Transcriber: Eunice Tan Reviewer: David DeRuwe
I was leading a night of wine education,
also known as wine edutainment,
earlier this year at a private residence -
one of the many things I do here in the Northwest
in the wonderful world of wine.
The group was all a group of ladies gathered together on a Friday night
to celebrate their friend's 40th birthday party.
You can just imagine the scene:
a group of women,
Friday night,
bonding deeper and deeper with each sip of wine.
Can almost hear the chatter getting louder and louder.
Now, this group of ladies, you could -
it would be easy -
you could almost stereotype women in general
as being the blind consumers of this age-old drink
and men being the purchasers,
poring over their glossy trade publications,
trying to decide which 94-point plus Robert Parker wine
to stuff in their cellar.
But in all actuality and statistically,
from year after year,
after all the data comes in and all the research comes in,
women, at almost 60%,
dominate the purchase of and consumption of wine
in the United States.
First wine myth:
men dominate the consumer world of wine.
Busted.
Now, this 40th birthday party,
it really did represent a unique opportunity
to talk with a captive audience about the world of wine myths.
So each and every one of us in the audience -
if you've ever had a glass of wine
or been "forced" to make a purchase of wine
either in a restaurant or in a retail environment -
have come across some sort of barrier to that decision-making process
or at least felt that rush of information overload
when it comes down to making a decision about wine.
For example,
what kind of wine will go with my entrée?
Should I choose this $25 bottle on the retail shelf?
It says "Reserve,"
but I don't even know what "Reserve" means.
What about this tasting note that says I should be experiencing
"the scent of freshly laundered linen sheets drying in the wind,"
(Laughter)
but when all I get is something that vaguely smells of fruit?
Am I even worthy of buying this wine or drinking this wine?
Am I worthy?
So without any prompting about the discussion of myth,
this one woman at this birthday party came up to me just gushing,
"Sarah, it must be so romantic to work in the wine industry.
Wine is truly an art form, isn't it?"
I will totally give in to part of this myth.
It's true that those grape growers and winemakers out there
who are producing location-based wines
are leveraging the inherent beauty and intrinsic sense of place
of where wine grapes are grown.
That's true.
And they are nurturing along nature's path in the creation of wine.
But A,
if a winemaker or grape grower is formally trained in university,
he or she obtains a degree or certificate
in viticulture or oenology.
These are science degrees, not art degrees.
B, grapes are a type of fruit.
Fruit is grown in the ground in dirt, all right?
In dirt.
It takes a lot of labor, both physical and mechanical,
to grow grapes,
harvest grapes,
magically turn these grapes into wine
before you actually physically pump the final product into a bottle.
Sounds pretty romantic, right?
Wine is hard work,
and it is a long and arduous process,
and it employs thousands of people in Washington state every year.
And think about all that equipment it takes to grow grapes and harvest grapes
and make wine.
I do not envy the debt load that many farmers and winemakers carry
in order to put those bottles on our tables.
But back to the romantic part.
Wine is not a -
or grapes, rather, are not a generic commodity
like corn or wheat, for example.
There's no public manual out there
on how to grow the perfect grape and make the perfect bottle of wine
in every climate.
So maybe, just maybe,
there is a little bit of art involved in the creation of wine.
I'll give people that.
Myth:
the wine world is made up of fairies waving their magical wine wands around.
When in truth,
the winemaking and grape-growing process is a long and dirty and laborious one.
And it is awesome and very powerful.
But when you're in the middle of that process,
it is not romantic at all
unless you like exhaustion and grungy, grungy clothes.
So think about that - it's a lot of work.
At this 40th birthday party,
I was approached by a woman,
a dentist from the area.
And she came up to me, and she wanted to know
how I had paired every wine with every course for the night.
Great question - love these kind of questions.
Being a dentist, she was scientifically oriented,
and she wanted to know
the absolute rules and regulations behind wine and food pairings.
And fair enough -
as a person who loves wine and who also loves to cook,
I have spent a long time in the kitchen thinking about this exact subject.
And I've come to the conclusion,
along with one of my favorite wine writers Karen MacNeil,
that wine and food pairings
have very little connection with the reality of our lives.
We aren't laboriously poring over every meal,
every dish,
every bottle of wine,
and what goes with what
7 days a week,
52 weeks out of the year,
365 days.
It just doesn't happen.
So back to the dentist.
She specifically wanted to know why I had paired Pinot Noir with salmon,
because white wine goes with fish, right?
Everyone knows that.
Sometimes when I'm in the mood for an easy-breezy domestic rosé
with some hints of and aromatics of candied apples,
I'll pair that with my salmon.
But other times when I'm more in the mood for something a little bit more robust,
I'll pick a medium-bodied Pinot Noir from the Willamette Valley
to go with my salmon.
Ahi tuna too.
But what about catfish?
Catfish has white meat,
but when slathered in Cajun spices and blackened,
I immediately think Zinfandel.
However, there are a few scientifically based "rules"
that one can follow when it comes to wine and food pairings.
For example,
artichokes and asparagus have compounds in them
which react negatively with wine.
Artichokes have an amino acid that make wine taste metallic,
and no one wants their wine to taste metallic.
So try to shy away from artichokes and wine.
Asparagus when cooked gives off this relatively horrible aroma
that is associated with being a fault in wine.
So those two don't really go together.
A lot of our leafy greens and healthy veggies like broccoli,
those contain sulfur that when cooked are released,
and that doesn't go well with wine either.
Busted.
When it comes down to wine and food pairings,
just go with your gut.
