Wine rant
2001-08-15 @ 9:58 a.m.
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Just a short note to let you know I haven't dropped off the earth (or quit cooking). I have been exhausted lately from job work and work around the house. I've made a couple of dishes lately that I want to share with you, but I haven't had the time or energy to sit down here and record them. Last night I had a great meal planned and got home so tired and headachy that Badsnake had to go pick up pizza.
Job work has been particularly exhausting lately. New wines are coming out so we have tastings galore. I know, it sounds glamorous. But we taste just as many bad wines at those things as we do good wines. We taste way more boring wines, not bad just not interesting, than we do good wines that inspire us to sell them. I have been doing a lot of reading and studying on wine lately to supplement all the tasting. I'm getting much more involvled in my vocation.
Here is a good wine retail story. Monday I spent a lovely morning with a dog on my lap reading about wines from Alsace. I went to work feeling relaxed and knowledgeable. When a customer asked me to help her with wine I was ready. She had picked out a couple of Sauvignon Blancs to take to a barbecue. In retrospect I should have let her stick with the wines she had. I like Sauvignon Blanc a lot myself, and they would have been okay at the barbecue. But I had to suggest she try for a notch or two better. I suggested a dry ros�. It's one of my favorite summer wines with food because it has enough body to match up to some of the heavier foods, like barbecue, but you can serve it cold. I am fully aware that most people see pink wine and think white Zinfindel. I consider it part of my job to introduce people to new wines. Wine is a adventure. So I tell people all about dry ros�, the real ros�, and how well it matches with food. Still many people turn up their noses and refuse to try it, which she did.
Okay. I move on to my next recommendation which is an Alsace Muscat. It comes in the long, flute shaped bottle like German wine (which I also happen to love), and people who are prejudice against any sort of sweet wine usually turn up their noses. (Yes I know that some people really don't like sweet wines, even the ones that have enough lovely acid to balance the sweetness. But frankly most wine buyers these days buy based on fashion rather than taste.) Wines from Alsace are often very dry, however. They have the body of the German wines without the sweetness. But this chick had the nerve to ask me if I had one with less of a "Disneyland lable." Not knowing what the hell she meant by that, I asked. She said there were too many labels on the wine. I did not bother to explain to her that the extra band across the bottle was for an award the wine had won. I pointed to another wine from Alsace next to it. She didn't like that label either. Finally, giving up, I wanted to say, "never mind, go enjoy your Sauvignon Blanc." But I had started this thing and I had to come up with something. I finally found a white Rhone-style blend by Joseph Phelps called Pastische (I think that's spelled right), and she bought it. But I think the only reason she did was because it was in a Chardonnay-style bottle. If she likes it, she will probably come back and ask for "that Pastische Chardonnay." Many wine buyers still think all white wines are Chardonnay. Is that better or worse than when they thought all white wines were Chablis and all red wines were Burgundy?
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