Thursday, January 5, 2012

Exploring Wine: When it's not right



Flor d'engora roure, Montasant (Spain), 2009, $9.99
My rating? I would not drink this, not even a sip.

When you buy a bottle of wine at a restaurant the waiter usually shows you the bottle, opens it in front of you, then pours you a taste. I used to think this was to make sure you liked the wine but actually the tasting is so that you can confirm the bottle is good before being served.

In all my years drinking wine I have never tasted a bad bottle. Sure, I've had wines I do not prefer or I have mistakenly left a bottle open over night but I've never tasted a bottle that wasn't what it was supposed to be.

That is until Gman and I opened this bottle. It seemed promising when we purchased it with reviews like this and this. However, as the bouquet hit my nose it smelled awfully like cat urine and very musky. Then I took a sip, instead of taking the hint, and it tasted like vinegar.

I once took a wine tasting class in Bordeaux and in order to learn how to smell and taste the wine, we were asked to smell various disks, then taste wine, then point to the disks we thought matched the smell. One of the disks was in fact cat urine, which indicates a spoiled bottle. This is the textbook example of a wine gone bad.

Who knows what went wrong but I haven't reached for this varietal on the shelf since. Have you ever had a bad experience drinking wine?

1 comment:

  1. Ack! I HATE when that happens! I have only had it happen 2 times before: once at a restaurant and once at home. It is NOT pleasant.

    I also have a strong aversion to red wines that have hints of tobacco...literally tastes like I'm licking an ash tray (in my mind) when I have those. Blechhhh!

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