slkinsey

Why does he need to join here? People are regularly slammed that never even heard of eGullet. They've made a public claim on a public website. Sammy, I know you don't want to accept that the claims made by the two companies are different in nature and extent -- but the fact remains that they are. Riedel doesn't have to provide you with research confirming that one's perceptions of wine are influenced by the glassware from which the wine is consumed. There is a large body of such research in support of this in the scientific community. So, on that count Riedel has nothing to prove to us. As for the other elements of their marketing claim -- that it "smooths it out" or "brings out the fruit" or whatever -- those are purely subjective considerations. Obviously the people who designed the glass felt that it influenced one's perceptions of wine in certain directions. However, it very well may be that what one person desires in a Syrah is not the same thing that the Riedel designers desire in a Syrah. There is the addional complication of the fact that "smoothing out" and "bringing out the fruit" means different things to different people and is almost impossible to define from a scientific standpoint. That said, Riedel enjoys a place of high prominence among wine professionals and there is a general level of agreement with the perceptions of the designers among the most experienced people in the field whose business is precisely to evaluate and agree on such subjective measures that Riedel glassware does indeed do things like "smoothing out" and "bringing out the fruit" and whatever else they are designed to to for the various wines. To sum up again: the unanswered questions for the Wine Clip are: (1) does it do anything, (2) if it does something, it is due to the magnets or something else, (3) if it does something to the wine, does it have the specific effects on the perception of the wine that are claimed by the manufacturers. For the Riedel glass, on the other hand, we already have answers to questions 1 and 2: (1) the glass definitely influences the perception of the wine in a characteristic way, and (2) it is the design that is responsible for the influence. The only question to be answered is 3: (3) does the Riedel glass influence one's perceptions of the wine in precisely the (very subjective and individual) way they claim. Big difference.

I think it might be relevant to quote FG's response from the tangential thread you started: The salient difference between Riedel's claim and Mr. Clip's claim is that (1) there is a large body of scientific evidence and agreement that glassware can and does influence one's perceptions of the wine consumed from same and (2) the Riedel people aren't suggesting that their product changes the wine, they are only suggesting that their product can change your perception of the wine in a certain way. Mr. Clip (1) does not have a large body of scientific evidence to support his claim and (2) he does claim that his product fundamentally changes the wine. It is also worthy of note that Riedel is a company with a long and illustrious history of making high quality stemware and not bullshitting people any more than the accepted norms of advertising. Now, I do think that Riedel's claim is a bit much and a little snake-oiley in that respect. That said, the Riedel glass clearly does do something, so the debate is to whether or not the something it does is what they claim in the text you have provided above. But there is a huge degree of magintude separating Riedel's claims and Mr. Clip's claims. Mr. Clip's claims, as people have pointed out a number of times, are not only unsupported by any evidence whatsoever but run counter to some things that are commonly accepted in the scientific world. So, to sum up: For Riedel the issue is not whether it works, but rather whether it work in the precise fashion claimed. For the Wine Clip the issue is whether it works at all. As to whether or not eGullet has given preferential treatment to companies like Riedel while jumping on companies like the Wine Clip. I believe that, had someone started a thread on these forums saying "Riedel Bordeaux Vinum Glass: does it really make new wine taste aged?" you would find that most people would respond by saying: (1) yes, glassware can change the percieved qualities of wine, but (2) it's bogus to claim that it "allows wines to achieve a balance that would normally take years of ageing to acquire." It is worthy of note that these are exactly the kinds of responses you got in your short lived make-a-point thread. Furthermore, if a sales rep for Riedel came to the site and started defending Riedel's claim in the way Mr. Clip has done here, I think you'd see a fairly similar thread.

FWIW... if anyone who has one of the "test" Wine Clips wants to sent theirs to NYC, I'd be happy to set up a double-blind ABX test in consultation with the other science and psychology people on the site, controlling variables to whatever extent is possible outside the context of a professional lab. I'd send it back when done.

No. Agreed. Now, Riedel makes great glasses, and it is well established that glass configuration , etc. can have a big effect on the perceived qualities of a wine. The question is whether the Riedel glass is one that provides an experience suited to your individual taste. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But there is no way it "smoothes out the rough edges, emphasizing the fruit, allowing wines to achieve a balance that would normally take years of ageing to acquire."

Perhaps Senior Partner of Burger, Club LLP?

Hopefully not fishy onion rings... bleah!

