and agree that it is well-integrated, not dominant. I do not sense anything like the eggy, buttery quality of brioche, but I can sense the ever so slightly singed quality of plain white toast. The La Crema, on
the other hand, fairly reeks of oak, with just a hint of vanilla to ameliorate it. I sip, suck air over the Au Contraire, swirl it in my mouth, and swallow. I get a combination of tart apple on the tip of my tongue and--there it is , now--softer,
syrupy (which is not for me a pejorative term in this case) pear sliding off the tongue's edges. Is there a pucker-making lemon tartness as well? Not for me. I'm settling for (and that may be a problem, because there must be so much
more in there that I cannot identify) essences of Granny Smith apple and Bartlett pear. Still no jasmine. I suppose there is a focused purity on the palate, if that means nothing unwanted or extraneous. If balanced acidity essentially means
not too acidic, then yes, I agree, it does have that combination of the tart and the syrupy. Minerality? That term seems vague to me. Does it mean something metallic? When I dissolve a multiple vitamin pill--which, according to the
label, among other things contains zinc, manganese, tin, copper, chromium, silicon, and selenium--and sample the result I seem to taste some rather dull combination of spinach, alfalfa, and chalk. Happily, I don't taste that--or anything metallic--in
the wine. When I taste the La Crema, I get that strong oak tinged with vanilla plus a bit of paint thinner which, strangely enough, is pleasing in a bluff, almost confrontational way. After swallowing the Au Contraire, I wonder what a refreshing
finish is and if it is even a desirable goal. Are we looking for a tonic? However, although I don't know what refreshing means, I do find that the sensations linger after I swallow and that they are very pleasant indeed. I guess I'm willing
to call that elegance. The La Crema hits hard from the beginning and maintains its assault to the end. It is certainly less subtle and insinuating than the Au Contraire, but its power is quite likeable in its own way. And, on the second and
third days, it remains its brash self, whereas the Au Contraire is in retreat, going from subtle to bland. With both wines, the use of language at once helps and hinders my appreciation. Even though I identify primarily apple and pear in the Au Contraire,
it would be absurd to concoct a blend of apple and pear juices in my kitchen and expect it to resemble the Au Contraire. There is so much more that is to me unnamable yet somehow knowable in that wine. Both wines, in my judgment, merit their
ratings--but then I do my judging at that nexus where Sherlock Holmes and Inspector Clouseau compare their findings and each case is pronounced both open and shut.