Love your work, just a constructive detail, in grapes... Carménère (kaar·muh·nehr) American Pronunciation Carmenère is a wine grape variety that originates from Bordeaux, France. The Romans especially adored this wine. The name Carmenère comes from the word carmin, which means crimson, an ode to the reddish shade the leaves of the vine turn during autumn.
Just came acroos this great channel yesterday. I got my French relatives, wife's father and brother in law to do a blind tasting of wines...very funny ...I must find the footage and post it. Really enjoyed the show in Bordeaux and look forward to watching more....move to France from UK with my French wife may be on again!
We always love watching these and seeing how you deduce what wine it is! It is amazing and inspiring how you figure it out! Thanks for making such fun and informative videos!
When I saw the color and heard your description, especially saying that pretty much everything was "medium", I guessed Merlot. You should taste this again when it is about 8-9 years old. Trust me.
Vince! Good job mate. A question. My girlfriend and I are big fans of the channel from Perth AU. We recently tried a Margret River wine (a local Cab Sav) and on the nose and on the palate it smelt of like alcohol? And very kind of "fuel like". It was 14.4%. It also looked like a cab franc, it was more brick colour than typical purple fruit. My questions: 1. We have another 14.5% from Chile. A Carmenere from Montes which we are saving. What does this mean for that wine, given we didn't like the 14.4 & found it too high? Does it mean the Carménère will also be too much for us? 2. Also what influences the alcohol level? We have a late harvest from Undurraga which is 13.8% so it can't be the sugar? Or can it? 3. Why did it look like a Cab franc lol Thanks Vince
Eh, it's all about balance with the other components. Chilean wines are done at altitude so they come off as fresher. Winemaking dictates a lot of this. My gut says you just tried an example you didn't like. I've had wines at 12% where you smelled the alcohol too much if it was made poorly and didn't have a lot else going on. In regards to where it comes from, it's all sugar levels at harvest. Sugar + yeast = alcohol. Warmer climate + later harvest + riper grapes = more alcohol.
I'd would have included for sure tempranill on the list. For the structure, red to black fruit and some oak. Not all tempranillos are super whiskylactin-oak forward.
For sure. They only reason I didn't was because the "exam wines" are always traditional style with American oak, and I didn't get that. (I had my team get classic examples of the wines just like the exams)
Haha that’s ok! Part of the learning process. Not enough earth or flower or tannin for Nebbiolo. It actually could have easily been a French oak Tempranillo, so you’re not far off. it’s just that when practicing for exams we assume that you’re getting the “classic” version of the grape, which would include American oak.
@@visforvino Awesome. I'm loving this journey of learning about wine - I work as a personal chef so wine pairings come up often. Thank you for your videos!
Love the video as usual. I have a question for you. I've done some blind tastings with some wines from France from 2022 which was an extremely hot year. Is climate change changing the classic signs of styles in blind tastings? I completely missed on some wines from 2022 in blind tastings because they felt super ripe and full bodied despite coming from cool regions
Every winemaker I talk to has similar concern. In some regions, (like Burgundy) they're ok with it because ripeness is no longer an issue. But yes, you get less "classic" vintages. We all need to adjust what "classic vintage" means going forward I suppose.
Nice process of elimination. Well done. As to your use of the terms "complexity" and later "structure", my observation of sommeliers is that they treat these as separate things. In my thinking they are related as follows: when you discuss the notes you smell and taste both in the case of the sliders and the icons used to represent notes, then you basically give an indication of complexity. IIRC this was implied in the video too. To me, structure then is about how these elements listed under "complexity" rank. You can have tannins but they can be too much and end up too high in the structure of elements in complexity. Acidity can be too high, or so low that you have a hard time to perceive it. In that way, they are different sides of the same coin. I have noticed that temperature and how much air/oxygen a wine was exposed to after opening the bottle make a big difference. How do you do that - decide on it? I sometimes want to be able to enjoy a bottle of wine over a coupe of days. Some wines can handle that, some can't. Some are better the second or third day, some worse. Another thing is the shape of the glass. The glass in the video is rather narrow towards the nose and higher ABV wines may tend to give only evaporated alcohol in the nose, especially when the win is a bit warmer. How do you decide on that aspect in preparation of the blind tasting?
The wines that last for days are fun, but few and far between, and you'll usually know when you have one. A super tannic red, or a unique white like a super high end Chenin Blanc or Chateau Musar white. It's fun to see how wines changes over days, but I'd say 95% of wines show best within the first few hours. Just my personal opinion. In regards to the glass, that's just a compromise you make when blind tasting. Because if the exam gave you a Burgundy glass for instance, they'd be giving you a HUGE hint on the wine in the glass. Best practice is to get your nose in there JUST until the wine hits your palette, and use taste to also confirm structure, not just the nose. Hope this helps!
@@visforvino - thank you for answering in depth. Well, I buy red wines for that quality of lasting 4 days, so I know I have them. I would not call them super tannic, though. If that happens, my wine merchant made a mistake, and I would decant the wine by the glass through a vinturi device. My last bottle was Petruccino, for example. I had a powerful Pauillac before that, that I would have appreciated a lot 50 years ago when my "standard" red wine would have been an old school Châteauneuf du Pape. Today, I didn't think the Pauillac had the complexity I am looking for. The St. Estèphe before that also was very good but too light for me. Each of these examples - of very good year - could easily maintain their quality over 4 days at controlled temperature (between cellar and room temperature). Blind tasting is interesting and I opine that the glass should be black, by the way, if you want blind tasting. People are generally shocked how bad they do with that. The shape of the glass is a bit of a hobby horse or pet peeve. At your ~blind tasting, I would probably offer the same wine in two different shapes glasses. The problem is the perception of the volatile substances in the wine: aromas and alcohol. Each of these evaporate and diffuse into the space in the glass above the wine differently. Evaporated alcohol is inclined to stick to the glass wall. My nose is probably too big for narrow glass openings and the alcohol that crawls up into the space along the wall of the glass will dominate the aromas. Serve me a Brunello in a Cabernet glass and I'll have to kick your rear bottom anatomy. There's no bragging here, just "quality over quantity" - if I needed the alcohol, I'd be buying loads of bottles in the euro 5..10 range. And I'd be disappointed about both the wine and myself. I can neither drink "poor man's wine" (aka malt-wine aka beer - gluten) in its natural frothy bubbly form nor in its distilled derivative (whisky).
Sorry to much talk and so confuse, Just tell us what is good in general that is your traste. But any way you are much better than others sommeliers thinking they are gods. Is useless to became with so much words this is not a clases in philosofie 😂😂😂😂
@@frossato You're right GSM is not a grape, it's 3 grapes and they make up the name. There is no grape called Amarone and most people can't name the grapes that make up traditional Amarone.