Trust yourself and your own palate.
You are intrinsically going to know what pairs with every dish
if you want to pair it with wine.
You really will.
And if you have not tried
an off-dry Riesling with pad thai,
you almost must immediately go out and do that, because that's awesome.
(Laughter)
It's a delicious combination.
So we're still at this 40th birthday party
where I'm the wine lady for the night,
and I hear someone in the background pipe up,
"I cannot drink any more wine
because the sulfites in wine give me a headache."
So this is a hotbed of discussion in the wine myth world,
and people are clutching on to this myth and holding it so tight to their chest,
and they're depriving themselves of precious, precious glasses of wine.
(Laughter)
So let's chat about sulfites.
Sulfites are a chemical, it's true.
And it is a naturally occurring chemical that happens -
it's a naturally occurring byproduct of fermentation.
So every single bottle of wine produced in this world
contains sulfites naturally.
There's been a lot of research about the effects of sulfites on the human body.
But sulfites - please know that sulfites exist all around us.
They're in those crackers you had last night at dinner.
They're in the jelly you put on your English muffin this morning.
That bag of dried apricots -
if you've got one of those running around -
those probably contain more sulfites than a bottle of wine.
The winemaking process typically adds a little bit of sulfites
but not a ton.
And it's true
that there is a histamine in wine
that can cause some sort of reaction in people -
typically not a headache, but sometimes.
And it's also true that sulfites are proven to be a true allergy
in about 1% of the population,
but just one.
If you are getting a reaction when you're drinking,
chances are it's because of something else.
Maybe there's another chemical reaction going on in your body.
Maybe you're dehydrated -
being dehydrated and drinking alcohol can give you a headache.
Or maybe you've just drunk too much,
(Laughter)
and maybe it's time to own up to that.
(Laughter)
But trust me, the research is out there:
sulfites don't give you a headache.
So wine myth
"I can't drink any more wine because the sulfites give me a headache" -
busted.
And please keep drinking wine -
you'll keep me in a job.
Do it.
So back to the birthday party.
One of my favorite things to do when I'm leading wine education events
is work with the official UC Davis tasting wheel.
And it's a really fun thing to do.
We get a wine or a number of different wines,
and we put them all together,
and we go through what each individual's experience is
looking at the wine, tasting the wine, smelling the wine,
and we compare it to what we maybe "should be tasting" on the aroma wheel.
And then we'll go through,
and I'll read aloud an official tasting note
to see where everyone's opinions come in.
So this can be a little daunting for the average Joe consumer.
I mean, not everyone's a professional taster of wine.
But I've found a disturbing reoccurrence
when I play this fun party trick at wine education nights.
People are really hesitant to talk about what they're experiencing with wine.
It's as if they don't feel like they have a refined enough palate
to even have an opinion or a voice about what they're seeing,
what they're smelling, and what they're tasting.
And this is a really disturbing thing:
not having the courage to have your own voice
when you're tasting something like wine, right?
So wine isn't a simple product;
it's profoundly complex, really, if you think about it.
But we're just drinking wine, right?
So we go through this Cabernet Franc that I'd chosen from the Columbia Valley,
collect all the responses,
and then we look at the official tasting note
from "Wine Enthusiast" magazine.
And it's very flowery and, you know, full of lots of descriptors -
I'll shorten it down here.
"This particular Cabernet Franc,
it displayed super-concentrated black cherry notes.
It was dark and smoky.
It had nuances of char and earth."
You know, balance, tannins, yada yada ya.
I'm not entirely anti the point system,
nor am I anti tasting notes.
Wine is a very objective as well as subjective product,
and tasting notes, for example,
give people a point of reference to work with
if they don't know where they're at.
So no problem there.
But just because a wine professional gives a wine 91 points
doesn't mean you have to fall in love with it.
I mean, it doesn't mean that at all.
That's just someone giving it a 91-point score.
As one of my favorite wine writers Karen MacNeil put it,
"Liking a wine is simply liking a wine."
It doesn't mean it's great or not.
So if you like a wine,
by all means, keep on drinking it
and embrace the fact that you like that wine.
Maybe someone else didn't, but it doesn't matter.
So going back to this Cabernet Franc.
Eight out of the ten people fell in love with it;
two people didn't.
Four out of the ten had never had a Cabernet Franc before
and indicated that they were going to buy it again.
So that's pretty exciting.
And then we all discussed how our palates -
we all perceive things differently.
I mean, our mouths are made up
of thousands of different taste buds and taste receptors,
and how we bring in all this information about wine
is through our eyes, our nose, our mouth.
What we smell is all going to be different;
how we each individually perceive a wine is going to be dramatically different.
Don't think that you have to be a professional taster of wine to enjoy it.
I've spent two and a half years
in professional tasting certificate programs
and wine business school,
plus countless hours and days
of on-the-job training and off-the-job reading,
to learn how to professionally critique wine
and understand the intricacies of wine and wine business.
But don't go down my route unless you want a second career
or to seriously kill your own wine buzz.
(Laughter)
You just don't want to do it.
Don't fret about not knowing "the proper way" to enjoy wine.
Have the courage to step outside your own boundaries
and taste one of the 10,000 plus vinifera grape varieties in the world
even if you can't pronounce their names.
And enjoy wine for what it is:
an agriculturally-based product
that is bottled around the world
and consumed by millions of people just like you.
And don't let a lack of knowledge
or perceived lack of knowledge
get in the way of your own personal enjoyment of wine.
And this is the ultimate wine myth busted.
Thank you very much.
(Applause)