Good wine

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The problem may be as much the types of wines you are trying as the serving temperature. It seems to be the style today to make very oaky, tannic wines. I believe many of them (especially Cabernet Sauv.) need more bottle age than many people give them. Try some Pinot Noir, Beaujolais, Zinfandel, and see if you like any of these. These are more fruit driven and less tannic than Cabernet (although each in quite a different style). I don't think it would be a problem serving any of these in the low 60s (the Beaujolais a little cooler).

Most experts say you should serve reds at cool room temp. (low 60s).

Do some experimenting by trying a lot of different types of wines. And work with a good merchant who knows (or can learn) your preferences. You'll get some idea what you like.

Tom Schellberg

Firstly, I feel that the 65-72F recommendation is a bit high, it should rather be 59-65F. Secondly, the fruiter wines are often best enjoyed at the lower part of the range. It is the big, complex, well aged and developed wines that show best at the higher temperatures and those are often perceived as oaky or tannic by beginners. Anders

Agreed, I'm surprised that the Wine for Dummies would say 72 was ok. Dale

Dale Williams Drop "damnspam" to reply

In article , snipped-for-privacy@home.com says...

Mel,

You do not indicate why you want to try to start drinking a glass of wine, and that might be important.

First, I'll assume that you are legit in your expression of both desire to drink and enjoy wine, and in your feelings that the enjoyment has been missing in your previous attempts. I'll get slightly personal and anecdotal: I too did not appreciate wine. Beers and ales and a few "hard liquor" drinks were more to my tastes. My wife and many of her friends enjoyed wine and attempted to get my interest up, but didn't meet with much success. About every wine that I tasted seemed unpleasant in some way. As this was the 60's in the US, Mateus Rosé and Lancer's Rosé were becoming popular. I found that I enjoyed both, but still didn't really embrace wine in general. At least I now had two wines from which I could derive enjoyment when in the company of my wife's friends. They didn't look down their noses too much and just accepted my un-refined tastes - at least I was drinking wine. Outside the boundaries of these two wines, not much else was appealing to me. I still sampled other wines and just didn't get it. After many wasted years, a very good friend introduced me to a Bordeaux from the Pomerol over a wonderful dinner. The wine was phenomenal. Over the course of evening, it changed several times in the glass much to my amazement and delight. Over that glass of wine, I had a catharsis. Had my tastes changed so dramatically? Had the evening with great friends changed the wine? Was this just such a different wine that I had ever experienced? Who knows, other than I found that I loved wine totally. I had a complete 180º turn. My biggest regret is that I wasted so much time before I made this discovery.

OK, where is this leading, you might ask? To know if you will ever like wine, you should experience a good deal of it. Considering that there are literally tens of thousands of wines available someplace, that will take several life-times. Pretty bleak endeavor, if you finally decide that NO, you just don't LIKE wine. My advice is to attempt to sample a very broad spectrum of wine in the most favorable conditions, and then make that decision, knowing that your personal tastes might well change at some point and then you might wish to start over. I'd suggest that you not concentrate on what price a wine is, and also ignore someone's rating of a wine. Price, while giving a clue as to quality leaves so many variables unaddressed as to be worthless here. One's personal rating is just that a personal observation based on their individual preferences - not yours. A possible start to your quest would be a book by Andrea Immer, Master Sommelier, "Great Wine, Made Simple." ISBN 0-7679-0477-X. Her approach is based on tasting wine and follows, IMHO, a very logical progression. Hers is more a "workbook," than a traditional wine text. Because it does involve actually tasting many wines, it might help to have a few friends around so you don't end up with a bunch of bottles that do not get consumed. The process is about experiencing wine at many levels and there is also quite a bit of information to be gleaned from the reading of the book - along with the fun of actually drinking the wine. She covers some background material, i.e. serving temps, glassware, and the like, which should help put each wine in the most favorable light. Again, having those friends around can do far more than just allow all the wine to be consumed.

While certainly every available wine is not covered in this book - it has fewer than 300 pages, sans appendices, it covers an extremely broad range of wines, giving you a great opportunity to see if there really isn't something out there that you DO enjoy. Even if you discover that you really do not enjoy wine, you'll have experience and knowledge and can keep up the conversation with those who do like wine.

Good luck and I hope you find the starting point that you need for a life accompanied by wine. Hunt

Alex, You might want to take a look at the book that I recommended to Mel, Andrea Immer's "Great Wine Made Simple." It gives much of the data that you asked for, and does it in a fun way - you drink wine!

Hunt

I agree completely. I'd had the Dummies... book for many years and had turned up my nose at it (it was a gift from a well-meaning relative). After Broadbent, Laube, Parker and many, many more, I picked it up one day, and opened it for the first time. I was amazed at hope well-written (some of the humor escaped me, but that was minor), and thorough it was. It actually answered a few nagging questions that Robinson, Clarke, and many more had never covered! I plan on picking up their two additional titles when I see them. I just wish that they had different titles...

Hunt

PS Yes to Zraly's book too. Immer was on his staff at one time.

I had not seen your response, when I made the Immer suggestion - sorry, you beat me to it. Hunt

One aspect of the lower temp is that many of the characteristics of the wine are masked, or numbed - both good and bad.

Bigger Chards are good candidates for being served a bit warmer. I feel this is true for Burgundies as well as OZ and CA big-guns.

Hunt

PS I hope you mean European "room temp" and not December inside Aunt Millie's house in Cedar Rapids!