Pleasure
by Charles M. Bear Dalton
For many years, I have both heard and used the phrase “The first duty of a
wine is to be red.” Which is an interesting concept that points to a greater
truth – that ultimate satisfaction is almost always found in red wines – but not
true in itself. I have an acquaintance in Bordeaux (something of a dirty old
man but he is French so it is tolerated) who says that “Champagne and white
wine are teasing and titillation but red wine is satisfaction.” I get his point. But
I will allow that sometimes “teasing and titillation” are the order of the day.
Sometimes I say “The first duty of a wine is to be drunk.” - which is closer
to true but maybe not always completely so. Some wines – say a bottle of Dom
Perignon on a date, or a bottle of 1982 Ch. Lafite in a Chinese business
negotiation – have a duty to impress before they get to the duty of being
drunk. In these two – and not just a few other cases (such as a hopefullynever-to-be-drunk magnum of Screaming Eagle broiling under a halogen lamp
in an otherwise appropriately cool River Oaks wine cellar) – the name and the
bottle and maybe the vintage become symbols and in many cases, that symbol
may be more important than the actual intrinsic quality of the wine.
As an aside, I used to call on Tony’s (the old Tony’s on Post Oak where Mo’s is
now) for Glazer’s. This was back in 1984 - 1985 when I was about twentyfive-or-so-years-old and knew EVERYTHING there was to know about wine.
Over a period of several weeks, Tony Vallone and I were having a running
argument about the real worth of a bottle of Dom Perignon. I was unconvinced that it could be worth as much as its price tag and he was convinced (it
turned out rightly) that I just didn’t get it. One night I walked into his
restaurant at about 10pm. When he saw me, he grabbed me by the arm, pulled
me around the corner so I could see into the restaurant, pointed, and said
“Look at that.” Across the room, the maître d’ was seating an “older” gentleman (probably about the age I am now) and a younger, very pretty woman who
we will charitably describe as his “niece.” On the table was a chilled bottle of
Dom Perignon. Tony told me that she didn’t know or care about Taittinger
Comtes de Champagne or Krug Grand Cuvee (two of the other luxury cuvee
Champagnes) but she did know about Dom Perignon and that Dom Perignon
was going to get that “older gentleman” where he wanted to go. I have never
forgotten that lesson.
But I digress.
The real truth about wine is this: The primary (if not the first) duty of any
wine is to give pleasure. Pleasure. Pleasure in a refreshing white or a sparkling
wine may come from “cutting the dust” off the end of the day. Pleasure in a
white wine may come from perfectly accompanying a fish course.
Pleasure in a red wine may come from balancing and complementing a
dry-aged, perfectly grilled, medium-rare prime New York strip. Or a
countless number of other combinations. Pleasure in Port may come in
the form of a warming sip from a flask before leaving a duck blind to
walk back to camp on a cold morning. In all cases, a wine – red, white,
or rose; still, sparkling, or fortified – has the primary duty of giving
pleasure. It may impress or appeal or even dazzle, but it must give
pleasure.
That pleasure is in the eye of the beholder or more accurately in the
senses of the taster. The first question I ask myself when I taste – the
question I ask even before considering the fruit or balance or any other
factor of the wine – is “Does this give me pleasure?” If the answer is “No”
I will likely quit tasting then and not drink the wine. If I am tasting
professionally, I continue, and look for the reasons why pleasure fails. Is
the wine bad, is it damaged, or was it presented badly? All could interfere
with the wine showing well enough to give pleasure. If the wine does give
me pleasure, I want to know how and why. What is good about the wine
and why does it appeal to me?
If a wine doesn’t give pleasure, I generally want to know why. Is it the
fault of the wine? Is the wine bad? Was it poorly or artlessly made? Was
the raw material bad or did the winemaker mess it up? Was the wine
improperly stored? Was it kept too cold or did it get too warm while
being shipped or stored? (That previously mentioned magnum of
Screaming Eagle will never give pleasure, as the halogen light shining on
it has ruined it with excess light and heat. It is now “décor” rather than
wine.)
