This may break a wine drinker's heart

[Bernie]

So you think you know wines?  Well perhaps you do.

https://www.alcoholproblemsandsolutions.org/wine-experts-and-wine-snobism-exposed-as-deceptive/

 

As a very young man I attended a "beer tasting" night at my local surf club. (you know waves, surfboards, bikini's, sun tans ...).

YES A BEER TASTING! My mates and I were rather enamored of beer at that time so it was natural thing for us to do.

It was a good excuse anyway. Very few women attended, it was a blokes thing.

Well as the night wore on we had all tasted very well and as part of the night a group of men were selected (dragooned is probably the correct term) and presented on stage complete with blind folds. The object of the exercise was for them to identify what they were drinking. (I seem to remember there were 8 seated at a long trestle table)

They were all seasoned beer drinkers.

They had to identify 3 different drinks. Each was given 3 different drinks randomly so they could not confer with each other.

The drinks were Beer Stout and Water, but they were all at the same temperature.

Not one of them got all the drinks right!

What I found remarkable that most could not tell the difference between beer & water. (and no Australian beer at that time almost without exception had alcohol levels of between 4.75% -5.2%.)

It taught me a lot about taste. When I moved on to wine and started to seriously appreciate particularly red wines, i have always remembered that lesson.

It is what tastes good to you AT THE TIME and that mood and ambience of your surroundings have a marked influence on taste.

Edited July 24, 2023 by Smithy
Corrected title's punctuation (log)

[Tropicalsenior]

Last Friday we had a bottle of sparkling wine that was probably one of the best that I had ever enjoyed

Since two in the group were teetotalers and I can no longer tolerate alcohol, it was non-alcoholic.

 

If I remember correctly, I paid the equivalent of about $16 for it. I don't think that anyone tasting it would have ever guessed that it had no alcohol.

[weinoo]

On 7/24/2023 at 10:06 AM, Tropicalsenior said:

Last Friday we had a bottle of sparkling wine that was probably one of the best that I had ever enjoyed

Since two in the group were teetotalers and I can no longer tolerate alcohol, it was non-alcoholic.

 

 

If I remember correctly, I paid the equivalent of about $16 for it. I don't think that anyone tasting it would have ever guessed that it had no alcohol.

 

Well, maybe not by tasting it, but in 15 minutes I'm sure some would know.

[Midlife]

The surf club beer tasting was kindof bizarre I think, unless it could be chalked up to people who really don’t care at all about taste and just drink to drink. Even then….. water doesn’t taste ANYTHING like beer unless the beer isn’t really ‘beer’. The story really does break my heart. 

 

Not saying this simply to pat myself on the back but at a family thanksgiving a few years ago one of the family set up a blind taste test of 5 beers. I was either just lucky or my years and years close to the wine world really gave me much more of an educated palate than I had imagined. I was able to name the type of all 5 beers without seeing a single beer or label. 

Edited July 25, 2023 by Midlife (log)

[Tropicalsenior]

1 hour ago, weinoo said:

 

Well, maybe not by tasting it, but in 15 minutes I'm sure some would know.

I wouldn't be too sure about that. Many, many, many moons ago, I worked as a cocktail waitress in one of the casinos in Reno. The free drinks that they sent out to the people playing the slot machines usually had no alcohol or if it had any it was just a float on the top to make it seem like it had some when you took that first sip. You would be surprised at how many people got drunk and obnoxious on those free drinks.

[weinoo]

2 minutes ago, Tropicalsenior said:

I wouldn't be too sure about that. Many, many, many moons ago, I worked as a cocktail waitress in one of the casinos in Reno. The free drinks that they sent out to the people playing the slot machines usually had no alcohol or if it had any it was just a float on the top to make it seem like it had some when you took that first sip. You would be surprised at how many people got drunk and obnoxious on those free drinks.

 

Some...

 

 

[Tropicalsenior]

10 minutes ago, weinoo said:

 

Some...

 

 

An old one but good one. And the world is full of them.

Later I transferred to the restaurant and my favorite was the wine expert. He was the one that sniffed the cork, smelled the wine, swirled it, tasted it and pronounced it excellent. Five minutes later I would get called back. You guessed it. The rest of the table was gagging because it tasted like pure vinegar.

[mgaretz]

Back in the day I used to teach "beer education" classes for the local beer distributors.  Primarily their salespeople.  We did a similar blindfold taste test but just with a hoppy pale ale (typically Sierra Nevada) and a stout.  They always picked the pale ale as the stout.  Then I would give them a few grains of roasted barley to chew on and had them try to remember that taste.  Then they could pick out the stout.

 

I have also done a similar blindfold test with draught Guinness and a latte.  Very few got that one right either.