wine column
rights
&
wrongs
Ogden Nash wrote the best advice for husbands:
To keep your marriage brimming With love in the loving cup Whenever you’re wrong admit it Whenever you’re right shut up. It is, of course, very rare for a husband to be right about anything, but the advice still holds good. It should be enough to hear, very occasionally, the murmured: ‘Well, I suppose so’ from the female of the species, without seeking further clarification or rubbing in the point. The reverse situation does not apply, for some reason. That reason is one of life’s little ironies upon which further speculation is pointless. If only the wine world would pay attention to the advice, choosing and drinking wine would be simple. All the bottles on the shelves would be ‘right’. They would not trumpet the fact; their mere presence on the shelf would be enough. No producer, having got his blend of grapes wrong or who knew his grapes had had a bad year, would bother trying to sell
it except, perhaps, as vinegar. Every producer who had got it right would simply bottle it with a brief label. This is a counsel of perfection and would not work in the real world. So we are left with trying to discover what is right and what is wrong for ourselves – with the help of the supposed experts. Those experts, from wine columnists to wine waiters, will never say a wine is wrong. They may steer you away from it: ‘A good choice, Sir, but I think you may find the 2005 is a better year’; or they may damn it with faint praise: ‘Reasonable quaffing now and may possibly improve with age’. But they will never say that a wine is awful and should not be bought. Perhaps this is not unreasonable on their part because much depends on price and the personal taste of the buyer. Perhaps. This column, ever idiosyncratic and iconoclastic, proposes now to break the mould of normal wine columns and to advise you against certain wines. Yes, it may be a matter of personal taste. It is also personal taste to dislike: beer-bellied English yobs shouting obscenities; ladies of a certain age and size in micro-bikinis; noisy motorbikes; overdone beef. Those whose tastes include enjoyment of any of these need not read on. n
Having kept the attention of some 99% of you (and, frankly, good riddance to the other 1%), there follows a list of what not to buy and what to avoid when offered. 1. Cava of any description. Spain makes a lot of good wine. She can hold her head up proudly in the face of the competition in respect of most reds and whites. But the fizz is awful, however expensively packaged. It does, granted, have fizz. So does fizzy water. Fizzy water is greatly preferable because, if it tastes of anything, it tastes only watery. Cava tastes watery with a touch of sharp sulphur and some wet newspaper. Swallowing it produces the same effect as a fingernail being scraped across a blackboard. 2. Pretty well everything German. Mosels and Hocks were all the rage until Australian Chardonnay took over and now the fashion is for drier, lighter whites like Pinot Grigio. German wine has never regained its fashionability, perhaps because of its taste. Medium and verging occasionally on sweet, even the endless compound names (Trockenbeerenauslese, Liebfraumilch, Vierwaldstadterseedampschiffkapitansmutze) cannot improve it. If you ever tasted the stuff that was (and perhaps still is) marketed under the name ‘Blue Nun’, you will know what I mean. 3. Mateus Rose. If you must have a lampstand then make sure to get rid of the contents of the bottle down the sink before attaching the electrics. Actually, the same applies to most rose wines but
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not all; if approached with care some of them can be quite friendly. 4. Table Wine – vin de table, vino di tavola or de mesa etc. Fit only for mixing with something else to disguise the taste. Why else should Sangria and Tinto de Verano need to be invented? Very, very occasionally you may find a table wine which is bearable (Liria is just about possible to get down the throat) but for the saving of about £1 over a bottle of ordinary claret you are giving yourself unnecessary grief. 5. Sweet whites. Sauternes, Muscat de Beaumes de Venise and suchlike (even the local Malaga concoction) are best left alone. The cost is ridiculous and the taste is of a sort of vaguely alcoholic cough medicine. The average pudding is quite sweet enough without needing a further burst of sugar. If some further wine is required with the pudding then it is far better to stick to champagne (not, of course, Cava). This list is not exhaustive and you may add to it as you wish. But it is a start. Further, I will happily admit I am wrong if you find, for instance, a decent table wine – but rather you than me in the search for such an elusive beast. This list will, however, enable you to ignore a lot of the wrong bottles in the search for the right ones. When you find the right ones then, contrary to the advice at the beginning, don’t shut up. But don’t make too much of a song and dance about it either.
GIBRALTAR MAGAZINE • SEPTEMBER 2009