Terry Theise changes the wine tasting focus from dissection to holistic. In the past, I admired the vocabulary of wine writers who described a particular wine’s taste components. But, seldom did these writers address the basic question I had, is this a good tasting wine. Wine descriptors such as fruit forward, acidity, alcohol, wet dog, earthy, minerality, etc. can be applied to good tasting, as well as bad tasting, wines equally. The difference between them is due to an imbalance in the wine’s flavor characteristics. Good tasting wines have all flavonoids in balance whereas bad tasting wines have one component that takes over the overall flavor of the wine thus creating an imbalance. Like everything else in life, there are exceptions.

I recently attended a wine pairing dinner at a local restaurant with some friends. One of them asked me what I thought of the wines we were tasting. I described the wine’s flavonoid components as I’d been taught over the years in the wine publications I’d devoured. She then asked the same question again, ‘Do you like the wine?’. I realized that this was a simple question, I said ‘No!’. This went on throughout the evening. With every wine, I would attempt to describe its components after which she would ask the question, ‘Do you like the wine?’. Despite my attempt to formally address the wines’ taste characteristics, I was, instead, forced to simply answer yes or no.

Reading “What Makes a Wine Worth Drinking”, caused me to reflect on that wine pairing dinner and the question my friend asked me. The realization that I came to was that Terry Theise is right, wine tasting is not about a wine’s components, it is about the wine’s holistic impact on the taster.

Going forward, enlightened, the initial question I’ll ask myself in trying a new wine will be, ‘Do I like it?’. That’s all I really need to know when I go to my local wine shop to make my purchase. A wine’s flavor nuances do not have to be analyzed for a buying decision, they merely need to be enjoyed holistically. But, if I ask, “Why do I like this wine?”, my former analytical approach will come into play; I’ll begin to break down the flavors that make up the wine’s taste profile.

According to the author, a wine drinker’s initial reaction to the first sip of wine is an emotional one. The first sip generally conjures up fleeting memories of the time and place where you first tasted a particular wine or one very much like it. It also brings to mind the people with you at the time, all of which are memory imprints imparted by emotion.

I couldn’t stop my mind from wandering as I read this book. Theise is one of those people whose writing vocabulary I envied. Each paragraph brought up images of the people and places he described. Those images then led to memories of my own. Much too frequently, I found myself having to re-read a section of the page I was on because my mind had wandered to another time and another place, one personally experienced, different perhaps, but one that had made an emotional memory imprint.

As to that flavor ‘imbalance equals bad wine’ exception I mentioned, it was a Chardonnay with an acid bight more characteristic of a Sauvignon Blanc. The taste was unexpected and, initially, shocking. But to my friend I had to admit that I liked the wine. It was unique. The winemaker, Battaglini Estate Winery, has a Chardonnay that may lead to a new Chardonnay fad in the future. ( )