Mark, no one is questioning your perceptions or your expertise. And, as I said before, it is a very interesting result. Indeed, I don't necessarily question that the different glasses of wine did, indeed, taste distinctly different. That said, what some of us are saying -- those of us who understand perceptual psychology and/or good experimental design -- is that your anectodal results, persuasive as they may be to you, do not really prove anything because there are too many other uncontrolled variables that could have influenced the results. These variables could influence your perceptions, they could influence the actual characteristics of the wine... or both. This is why carefully controlled, blind ABX trials are so valuable. I know you have a lot of confidence in your abilities and perceptions, and I share that confidence. One of the hardest things to explain to people who don't understand experimental psychology is that all the expertise and experience in the world doesn't really matter in this kind of setting. That said, I am sure I speak for everyone interested in this thread when I thank you for your careful efforts -- which I do think are very interesting and make me feel that the Wine Clip may be worthwhile spending the time and energy to do a blind ABX experiment.

Um... Elyse, I believe I was suggesting that BC perhaps be made less complicated and dispense with some of the superficial trappings people seemed to think might be tiresome and unnecessary in this setting, and irrelevant anyway if we are going to be so informal. I just felt it was neither fish nor fowl... or perhaps it was a fish dressed up as a fowl. Okay... there was some kind of fish and chicken analogy I was trying to make here but now I've managed to confuse myself. Regardless, you should have no fear that Steven or I want to usurp your role as Managing Director of Burger Club, I'm perfectly happy to follow your direction as it relates to future meetings of the Club. Hanging out and eating burgers in non-systematic way suits me just fine.

Been there, done that. Hi5!

I think the point is simply being made that the BC as it is currently operating is really a social gathering more than anything -- which seems to be what you're saying too -- and that perhaps we should give up the facade of a systematic evaluation and do away with laborious rating systems, spreadsheets, taking temperatures, weighing burgers and whatnot. If we're going to get together informally to try out some good burgers, discuss and post our impressions, why not just leave it at that? If other people have an interest in doing a more rigorous survey in parallel (and I am certainly interested in doing both) that's cool too. But one shouldn't confuse one with the other -- a sentiment that I see echoed in some of the other comments in re to the rating system and composite score. If people really love the forms and the thermometers and stuff, of course there's no reason not to continue with them...

There are many ways that one's wine drinking experience may be made more enjoyable other than making the wine taste better. Just one reason, and certainly not the only benefit of good glassware, is enjoying the fact that you are using good glassware. This is similar to the enjoyment one gets from eating food with sterling silver off of fine china. Note what else I said above: "presumably a reasonably intelligent person who understands that he/she does not care at all about glassware will know that FG's recommendation does not apply." I would like to think that we are reasonably intelligent and capable of understanting that different people will prefer different glassware. Note also that I mentioned to Mr. Clip that no one here is arguing the Wine Clip can't enhance one's wine drinking experience. Indeed, if dropping eighty bucks in a fancy magnet makes someone happy while they're drinking wine, it's money well spent! I think the infinitesimally small commission eGullet makes from Amazon purchases hardly qualifies as an ulterior motive. Furthermore, one is always able to purchase goods from Amason without giving the kickback to eGullet. To suggest that Fat Guy's position vis a vis a glassware purchase from Amazon is remotely comparable to Mr. Clip's position vis a vis purchases of the Wine Clip is unkind to say the least, and a broad misrepresentation of the actual situation. It bears mentioning, however, that eGullet runs at a significant loss and that the measly Amazon earnings are a drop in that huge bucket rather than Fat Guy's pockets. Sammy, I'm sorry but I am not going to dig up a bunch of studies on the Internet for you. Suffice it to say that it has been widely understood for a long time, based on sound science, that the shape and character of glassware can effect the perceived qualities of the beverage that is consumed from same. This is not suibject to debate. Now... if Reidel were saying that "our new Syrah glass makes your cheap stuff taste like it cost nine times more!" you might have a legitimate snake-oil claim. Unfortunately for your argument, they don't. They might say that they have designed glassware specifically to highlight the qualities of Syrah and enhance the enjoyment of drinking Syrah, but this is not the same thing. Again, a reasonably intelligent person understands that the qualities Riedel looks for in a glass for Syrah might not be the same as his/hers. But the point here is that the glassware will affect the person's perception of the Syrah. It is up to each person to decide whether or not they agree with the qualities offered by Riedel's Syrah glass. The Wine Clip, on the other hand, is competely unproven. There is no evidence to support their assertions that it does what they claim it does via the mechanism they claim. Whether or not you find certain comments inappropriate because they come from a coordinator, a moderator, a contributor or a member is entirely irrelevant. We are all coordinators, moderators, etc. and participants. The only place where Fat Guy threw around any "eGullet weight" was telling Mr. Clip that he couldn't use any material from eGullet threads in promotional materials for his product. If I may say so, offering someone's organizational position here as a point against their argument is an unworthy line of reasoning to say the least.

