On Monday I had a nice little chat with our Sommelier/Wine Manager at work who has taught me most of what I know about wine. I said to him "I still don't know a lot of things. I need to learn more -- sometimes clients ask me fancy questions and I have no idea what to say to them... But I am starting to get snobbier in my wine choices. I don't really know how to describe them, but I am starting to be able to taste what's good and what's not." To my surprise he told me "that's good -- that's really what's most important."
I think my new-found love for wine knowledge is greatly attributed to him. He's very nice & encouraging about what I should know and it makes me feel less afraid of it. I've gone to wine tastings where everyone has their nose in the air, smelling the "delectable, yet not over-stated aroma of..." and I'm like "there's what in this?" Yet when someone says "oh, well when the wine's too cold, it doesn't allow you to taste a lot of the flavours." Well, I can understand that and suddenly it doesn't seem like such a bad idea to try it at a warmer temperature. Not to mention, when you finally do get to try a decent wine, served at the proper temperature, you start to try to taste what everyone's talking about.
Despite all the good habits I'm trying to acquire, one thing I've found that's fun to do is buy a bottle of wine a week to test my own knowledge of wine and what I'm learning. This week, I picked up another bottle with fancy writing -- Cotes du Rhone. I was leery of any French import that was only $5.99 (at Trader Joe's). I gave it a try last night. It was kind of awful. It's a dry-er wine, which I knew and I don't particularly like, but some of them have a smooth finish which I can appreciate. It didn't. I've left it uncorked hoping it will aerate for a few days like my sweet red wine from Robertson Winery, South Africa did. That actually turned out to be a very enjoyable wine for $10.99 -- nearly double the price (but still affordable). I'm much more fond of whites than reds so depending on what else I find (I'll try not to let the fancy writing impair my judgement), I may not be buying anymore cheap reds. I'm hoping on second try, possibly paired with a nice meal, that this wine will improve. But honestly, I doubt it.
On my wine adventures and samplings, I believe I will try to read more. Our Sommelier gave me a book he said was excellent and really got him into wine. He said it wasn't pretentious and pretty straight forward and easy to read. I think I may get it when I get my next paycheck or two. (I'm trying very hard to be financially responsible. And it is, in fact, very hard.) It's called "Windows on the World: The Complete Wine Course" by Kevin Zraly (available on amazon.com for only $9.98)
I think it will be fun to compare my ability to shop for myself (and friends) and what I could learn from this book. Maybe, despite my goals to be on a super diet & lose 20 lbs in the next 2 months, to write & publish short stories, blog consistently, create websites, a business plan for this idea I have and become more organized, it seems at the rate I'm going I may just leave 2012 as nothing more than a betch with a classy wine list.
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