Fun fact: one of the easiest way to indicate that you are not a native-speaker of French is to compliment your host's white wine. The phrase un bon vin blanc, literally "a good white wine," contains all three of French's nasal sounds, which are unique to the language (the Danish equivalent of the phrase impossible for foreigners is rødgrød med fløde, a dessert as marvelous as its name). Monday night, I had some bon vin blanc, even though I couldn't pronounce it, at a wine tasting, not far from the National Archives. Organized by EDUCO, I left with a bit more oenological and viticultural knowledge than I had had when I entered, though I'm still going to refer all of my wine choices to a certain older brother of mine.
Before we even saw the first bottle, the instructor, who is a professional wine taster, explained to us a bit of how French geography and climate affect wine quality. In the EU, wine is designated according to its origin, not according to the variety of grape (although this is sometimes secondary). The instructor was very enthusiastic about the different characters, insisting that grapes are just like people; some are thin, some are wide, some are narrow, some are bitter, etc. As it turns out, France is just warm enough to grow grapevines, and there is a noticeable difference between the wines of the south (in Provence, Languedoc, etc), and the more central and northerly varieties (from the Loire valley, certain regions of the Atlantic coast, etc). The northern wines receive less sunlight, and thus tend to be thinner, more acidic, lighter, and longer; southern varieties fulfill all of the (silly) stereotypes of southern climes of 18th-century philosophy a la Montesquieu.
There are also right and wrong ways to taste and experience wine; that is, professional tasters use a different method than people like me. First there is the swirling of the wine glass, in order to test viscosity; depending on how quickly the residue adhering to the sides of the glass drips back towards the stem, the thicker the wine, and the closer together the drops (formally called "legs"), the sweeter. Next, there is the initial sniff, followed by the real one, which is accompanied by another swirl. Next, our featured presentation -- sipping the wine. After swishing the wine around one's mouth, in order to stimulate all of one's taste buds, one should inhale a bit (being careful not to drip), and either spit or swallow. This burst of oxygen makes a surprisingly large difference, for chemical reasons I would probably understand if I took a class with Prof. Regenstein.
The first wine (a white) was served in bottle with it's label covered, so that we would have to guess geographic origin. The wine was nearly transparent in the glass, and scored very low on the viscosity scale. The smell was sharp, and the taste was dry, without a hint of sweetness. In spite of all of this wonderful data, in a guided multiple choice question with two possible responses, I chose the wrong one (sorry, Sam). The wine was from Bordeaux (like my friend Guillaume), and was a sauvignon blanc.
Out came the cheese, and quite a lot of varieties, too! Too many to list and describe them all, but I took away one lesson from all the cheese, and that was the identity of two very tasty cheeses. The first was Saint-Marcellin, which I had never heard of. The second, the best cheese I have tasted since my arrival in France, was a humble compte -- but not just any compte. This compte had been aged for a very short amount of time, under 12 months, and I can still taste its mild sweetness. By the end of the night, with a bit more wine in my system, I began to refer to it as "Conde" by accident, this being the name of a 17th-century French general and prince, who gave Louis XIV both a lot of grief, and a lot of victories (see FB for a photo of a painting of him).
The next wine, also a white, was just a little bit thicker, and was also from the north. It was called Marsanne, and it really didn't do much for me. It was at this point, also, that small flasks of various scents were handed around the table; we tried to guess each fragrance, and, again, I failed miserably. Somewhat amusingly, I guessed that the lemon flavor was chamomile; this is because I instantly recognized its scent from herbal tea, of which there are mostly three kinds served in my house: mint, chamomile, and lemon. The power of association!
The next wine, a red, smelled heavily of raspberries, to me, at any rate. The instructor validated this, and added a few other flavors that I should have been smelling, but I could never really get past the crushed raspberries. It was a nice rich wine, from the southeast, known as the Coteaux du Languedoc (Longuedoc is right by Provence, on the Mediterranean coast). I refilled my glass once or twice with this one; I really liked it!
Last up was another bordellais wine, a white. Saint-Croix-du-Mont was it's name, and when I first sniffed it, I was immediately repulsed: it smelled of rotten fruit! I brought this up, and it looks as if my sense of smell wasn't misaligned; to manufacture this particular wine, the vineyard workers deliberately wait until the fruit has achieved an overripe flavor before they harvest it. I was at first hesitant to taste such a foul-smelling liquid (nobody else seemed bothered by it), but the taste was nothing like the smell: the taste was wonderfully sweet, that of a dessert wine.
Fun fact #2: There is no French word for "wine snob."
~JD
"Agenouillees, elles attendent qu'il passe, suivi de ses aumoniers; le premier medecin tient la tete du malade que le roi touche en repetant la formule" [Kneeling, they waited for the king to pass, followed by his chaplains; the chief physician held the head of the scrofulous supplicant, whom the king touched while repeating the phrase "the king touches and God heals you"] (Christophe Blanquie, Les institutions de la France des Bourbons, p. 27).
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