A few comments: Canadian Whisky is nothing more than blended whisky from Canada. In other words, it is a blend of several malt whiskies that is also blended with a fair amount of neutral spirits. It's all crap to me, but some people seem to enjoy it. Again, when you say "grain whiskies" you mean "neutral spirits." (I know you know that, but not everyone does.) As for recommendations, when I was in Scotland as a child with my grandfather McDowell (we're of Scottish extraction and he was a great admirer of quality spirits) he asked the locals in every single pub or bar we entered what they thought was the best blended Scotch. Interestingly, literally 100% of them said "Famous Grouse," and that continues to be the Kinsey family blended of choice to this day. That said, I tend to be a mostly a single malt drinker, with a fondness for Highland Park and Lagavullin.

Several things here: 1. Fat Guy did not say that the glasses would make your wine taste better, only that they would "make all your wine more enjoyable." This is clearly a judgment call, and presumably a reasonably intelligent person who understands that he/she does not care at all about glassware will know that FG's recommendation does not apply. 2. Fat Guy's personal recommendation was just that: a personal recommendation from someone whose judgment we know and trust. In this way, it is similar to a trusted restaurant critic saying, "you can't go wrong with the fish." Fat Guy was not trying to make money by selling us glassware. Mr. Clip, on the other hand, is trying to make money and is not someone whose judgment we know and trust. 3. It is well known and understood that glassware (shape, etc.) can effect one's sensory perceptions of the beverage consumed from same. Suggesting that certain glassware can have a positive effect on the experience of drinking wine goes right in line with currently accepted science, not against it. Suggesting that a ring of magnets around the neck of a wine bottle "break up the tannins" and that the magnetic field produced by those magnets "changes the molecular structure" of the wine does. 4. I think many of us are not willing to accept the idea that the Wine Clip does what Mr. Clip says it does because a) the idea that it works the way he says it works goes against the scientific knowledge and experience many of us have; and b) he really hasn't demonstrated that it does do what he says it does. I don't think anyone on these threads has suggested that wine served using a Wine Clip in certain circumstances can produce wine that is perceived as having certain improvements. What many of us are questioning is whether or not the perceived difference is a real difference, and if so, whether or not it is due to the Wine Clip, and specifically due to the wine passing through the magnetic field, or due to other factors not inextricably linked to use of a Wine Clip. I'm sorry to hear that you are not happy with the response that Mr. Clip received here, but extraordinary claims are generally met with skepticism and there is a commensurate burden on the maker of extraordinary claims to support those claims with sound evidence. Instead Mr. Clip replied with many of the same techniques and arguments as well as the personal style of most sellers of snake oil. This proved risible to many of us who have knowledge, education and experience apparently not shared by Mr. Clip that pokes holes in most of his arguments and evidence. Sp, I'm not sure how, exactly, you think we should respond to him. Many of us have strongly challenged some of his assertions, and a few have been a little sarcastic, but I haven't seen anything that struck me as inappropriate or outside the boundary of behaviors exhibited by Mr. Clip himself. Try going back through these threads replacing "Wine Clip" with "Crystal Pyramid" and ask yourself how you would respond then.

Yea... I found a couple of things a bit disingenuous: Okay... what, exactly is "not a great deal of money?" $10,000? $100,000? $1,000,000? $5,000? And, if he intended all along to give the money to the Frontera Farmer Foundation, why didn't he hold out for more money? For that matter, why didn't he mention this donation in his letter to CC? It certainly would have gone a long way towards smoothing any ruffled feathers among his colleagues there. The decision to donate money to Frontera Farmer Foundation, besides being a huge tax-deductible contribution to a non-profit organization for him, strikes me as after-the-fact spin control. Also, am I the only one whom the article struck as written by an unabashed Bayless admirer/apologist? I suppose it is now traditional in this thread to end every post with something like: werd to yo' mutha © tiresome device, inc...

oh dear. yet one more outlet. what are we up to now, 3? 4? i wonder if that really was rachael. sounds like it could be. Hey... I liked her FHM shoot!

And that's fine. Test the clip one hundred different ways, I have no issue. What I do have issue with is people making slanderous remarks regarding me and my company while your trying to figure out how to do it. The problem that people are having is that you are making certain claims as though you have sound evidence to support those claims when in fact you do not. This is not slander, it is a fact. Now, I don't think you need to make those claims to move the product, but you're the one making that call.

