The National Wine
UnClub
Newsletter
May/June 2006
Honest Wine
When tasting wine for the purpose of buying new labels for a fine wine shop several points are considered as to whether the wine in question is a right fit for the store's wine program. The professional buyer will of course note the packaging: bottle shape and size (some bottles are too wide or too long for the standard wine rack!) and, most especially, the label appearance: size and clarity of font, label art, and label durability.
Also under consideration is the needfulness of the wine being tasted. Is there a spot on the shelf for it in the particular category where it belongs? If the shop already has three Sancerre wines the thought is "do we need another Sancerre at this time?" (probably not). If the wine is in a minor category by itself, like Greek Mavrodaphne or Italian Vin Santo, then one label of each is usually enough.
However, the point we wish to emphasize here has to do with categories of wine that are quite flush with offerings being produced around the globe, like Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Sauvignon Blanc, or Cabernet Sauvignon. Here a multitude of labels are required to fill out the selection of a fine wine store so a severe selection process is warranted. Besides the above criteria, what delineation is applied to decide what should appear in the wine set?
At this juncture of my monologue you may be thinking - what does this matter to me the consumer? Well, when the consumer of fine wine realizes that there is a vast ocean of wine available for their choosing they begin to understand that a little help finding the 'real thing' from the commercial look-alike is a good thing! It's like determining which gem is real when looking at a bowl with one bonafide diamond and dozens of crystaline cubic zirconian stones. If you're paying the money for the gemstone you want to know it's a genuine diamond.
With wine, this concept of real is a little harder to define; it's a bit more subjective. It's more like fine art as compared to commercial art. You may hate the abstract work of a Picasso whilst you truly love your Adobe Photo-Shop abstracts, both fitting within a category, yet the former is a one-of-a-kind masterpiece worth millions and the latter can be reproduced in seconds with a point and a click. You're free to like one over the other as that is the way things are with human nature.
Wine made by artisans utilizing the rare fusion of a particular climate, soil, and mature vineyard can be compared with the Picasso work of art. A monumental wine from a great vintage can be that way. Connoisseurs will pay thousands of dollars for single bottles of wine in this rarified category. Drop a name like Chateau Cheval Blanc '82 in such a circle of aficionados and watch the excitement factor immediately raise the roof!
OK, most of us aren't connoisseurs of wine at such an exhorbitant level of appreciation; does this mean that we're stuck with the common commercial wine that costs a mere pittance but lacks artisanal flair? Thank goodness, this is not true! Excellent 'hand-made' wines exist at nearly every price point. This brings us back to the efforts of the professional wine buyer making selections for his/her wine shop.
I prefer the term honest when referring to these wonderful discoveries of affordable, small production wines. Tasting a wine of this nature is a revelation of the glory of nature handled expertly by a passionate winemaker/vigneron to produce a wine of exceptional character regardless of whatever the final price may be. Jean Descombes produces his Morgon wine of Beaujolais with this level of dedication yet his wine will never sell for more than $20 on the shelf!
We believe it is our duty to seek out these wines and offer them to a commercial wine-weary public. How often we hear people say: "I can't drink another New World Chardonnay!" only to hear their tune change when they taste a Chardonnay produced in classic regions like Puligny Montrachet in Burgundy. When it comes to wine, as in life in general, "honesty is the best policy"!
Cheers!
Donald W. White