Monday, February 7, 2011

Whining About Wine



So today i want to talk about wine, well really I want to try to understand wine?  No, No, I got it, you drink it with or without food and it makes you happy and drunk.  What I don't understand is this whole complex world that surrounds wine.  Like how you are supposed to look at it, the way you are supposed to smell and taste it.  On the surface it appears to me to be a little snobbish and too fancy for me, or is it?

Lets face it I am a pretty simple guy who can smell BS from a mile a way and I don't like to be handed a pile of crap and be told its roses.  With that said, when we got to tasting the wine today in Mixology class I felt a little left out.  Left out because I wasn't buying into the whole pomp and circumstances that is the five minute dance of tasting wine.  I guess I felt like a snob doing it and I hate feeling that way, its not me.  So when people were sniffing the wine to identify it automatics I wasn't smelling a thing.  I guess I wouldn't let myself just make up something that wasn't true.  While fellow classmates were smelling bananas and currents I was confused because for me it was still just grapes and rubbing alcohol.

Maybe the wine culture is too complicated for me, maybe I don't fit in to this lifestyle.  Wait, maybe there was a way to make wine simple.  A way to make it more accessible to people who don't want to be uber geeks about it, instead they just wants to sit down and enjoy some wine without feeling they need to be wearing ascot and a fur coat.  The only problem with this idea is that I think the complexity of wine is why all the fancy people like it, the idea of it being so complicated that they are the only people that could possibly explain it to you is what makes them feel special. Its like the IT guy at work who comes down to your cubical to fix your computer, and then decides to spend an hour telling you everything he knows about computers and how he would father Steve Jobs baby if they could.  So how do I learn more about wine without getting caught up in the crazy world of tannins and terroir?

I am still working on that last question, this is going to be a journey that will probably result in me spending too much on wine and embracing the nasty morning wine headache.  So I will keep you up to date.  For now I guess I need to find a good place to buy good wine.

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