Let’s Talk About Wine!…Again

I.  Wine Baby 

Now that the heat of summer is less intense, and the browning and crisping of leaves signals harvest time is near—my thoughts turn to wine.  I know that the best season of the year is coming.  Autumn is in the air, and the beautiful month of October brings not only crisp, clear weather, but  my birthday and wedding anniversary.  Which, of course, makes me think about wine.  Come to think of it, it doesn’t take much to make me think about wine.  A couple of years ago, my husband asked me what I wanted for our 25th anniversary.  I drolly offered, “Um…a divorce?”  Ignoring that, he continued with: “How about a trip to the wine country in California?”  I countered with, “Throw in an extra case of wine, and it’s a deal!”  “Done.”  And so we went.

I’d been drinking wine for most of my adult life by the time we made the trip to Napa Valley.  And though I already thought of myself as something of a “winethusiast”—in that I enjoy drinking wine and am always enthusiastic about it—I was eager to learn more about wine.  I hoped that this trip to California’s famed wine country would enhance my wine knowledge.  Secretly, I was also hoping to pick up some pretentious wine terminology that I could impress others with, thereby upping my cool quotient.  But what I discovered there was that I was a classic “wine baby.”

In the lead-up to this trip, which I kept calling the “Sideways tour,” referring to that film with Paul Giamatti that I liked so much, I imagined there might be some parallels between this movie and my trip.  But the only similarity was the wine-drinking part.  That and my steadfast refusal to use the spit-bucket.  As far as I remember, I did not drunk-dial anyone, nor make it my mission to get my traveling companion laid, nor obsess over a failed past relationship.  This would have been weird since my traveling companion was my husband and the purpose of our trip was to celebrate our anniversary.  So I stopped calling it that.

But back to the topic at hand—wine.  Out in California, the label they give to novices in wine appreciation is “wine baby.”  And if this isn’t enough to lower your self-confidence, wait till you walk into some high-end wine tasting room, because then you will want to cry.  People in the trade take it upon themselves to give any tourist (read: potential wine buyer) a crash course in the intricacies of wine-making and wine-tasting, and they would have you believe it is an incredibly nuanced and complicated operation.  Which it is, but that’s not the point.

The point is, I really like wine, but I do not necessarily like wine culture: how we write about it, talk about it, taste it, or buy it.  What I like is drinking it.  In fact, more than anything else I can think of, besides the bloviations of a second-tier university English professor, wine means pretentiousness.  There is no avoiding it—and believe me I try—but to talk about wine is to talk like an asshole.

James Waller, in his leather-bound little tome called Drink-ol-o-gy:  Wine—A Guide to the Grape (which I picked up in the gift shop of one of those high-end wine operations), explains the term “wine baby” for us.  A wine baby is someone who has “not yet learned the basic facts… and lacks the proper vocabulary to intelligently appreciate and discuss wines”—so states Waller in his Drink-ol-o-gy book.  (While I appreciate the author’s helpfulness in breaking this tricky word down into syllables for me, it is a term I am familiar with and have no trouble pronouncing.)     I am beginning to notice a certain patronizing attitude among wine experts.

Heretofore, I did not consider myself a wine baby.  Drinkology is a subject I have great interest in.  In fact, in college I minored in it.  I almost had enough credits to major in it, but I kept missing classes due to all the field work I was doing on the subject.  Some people I knew in college continued their work in this area at the postgraduate level.  They succeeded in earning the respected title of Drunkologist.   I, however, did not set such lofty goals for myself and wound up with a B.A. in English.  And here we are.

According to Waller, a wine baby is someone who has a basic familiarity with wine, in that they may have tasted it once, or maybe a few times, perhaps with their younger sister when left at home without parental supervision; or gotten drunk on it at, let’s say, the movies, with a few high school friends, maybe up in the balcony while watching a Woody Allen picture, like Annie Hall, or maybe it was Play It Again, Sam—look, what movie it was doesn’t really matter.  Or perhaps they embarrassed themselves in front of their in-laws by making some wise-ass remark a little too loudly at someone’s bridal shower, or wedding, or funeral.  Maybe they did these things, but what should be noted is that they really regret it now.

The point is that a wine baby may already know a few basic facts about wine—for instance, that it is made from a fruit known as the “grape.”  This may sound elementary, but the true definition of wine is: “an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grape juice.”  (By these standards Boone’s Farm Strawberry Wine does not count.)  Unless preceded by a qualifying adjective—rice, elderberry—the word wine denotes a beverage made from grapes.  It comes in different colors: red, white, or pink (rose to those who have progressed to the level of wine toddler).  It can be inexpensive or wantonly overpriced.

Some wine babies know more:  there are still wines and there are sparkling wines; they know that you can’t call sparkling wine “champagne” unless it comes from the eponymously named region in France.  I don’t mean to imply that the champagne police will come and arrest you for calling it this, but you will not seem wine-savvy if you do.  And you know how the French can be.

Wines can be described as either dry or sweet, but they are almost always wet, especially when spilled.  Sometimes they are named for the type of grape from which they’re made, i.e., Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Sauvignon Blanc, Welch, etc.  But here’s where it can get confusing—sometimes wines are named for their regions as well:  Bordeaux, Sauternes, Burgundy (a region, not a color; there are only three colors and they were named above—try to pay attention, will you?), Chianti–a region where wine bottles are encased in straw with drippy candle wax running down the sides.  (Some people think these bottles make cool candleholders, but these things went out with the 70s; I’m just saying it will not make you seem sophisticated if you order this on a date.)

This is about the level I was at in terms of wine knowledge when I arrived in Napa Valley.  I was like a sponge, ready to absorb as much wine as I could.  Did I say “wine”?—I meant “wine facts.”  Yes.  Anyway.  On to the tasting room.

Next—Part II:  Time to Get Your Drink On!