Does a wine suffer from cork taint or another flaw? Was it served at the
wrong temperature or in the wrong sort of glass or with the wrong food?
The answers to all of these questions tell me whether I want to (at some
future date) give the wine another chance. If the raw material is lacking
(too green or too ripe, lacking fruit, out of balance, etc.) or the winemaking is poor or inappropriate (too much oak, too much oxidation, too
much manipulation, etc. – have you ever noticed that winemaking
problems are almost always “too much …” rather than too little?) I will
pass. If the wine in the bottle was damaged by heat or the taste is tainted
by the cork, I’ll give the wine another chance from another, hopefully
unaffected, bottle.
If the wine does give me pleasure, I want to know the “why” of that too.
Is it the fruit (raw material-based), the art (the winemaker’s hand), or
(best yet) a combination of both? It almost goes without saying that a
wine that gives pleasure is well or at least appropriately presented. If I am
at home or in a restaurant, the wine has to be served in proper glasses, the
temperature must be right, and (if appropriate) properly decanted. If I
am in a duck blind, a cool sip from a flask may be appropriate. If we have
just finished riding on a trail ride or at the barn, a red solo cup may be the
vessel of choice. In all cases proper serving temperature is essential. Too
hot is unforgivable. Too cold (as long as the wine is not actually frozen)
can be overcome as the wine will warm in the glass. Eventually.
Both personally and professionally, I want to know what did and didn’t
work because I care about why the wine did or didn’t give me pleasure.
The wine professional in me really cares about the “why” of it all but the
consumer in me (and I am first and foremost a consumer and enjoyer of
wine) is mainly concerned with the essential question: “Did the wine give
me pleasure?” The follow-up question is “what can I take away from this
to get to that pleasure again?”
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I guess in the end, it all boils back down to my friend Lynne’s simple
wine evaluation system: yum or yuck. As I have many times noted, I
taste a LOT of wine. What I don’t always note is that I taste a LOT of
bad wine. Over the last couple of years, the yucks have increased. I think
this is because there is a lot of what I think of as “desperation wine” in
the market - but here again I digress.
Getting back on point: During a recent trip to Bordeaux some of the
Spec’s staff and I got to drink some fancy older vintages of a particular
chateau. Some of the guys seemed overly impressed with the vintages
(and they were fancy vintages) to the point where they seemed to miss
that the wines were (mostly) not very good. That chateau is now a top
performer but during the time of those vintages (notice I am walking on
eggshells here), it wasn’t making very good wines. And these wines also
showed signs of not being properly stored. The name and the vintages
were impressive but the wines did not give pleasure.
Remember that the most important question to ask when you’re tasting
or drinking wine is “Does this give me pleasure?” Everything else
proceeds from the answer.
Perverse Pleasure
As with any other pleasure, the enjoyment of wine can be warped.
While the primary pleasure in wine is found in the drinking of it,
there are people who find their vinous pleasure more in owning the
wine than in drinking it. In itself, owning and keeping wine is not a
bad thing. When you own wine and keep it in good storage
conditions, you are participating along with the grape grower and
winemaker in its elevage - its raising up to its ultimate quality so that
it can be drunk at its best. For me and a a lot of other people who
love wine, there is pleasure in the anticipation both of what the wine
will become with age and how we will enjoy that developed bottle.
The problem in owning wine is that for some people, the wine
becomes an object of collection or even a trophy that can only be
drunk or shared with a great sense of loss. Their appreciation is less of
the wine and more of the object and their pleasure, such as it is, is
found in the gazing at, petting of, and showing off or bragging on the
object they own that may never get drunk. Or if it ultimately is
drunk, may well be past its prime.
From my perspective, these folks are wine misers and they are on the
dark side. From their perspective, I must be full of beans.