If you don't think that the way a perceptual test is conducted can have a large effect on the result, and if you think that claims to that effect are "radical" -- all this demonstrates is your ignorance of experimental psychology. No. Your marketing should state that the Wine Clip enhances your wine drinking experience. That is a safe claim. Your claim, that it actually enhances the taste of wine has not been proven. You are correct that it is your opinion, but is is not your "finding" because you have not conducted any valid controlled experiments in which to make any "findings." You need to be careful about throwing around scientific-seeming words that make it appear as though the Wine Clip has scientific support when in fact it does not at this point. The same thing goes for your statement about magnetics. Your opinion is that "it's all taking place under the influence of magnetics" but, in fact, you have no support for this claim. Whatever difference you are observing in your tests could come from a variety of factors completely unrelated to the magnets. This is why it is unadvisable to make such claims without having conducted any real scientific evaluation. Ringling Brothers' claim is obviously marketing hype, and is clearly a matter of opinion anyway. There is no factual basis by which such a claim may be evaluated. If, on the other hand, Ringling Brothers claimed that their show included "the world's longest high wire walk" one could evaluate this factual claim. You are making a factual claim when you sau that the Wine Clip uses "magnetics" to "enhance the taste of wine." You would be in the same boat as Ringling Brothers' "Greatest Show on Earth" claim if you said instead that "the Wine Clip magnetic device enhances your wine drinking experience." There is a subtle but salient difference.

It could influence the way the wine is poured, it may have a slight cooling effect on the wine... there are many things that might be slightly changed by the presence of a metallic clip on the neck of the bottle. The nonmagnetic would be a "placebo" and would have much the same function as giving patients a sugar pill. It just eliminates any possible source of data contamination. Granted... it's probably not essential. Given the resources to do such a test, however, I think it's advisable to go all the way. Ultimately, the best way to pour the wine would be to have each bottle in a nitrogen-flushed system that dispensed measured identical doses from each bottle simultaneously without any human participation.

Well... given what Boulud charges for the burger, that could be a legitimate question. There is also a big difference here... It is quite easy to taste a burger and see if a truffle flavor is strongly present. On the other hand, suppose Bouloud said that he got his meat from Jackson Hole and cooked it under a pyramid that used the power of crystals to make the burger taste better -- and for this reason he was charging $27.50 for his "Jackson Hole Magic Pyramid Burger." Now, I can virtually guarantee you that most people who ate Jackson Hole burgers in BD Bistro Moderne would rate those burgers as tasting better than a Jackson Hole burger even though they were 100% identical to the burgers served at Jackson Hole. In this case, it is legitimate to question whether it is the pyramid or perhaps other factors that influence the observed difference in evaluation. I don't think anyone here is saying that using the Wine Clip cannot or does not make some people perceive the wine as tasting better and enhance their wine drinking experience. I would say the same thing about keeping the bottles in a pyramid-shaped container, or even drinking wine that has a fancy label or a famous name. BUT that doesn't mean that the Wine Clip or the pyramid or the fancy label or the famous name actually makes the wine taste better. Now, it is certainly legitimate to ask, as Mr. Clip is asking, whether it makes a difference if these things actually work so long as they enhance the consumer's experience. In the grand scheme of things: no, it doesn't matter. Some people get a lot of satisfaction paying top dollar at retail for All-Clad because they think they are getting the "best cookware made." And, so long as they are happy with their cookware, who cares if it is true or not? These are not the questions we are asking here, however. Some of us are interested in knowing whether or not the Wine Clip really does make a difference and whether or not All-Clad's construction and design really is better than all others.

I'm sure that Alex will have his own, well-informed opinions about this, but this is how I would begin to study the efficacy of the wine clip in a scientifically valid way: Test: Does the wine clip make any difference in freshly poured wine? - 20 subjects/30 comparisons each - The same wine is used for the entire test, and all bottles have been verified to taste "identical" by wine experts immediately prior to use in the test. Bottles not in use are flushed with nitrogen to prevent oxidation. Bottles are clipped immediately prior to pouring. The unclipped bottles are fitted with a nonmagnetic "placebo clip" immediately prior to pouring. The pourer is passed the bottles on a tray labeled to indicare the pouring order. He/She does not know which bottle is clipped and which is not clipped. - Each comparison pair is poured in a separate room and the glasses are placed side-by-side on a tray. In ten of the comparison pairs, the clipped wine is poured first, in ten comparison pairs the clipped wine is poured second. Ten of the comparison pairs have only the unclipped wine. Comparison pairs are poured at the same time (i.e., the pourer does not pour 20 clipped glasses and then 30 unclipped). - Each tray is taken in to the test subjects by a third party who was not in the room when the wine was poured. The test subjects are told that they are doing a test to see if they have a rare genetic abnormality that allows them to taste trace amounts of [some strange sounding chemical] and that it is possible that all their wine comparisons may be the exact same wine with no difference (this to prevent any effects that might result from the test subjects feeling that they "should" be tasting a difference). Test subjects taste the clipped wine first in 10 pairs, and the unclipped wine first in 10 pairs. - Test subjects indicate immediately on a form simply "different" or "same" for each comparison pair. Test subjects spit wine, and appropriate neutral palate refreshers are used. - ANOVA of results for significance. If a significant difference was detected and found to be statistically significant, a similar study could be done using time as a variable (i.e., how long does the wine have to sit in the glass before the "Clip Effect" wears off).

