Wine Notes & Comments on a Monday Morning
As I am wrapping up a much-needed vacation, here are a couple of stories that caught my eye
From WAPO via Morning Brew: “France is about to spend about $216 million destroying nearly 80 million gallons of surplus wine. Higher production costs and shrinking demand have made it impossible for French wineries to sell their ‘spiked grape juice’ for a profit, even if it does have tantalizing hints of oak and leather. The average French citizen drinks about 40 liters of wine per year, compared to 136 liters in 1926.”
PG: Morning Brew being aimed at a younger crowd, I was struck by the snide commentary apparently added to the basic news story about the French dumping wine. “Spiked grape juice” and “tantalizing hints of oak and leather” sound like something your 20-something child or grandchild might come up with while ordering their non-alcoholic shrub. Not to overthink this, but along with its other woes – oversupply, vastly increased non-wine competition for recreational highs, skyrocketing prices and/or palate-deadening blandness – wine is facing a pushback against the tastes of anyone associated with Boomer culture.
Consider this headline on found this morning on a lifestyle-oriented website out of Hong Kong: “Alcohol? Gen Z are saying no. Beer drinking, wine and cocktail consumption are all on the decline among the TikTok generation – wellness, even cannabis could be why.”
Reasons cited: “Experts suggest why there is a move away from alcohol among Gen Z, from drinking less to none at all. Among the explanations – Covid pandemic rules that stopped young people gathering to socialize, a focus on fitness and wellness, and a turn towards other drugs.”
From Medievalists.net: “What was the best wine in the Middle Ages? When medieval people chose what wine to drink, they might check its color, smell and taste. More importantly, the choice was often an individual one based on what was the healthiest drink for them.”
PG: The article summarizes a technical paper from Harvard professor and food historian Allen Grieco. It was published it back in 2009 under the title “Medieval and Renaissance Wines: Taste, Dietary Theory, and How to Choose the ‘Right’ Wine (14th-16th Centuries)”. Much of his research came from Italian medical texts of the time, and the conclusions reached had to do with various scientific theories and advice regarding healthy options.
Not being one who closely follows research into food history, I was pleased to see the material pop up in a much more readable form. To summarize a few of the key points:
• Meals and drinks much maintain a balance among four ‘qualities’ – hot, cold, dry and wet
• Color and aroma were important indicators. One doctor advised patients to “always shake the wine first in the glass and put their nose to it in order to judge it.”
• Wine could have many more than the salty, sweet, tart, bitter and umami flavors we know today. In fact, as many as thirteen different types including strong and sweet, bitter and weak, fat, vinegary and brusque.
• Drinkers were also advised to consider the food (cold or hot), the season and their age (no hot wine for old people!).
In sum, there were many variables to consider when choosing your wine, made more difficult by far as none of them were rated on the 100 point scale. One cautionary note pointed out that “there are different types of wines since some of them are new wines, some old ones, some white, some red, some sweet austere, some raw, some cooked, some navigated, others not navigated, some odorous, others lacking odors, some from the mountains, others from the valleys, some powerful, others weak, some fine, others gross, some tasty, others insipid…”
I am beyond baffled by navigated vs. not navigated, though the rest of it makes a bit of sense. That said, it would take another 500 years before Robert Parker made everyone’s life easier by assigning numbers to wines as the most (often only) meaningful criterium for purchase. Whether for better or worse, the 100 point scale has simplified things for both trade and consumer clients. For wineries whose efforts have not received the requisite high scores, I suggest they adopt their own system, based entirely on the science of the middle ages, with particular attention to navigation!
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