wine whine. taste test

Shock! Horror! Edinburgh Science Festival conducted blind wine tasting which revealed half of drinkers could not tell the difference between an 'expensive' wine and a 'cheap' one. The conclusion was that therefore most people bought wine according to the label and were paying too much.

So far, so good, but then you read on to discover how they were defining the wines. Apart from a couple of champagnes the BBC report said "varieties tasted were shiraz, rioja, claret, pinot grigio and sauvignon blanc." Hmmmmm, this shows the quality of BBC wine reporters (and possibly Edinburgh scientists). Of the above mentioned, shiraz, pinot grigio and sauvignon blanc are not wines but grape varieties, rioja is a geographic appelation (although it does also contain stipulations on grape varieties) while claret is simply an old English name  for an red Bordeaux. Elsewhere it was stated that the 'wines' included "merlot and chardonnay". Again these are NOT wines, but grape varieties.

In short what the survey, as reported, revealed was that most people who buy wine - and quite a few who write about it - know nothing at all about it, and usually order according to the grape variety, which in itself is a travesty as the best wines are almost exclusively blends.

Yes, a St Emilion will have more merlot than a Médoc or a Graves, but it will still contain (usually) an element of Cabernet Sauvignon and maybe Cabernet Franc. A great wine is a great blend. It is a work of art, not just fermented wine juice. The survey suggests most people 'don't know much about wine but know what they like', which is of course just fine. But these are not the sort of people to use as barometers for the wine business as a whole, either making or consuming.

Sometimes we get beer made from a single varietal hop, and it can be fun and interesting. But the best beers are also made from several hops, carefully judged to balance acidity and flavour.

It would seem the wine taste conducted in Edinburgh was comparable to a blind lager tasting I once attended to show alcohol-free Kaliber could not be distinguished from the other alcohol-containing varieties on offer. It couldn't. None of them had much taste at all.