They carry Niman Ranch pork at Oppenheimer Prime Meats (the full service butcher in my 'hood) as well. Chops cut to order, etc.

Thanks for the report, Mark. These are indeed very interesting preliminary results, and do tend to support thewineclip's marketing claims. That said, the fact that the difference was observed to be almost imperceptible after 15 minutes does not bode well for the Wine Clip as a product for practical use. This would depend greatly on whether most tasters would prefer 15-minutes-in-the-glass unclipped wine over freshly poured clipped wine. As Steven said, there are some things that need to be cleared up in terms of experimental design (the control group is particularly important). But this was a very well done first look, and one that merits further investigation. Very interesting indeed.

Anyone who understands experimental psychology knows that certain kinds of perceptual tests are guaranteed to produce certain results. The only kind of test that would truly demonstrate a real effect would be a double blind ABX type test with a statistical My training in psychology, for example, leaves me quite certain that I could conduct taste tests such as you describe using a nonmagnetic Wine Clip and achieve similar results. This does not mean that the Wine Clip doesn't work as you suggest... but it does mean that your "2k taste tests" prove exactly nothing. I appologize, I thought this site was called eGullet not eScience. Gastronomy and cooking are arts and sciences. If you want to produce "tests" as "evidence" of the efficacy of your product, you have to expect that people will apply their appropriate areas of expertise to your evidence. That's the way it works when you make claims. This is not a matter of taste (i.e., whether someone likes the flavor of salted or unsalted butter), it is a matter of science (i.e., either the wine is changed and really tastes different or it isn't and it doesn't). All the tests "prove" is that the "test" produces a certain result. As I said before, I am quite certain I could produce similar results using a nonmagnetic Wine Clip, or a crystal for that matter. I would absolutely dispute this assertion. 1990 of them will not jump higher wearing the Air Jordans. And, I would add, if Nike promoted their product as "making you jump higher" it would be a bogus claim. Now, if Nike did a double blind ABX test where test subjects jumped wearing different shoes, and if that test demonstrated a statistically significant difference between groups with the Nike wearing subjects jumping higher than they did with the other shoes... then it would be a marketing claim with some teeth. This is the difference between a bogus claim and a real claim. It is worthy of note that Nike makes no such claim. Now... if you want to suggest that the Wine Clip might make people enjoy their wine more, I have no problem with that. I am sure it does for some people. I strongly suspect that any such enhancement is due to psychological factors affecting perception and relating to expectations rather than any real, verifiable differences in the flavor. Thus far, according to your own descriptions of the "testing" you have done, you have not demonstrated that there is a real difference between "regular" wine and "clipped" wine. This makes your claims as to an actual change in the flavor of the wine and your explanation of what happens to the wine and why some people might appreciate the Wine Clip unsupported and therefore bogus. If you come onto a web site that is populated my educated, intelligent connoisseurs of food and wine, those people are going to want to know whether or not the flavor of the wine really changes -- not whether or not some people can perceive a change under certain conditions. You have demonstrated the latter. I don't think anyone here disputes that. You have not demonstrated the former. It's as simple as that.

i'm even more smooth after an MRI. if you can believe that. Isn't that a logical impossibility? Like more than infinity?

Oh yea. That stuff is awesome. The liquid form is particularly fast-acting. Trust me, I've eaten Taco Bell at 4:00 AM in the middle of a cross-country road trip. Taco Bell? Oh Sam I'm so dissapointed in you! Burger King is near a line. Taco Bell crosses it, since it has been scientifically proven that you can't eat Taco Bell without contracting something. Dude... I was on Spring Break from college in Wisconsin. My judgment was clearly addled from too much Blatz and Rheinlander Bock. FWIW, I have literally never eaten at one since that unpleasant episode. Believe me, you don't want to find yourself frantically driving around rural Arkansas at 4:00 AM looking for someplace open that sells Immodium.