The FIve Senses of Wine

Earlier this week, in one of my most viewed posts, I wrote about a sense of place. While it is a real sense, you get there with wine (or food or other drinks) by transporting yourself to that special little world. I'm going to go out on a limb by saying that people tend to like that wine that brings them to one of their favorite places whether that is the beach, the mountains, a quaint little town in your favorite country to visit, or even home sweet home.

To truly get there, however, you need all five classic senses and sometimes even a sixth one (does the experience lift you up or bring you down), or at the very least, as many as you can get yourself to conjure up at the moment. And, I'm going to claim that the more of those senses you can happily bring to the fore, the more likely you are to enjoy that wine. Conversely, if the senses bring you unpleasant feelings, it could be a $1,000 bottle of wine, but you're not going to like it.

Let's start with an experience that brings you down. And, while I could give you enough information to identify the winery in question, I'll leave those details out. 

Walking into the winery, you're greeted by some boisterous individuals who tell you they started this winery because they love the feeling the alcohol gives them. That's why they also have a brewery and a distillery. The tasting room is busy, but mostly with people walking around, telling crude jokes, and generally making lots of noise. We ask what is available to taste and they give us the usual about getting five wines for some amount of money and you get to keep the tasting glasses. And, if you buy two bottles, the tasting is free.

The first hint that is not going to be a great wine experience is the order of pouring. They are starting with the Merlot, then the Cabernet Sauvignon, followed by the Zinfandel, the Chardonnay, and the Reserve Chardonnay. This is bad because starting with the heavier red wines, your palate will be overwhelmed before you get to the Chardonnay. 

The first three wines were okay, but barely. There was nothing overly offensive about them, but they had none of the characeristics we look for. However, we had been told that they were saving the Chardonnay for last because that is what they are known for. And, in particular, the Reserve Chardonnay using their own techniques had won over the locals.

The bottle was nice enough. Small samples of the Reserve Chardonnay were poured for us. The wine had an unusual visual to it. The color was not consistent. I remarked about it. The proprietor explained that this was a hallmark of the wine in that the swirl in it made it visually appealing. 

Okay!

We smelled the wine. Have you ever changed the oil in your car? If so, have you smelled the oil that you've drained?

The proprietor explained his winemaking process. Notable was that the grapes were aged for 27 months, he thought, in new American oak. From there it was bottled and immediately ready for sale. 

Whoa!

Have you ever tasted that motor oil that you drained? (No, I haven't.)

This wine did give me a sense of place. It gave me the sense of an auto repair shop just as I was about to spend more money repairing a car than the car was worth. That's not my happy place. And, to close out this saga, no we did not buy two bottles to get our tasting fee waived.

Right down that road from that lovely winery, we found another one. This one had better be good. Visually, it was quote pleasing. The single building housing the tasting room as well as the crush pad, fermentation tanks, barrels, racking area, and everything else looked new, but it also looked old. Built in what the proprietor referred to as an Italian Gothic style, 

We were greeted by a 30-ish bearded man (frankly, he looked more like he was only possibly old enough to drink) in cutoff shorts. He asked if he could help us and after exchanging a few pleasantries, we asked if we could taste wine. One of us asked if we might have some time with the wienmaker. His response was, "You've got him."

We were the only ones in the tasting room, housed in the building that he and a few friends had constructed from the ground up. He explained that while in school, he had worked summers and harvests at lower-end California wineries. But, wanting more, he got an apprenticeship in the Barossa Valley region of Australia. After that, he came home and set about to build a winery.

The building was constructed so that the sun shone in from multiple angles, but not to get in your eyes at the tasting bar. Soft music played. Everything was calming. As he poured our first sampling, he talked about his path to getting to his newly-opened winery. He also talked about his winemaking. While he knew he was in a relatively unknown wine area, he sought to appeal to the more refined wine drinker.

His bartop was white. As he explained, and as we knew, this was so that we could see the color and clarity of the wine when holding it up against that backdrop. While each wine was different than the others, each had a pleasant scent -- the Sauvignon Blanc somewhat grassy with faint citrus notes, the Tempranillo a bit earthy and leathery, the Zinfandel rich and filled with aromas of ripe berries, and the Cabernet Sauvignon loaded licorice and cassis. Each, in its own way, when combined with the soft music and the rays of sunlight brought us to a happy place.

Finally, the last two senses -- the taste and the feel. Each of the wines was quite enjoyable. The flavors of each were expressions of the individual grapes. And, each gave us the desire to let the wine linger on the palate. There, the Sauvignon Blanc gave us the stark minerality of the local high desert soil. The Cabernet, in particular, still young and supple, gave us the chewy mouth feel of a high-end steak.

The experience worked. We walked up and saw a pleasing looking building, heard relaxing music, saw rays of natural sunlight, saw wines that looked like the winemaker had taken great care, got interesting and pleasant scents, pleasant tastes that made us imagine the foods we would eat with them, and even had mouth feel that encouraged food. The proprietor-winemaker was engaging. The experience he created worked on all of our senses.

So, when you choose a wine, it doesn't need to be about what the critics say or what I say. Choose a wine that makes you happy. Choose a wine that engages all of your senses ... in a good way.