The Demystification Of Wine

Look...I'm sick and tired of all those people out there who profess to be connoisseurs or aficionados...or whatever you call yourselves...

Wine is meant to be enjoyed...not used as some kind of status symbol.

It's ghastly that you have to resort to a litany of metaphors and jargon just to express how much you love or hate a wine...just because you know what a bouquet or a vintage means doesn't give you the mandate to make non-drinkers appear as some inferior sub-species of homo sapien...

eg." This Chardonnay has an intense nose (vague, ambigous term that is somewhat similar to bouquet) ...fruity bouquet with hints of Rosemary, Apricots and Sage (hullo! It's wine...not fruit salad)...Firm, well-defined legs-a sure sign of strong character (?)...Perfectly balanced...but veering towards a crisp acidity whilst imbued with a strong tannic feel (clearly, the wine is schizophrenic...)...Excellent Finish (Oh Yeah? so what makes it so excellent? Bet you don't know...)...Reminds me of the summer I spent vacationing at the Margeret River at Perth...You know...with the Black Swans, the Rainbow trout and the Maples along the banks (The oldest trick in the book...saying that this wine brings back some pleasant memory...Point of Info...Maples grow in Canada, not Perth...)

Oh, and Chardonnay happens to be a type of grape...not exactly a wine...even though wine labels may have "Chardonnay" brazenly emblazoned on them...

Stop it! You are making the whole drinking experience intimidating and unpleasant...I've had the bad fortune of meeting a few phoneys in the course of wine appreciation...They think they are experts because they have read about a few wine-related terms.They believe themselves to be culturally superior to the rest of humanity...They try to impress ignorant, naive girls with their lyricsm...they pretend to be well travelled and exposed to the different wine cultures of Europe, Australia and The Americas...they beguile...they confuse...and they portray themselves as the beatified guardians of some sacred knowledge...It's appalling to see them act like intellectual aristocrats...

but blindfold them and they can't even taste the difference between Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon...By the way, if you can't tell the difference, close your eyes and concentrate on the bouquet...C.S. is the wine that has blackcurrant hints...i.e. smells like Ribena.

My principle of enjoying wine is very simple...

"If you like it, it's good...If you don't, it's not good..."

Sadly, wine has been over-romanticized...Too many adjectives are used to describe properties that don't even belong to wine...I've heard people who describe wine to be "buttery" and "smoky"...Everybody is entitled to his opinion...but too many times I've heard people who use fancy words just to impress...at the risk of information overloading...

I don't mean to launch into an emotional tirade against these wine snobs...but I believe that the man-on-the-street should not find wine too inaccessible just because a few childish individuals make wine-tasting seem complicated subject...

To make things simpler...here's a short glossary...