Uncorked DC: Savor the Flavor. Taste the Rainbow.

October 2, 2008 by Danielle  Send to a Friend

So the point of this column is to review area wine bars and wineries, suggest inexpensive wines for purchase, and report area wine events.

To start:

• The new wine bar in Columbia Heights, Room 11 (3234 11th St. NW) is slated to open this month to no doubt overexcited yuppies. I am one of them. Anyone know the official opening?

• If you haven’t yet gone to see the Avedon exhibit at the Corcoran, make it a point to go on Thursdays during their “power hours”: for $25 you can see the exhibit, snack on cheese and hors d’oeuvres, and enjoy two glasses of “highly rated wine”. I’m still trying to connect with someone at Corcoran that can explain to me what they mean by “highly rated”, but regardless, this sounds smashing.

Another overarching goal of this column is to educate as well. Education wasn’t really one of the goals, but I just realized that were I to launch into the wine selections at Enology and say, “the 2005 Montinore Estate Gewürztraminer has an overwhelming bouquet of apples and citrus, with a crisp mouth feel and ammonia on the finish” all of your eyes will glaze over while you are in the process of rolling them at my bastardly pretention. Then you’ll think “what the fuck, there’s ammonia in the wine?”

I’m not here for the douchbaggery. I’m here for the wine. So before I tell you about any wine bars, I’m going to tell you about wine flavors. How wine is described, what on earth people are talking about, and how you too can irritate your friends and loved ones by pompously describing wine!

*Nota Bene: avoid the 2005 Montinore Estate Gewürztraminer at Enology unless you really want a wine that tastes like apple juice. This stuff is fit only for cheesy bachelorette parties and ragers made up entirely of 14 year olds who stole their parents’ stash.

Pick up any written piece about wine and you are instantly awash in verbiage that makes absolutely no sense: “This Chablis has grassy notes and a crisp finish.”; “This Bordeaux is rich in ripe plum flavors and smooth, oaky tannins.”; “This Sauvignon Blanc has a lot of bright and refreshing citrus fruit with a hint of pipi du chat on the nose.” These wines do not contain any grass, plums, citrus fruit, or cat pee. Wine articles are notorious for having such flowery language, and a huge, ginormous, laughable misconception is that some wines have these ingredients in them. Certainly a cat did not pee in your Sauvignon Blanc. If it did, well, bravo. Cats aren’t known for their aim. You must have trained the beast well.

So why are wines described as such? The short answer is this: the chemical composition of the flavors and smells of certain things (grass, fruit) are identical to the chemical compositions found in some flavors in wine. If you’re interested read up on it, but for now the science is being skipped in favor of the flavors. Some wines do truly have a finish that tastes like pepper, though there’s no pepper. Some wines do remind you a lot of berries and plums but aren’t made from these. These flavors come from the soil they’re grown in, the barrels they’re aged in, and the time it spent in the bottle before it found its way into your overpriced apartment.

So grab a bottle of wine, doesn’t matter what it is. Pour a glass, and then go to your spice rack (or your friend’s spice rack, or your mother’s, I don’t care) and sniff around. Get some fruit and some vegetables and try them with the wine too; don’t just eat the food, but savor it. A lot of people (myself included, until I learned better) just wolf down food and don’t truly savor it. Chew it twice, and then hold it on your tongue and think about the flavor. Ask yourself; what does a peach taste like? “Duh,” you say, “like a peach”.

….but what does that really mean? What about a fresh peach vs. a canned peach? What does a mushroom taste like? It’s sort of earthy, and a little musty. Pinot Noirs from Burgundy have the same characteristics; try one with some mushrooms and like magic, they fit! This is why a mushroom risotto can be a Burgundy Pinot’s best friend; similar flavors pair really well.

To further help describe a wine, check out this chart. It looks really goddamn ridiculous, doesn’t it? Sawdust? Pencil shavings? Jolly Ranchers? But take a sip of wine and think about it. That Merlot you’re drinking will start to taste an awful lot like leather…but in a good way.

Knowing the flavors of wine and being able to match them to flavor in food is the magical key to food and wine pairings. Next week I’ll help you do the ultimate in classy: throw a wine and cheese party.

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