Great show, as always. As an economist, I’m very interested in the effect of ratings on wine sales, but it’s difficult to find sales data since most wineries are privately held. Basically, since wine is an experience good, there’s an information asymmetry between the wine buyer and wine seller. People use the ratings as a way to gauge the quality of the product before they purchase it.

Is the difference between an 89 and 90 that dramatic?

QOTD: definitely a wine making kit!

Gary,

You continue to impress. RE: QOTD definetly a wine making kit. This is a great lead-in to an idea I have, why don’t you do a show on homemade wines? What a hoot it would be to do your thing on the top four wines you received. You could restrict the wines to those made with fresh grapes (sorry no kits) and further limit entries to producers of 100 gallons or less. You want to experience the efforts of the true garage home winemaker who crushed the grapes by hand (or feet). Just a thought…

Ciao

Gary, Love your show. QOTD: The wine making kit. Why? Because much of my family and a few friends think grocery store wine is really great. So, I’d rather experiment. Even though I now live in MN where there are few grapes, but a truck load of apples, rhubarb and cranberries. Hmmmm. I better re-think the QOTD.

I had the Provenance SB last night and I thought it was very good. Like ginger ale and sprite mixed together.

wine basket – I keep telling a friend of mine he can’t make wine –
with all that wine to drink, we’d have no time to taste all the other wines out there!

QOTD – Wine Basket… no contest.

BIG FAN of d’Arenberg wines…esp. so of Coppermine Road, d’Arry’s Original, Dead Arm, and Laughing Magpie. Great producers of some great (not to mention fun) wines…
Speaking of fun…match a foot long (all the fixings) chili ‘dog w/ Stump Jump (Red). Ahhhh!! Now all that we’re missing is a ‘ball game… LOL.

QOTD: a basket of course, what the h*ck would I do with a wine making kit, better a beer making kit then.
So, d’Arenberg, nice you think the same about it as I did: it’s tremendous. We had it blind in a Rhone white tasting … I could not believe that it was NW (so, maybe the NW/OW-prejudices are unescapable). C ya.

A Wine Making Kit would make my day. I’m biased having started making kit wine last September. We’ve bottled two whites and five reds and have increased our wine knowledge and appreciation exponentially.
I spent a year working in a tasting room at a local winery and did not learn near as much as what I’m learning with kit wine. Highly recommend kit wine making to anyone who wants to learn about wine.

Great episode! I say basket….great for the instant gratification!

Hey, watch the Consumer Reports stab (you took it back, though!). Ratings / Reviews if done in an empirical and objective way can serve the buying public in a good way (e.g., cars, flat screen TVs, and, yes, even wine)!

QotD : Wine basket…

And great that I found you trying the Hermit Crab. I´ve tried a lot of d´Arenbergs lately : Feral Fox Pinot Noir, Stump Jump Red, Stump Jump White, Money Spider Roussanne, Last Ditch Viogner and of course the Hermit Crab, the only one I liked was the Crab and I liked it a lot. Marsanne is my white grape of choice right now.

Cheers

Swedish T

PS. And now we´re friends at facebook DS

Hi Gary,

I just started watching your show and I love it. I actually saw the conan episode when it first aired! But now I’m a bit more into food, and am expanding my knowledge about everything culinary, including wine. That said, I bought some nice, fresh, organic broccoli yesterday and really tasted it. It tasted first of grass – nice and clean. After a chewing and swallowing, an overwhelming taste of tobacco was left in my mouth, which is why I’m posting this. You mentioned that one of the wines had an aspect of tobacco on the mid palate, followed by broccoli. Now, I’m not certain as this was the first time I’ve really paid attention – but somehow I think broccoli has that tobacco-ness in it – not to say that that’s where the flavor came from, as tobacco-taste can be present without the broccoli. What do you think? Do you taste food as you taste wine? Can you build the taste profile of a food with other foods, or have you ever found something you thought you knew as a “building block” to taste of something else? I will continue to expand my palate, and thank you for helping all of us on our quests to taste the world. Or wine, at least.

When you tasted the Hermit Crab, you said that it was a “real wine” and should not be for the kids (21 and older). I’m just a beginner (lets say.. 21) and I am trying to switch up the palate with many different types of wine. Shouldn’t we introduce the more finer wines to the up and coming generation of wine connoisseur’s? What’s so wrong about being young and having a great interest in “real wine”.. I DO take it very seriously.

Putting all that aside, I think this is a Great show! I enjoy watching you critique wines, and learning from you.

Gary – great stuff! I recently found your website, and I’m browsing around. Enjoyed the segments on wine tasting and training your palate. This helps me understand tastes and terminology considerably. You explained what’s meant by a “hollow” wine (no midpalate) – my question is: what do you mean by a “flabby” wine?

Of course, I’ve got a bunch of seemingly related questions about terms like “backbone,” “structure,” what you mean when you say a wine is “tight” (or has a tight flavor profile… Are there any episodes where you talk about these kinds of wine terms?

Thanks!

QOTD: Wine making kit, no question. I’ve already been looking into it. My whole goal would be to just make a wine that doesn’t suck.

qotd wine making kit. unless that basket has a ’61 petrus in it.

Gary, one day you should have a vin jaune on.

Why don’t you change out glasses between wines? The residue from past wines will mix with the new wine being tasted and will interfere with the flavor.

QOTD: Wine making kit

Definitely wine basket. Wouldn’t trust myself to make wine in a dorm room. Also, GREAT SHOW! Just started taking Mr. Boyer’s Geography of Wine class at Virginia Tech and he has us watch your show as part of our homework. Keep up the good work!