TN:Some wines with friends

originally posted by Ken Schramm: I'm simply an e-info junkie, but at some level I can be painted with Maureen's brush. Guilty? Maybe, but everybody's got to learn from somebody.
Click to expand...

I don't want to put words into Maureen's mouth. But from where I sit the lament is not necessarily about getting information from other people quickly via the web. Instead, the lament is that some people combine the quickness of the web with their greed/superficial interest/ego to buy cases and cases of wine that they have no clue whether or not they will like.

I'd like to that that folks around here are wise enough to be a bit more prudent and serious about their approach to wine, regardless of financial means. But hey, maybe that approach is also out of touch. (Witness those who missed out in the 09 Beaujolais Frenzy).
 
I get where Maureen is coming from. Certainly, I think most people on the Internet are just looking to find the top producers because, let's face facts, wine is really expensive, and, for most people (and I include myself), spending even $25 on a bottle of wine isn't a casual expenditure. So, they need some guidance in order to maximize the probability of getting a hit and minimize their chances of misses since they simply can't afford to try every producer for themselves and earn their stripes.

But, of course, on the flip side, because of all this wine information, and because people all now know who the best producers are, wine is basically becoming just a Veblen item that people want to own solely for the sake of owning rather than to drink and enjoy. So, while before, these collectors can just buy up their 100 cases of Latour and call it a day, they now have to buy up cases of Bachelet Charmes or even Coudert CT to supplement their cellars, even though there is no chance in hell they will ever be able to drink them all. That is obviously annoying and unfortunate. Which, then of course, forces newbs like me, who basically resign themselves to being priced out of premier cru and village wines, to rely on the Internet even more to find out the new under-the-radar producer or even a new region to look to in order to buy high quality, affordable wines. And, the cycle begins again.

I just read on Slate that a collector bought 400 cases of 1996 Salon. I mean, really? I'm sure in 10 years, that same collector or someone like him will be buying up all the top cuvees of the best growers to show off to his friends. But, I hope I still have a little time to enjoy that wine, and others like it, before getting priced out.
 
originally posted by Yule Kim:
I just read on Slate that a collector bought 400 cases of 1996 Salon. I mean, really? I'm sure in 10 years, that same collector or someone like him will be buying up all the top cuvees of the best growers to show off to his friends.
Click to expand...
If that collector is who I think it is there is absolutely no reason to worry that he'll start buying any grower Champagne.
 
originally posted by Ken Schramm:
The night stand reading right now is "The Wines and Vineyards of France" by Louis Jacquelin and Ren Poulain. It's interesting to get their take on the state of wine circa 1960. There's some good history in there that I haven't found anywhere else.
Click to expand...
Indeed, a fascinating book.
 
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
I have to think Burghound is a much bigger culprit than the wine boards in creating mass demand for everyone's secret favorites.
Click to expand...

I dunno Keith. I highly doubt that the folks Maureen is referring to are Burghound subscribers and chase the wines based on his reviews. Plus, Meadows rarely reviewed Truchot and when he did, they were lukewarm reviews at best.
 
Look, I am as "guilty" as the next person if guilt is derived from reading wine boards and learning about wines previously unknown to me from other posters - hell, one of the things I liked most about the WLDG in the old days is that it permitted me to learn a bit about loire wines from several of the posters, most of whom are now here. I think Rahsaan accurately summed up my real complaint. And when the newbies figure out which producers chet kern or alan weinberg or even keith like and insist on snapping up the precious few cases brought into the states, that's when I get irritated. I had to give Paul Wasserman (while he was still working at woodland hills) a lecture on the foolishness of encouraging his young disciples to lay down denis bachelet - when I pointed out that hardly came into the country and those of us who already loved his wines were having enough trouble buying a few, so why stick them in the basements of some 26 year old who may never like them, he thought for a moment and said, you know, you're right - but it was too late.

And to just to add to what David observed - several years ago, not all that long after the 2001 german rieslings were reviewed by Rovani, I was on the phone with the salesperson I dealt with at Carolina Wine Co. We were laughing about the sudden rush to buy german riesling, which I'd been buying since the 1983 vintage and which he'd been selling me for several years by that time. He told me he had a customer who called and insisted - very emphatically and with the implicit threat that he might take his considerable business elsewhere if thwarted - that the salesman sell him some 01 Donnhoff N.H. spatlesen - so he did. Then he shipped the wine and the customer called up, all irate and sputtering - "why'd you sell me WHITE wine???"
 
Witness those who missed out in the 09 Beaujolais Frenzy
Click to expand...

Huh? Do those people really exist? I thought 09 Bojo's were the new mer-shi-pin-bec? From reading the web, it's folks have (rightfully) gone overboard loading up on them.
 
Well in relation to a thread from a couple of weeks ago, some of the 'old hands' might not have bought all they would have liked to because some of the wines disappeared so fast.

In addition, some of us (me!) were complaining that from a consumer perspective it is less attractive to have a short window to buy all the wines one would ever want to consume as opposed to being able to buy a couple per month for the next twelve months.

But as I mentioned, these hopes and dreams of mine do not necessarily reflect (the new) reality.
 
I'm definitely as guilty as anyone for getting caught up in the '09 Beaujolais frenzy, but it doesn't seem so bad now. Yes, you have a short window to buy the special cuvees, but generally, I haven't had too much difficulty getting wine (with the exception of Lapierre and Coudert to a lesser extent).
 
Blame Keith for the Coudert frenzy :).

The boards are culpable: Jim Cowan is personally responsible for my current Beaujolais habit, though I sampled his recommendations back in 2006-7 fairly carefully before jumping in with both feet. If 2010 is another banner year, anyway, Beaujolais may go the way of Burgundy for the long-term. Then it will be too expensive to build up a Beaujolais cellar.
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Blame Keith for the Coudert frenzy :).

The boards are culpable: Jim Cowan is personally responsible for my current Beaujolais habit, though I sampled his recommendations back in 2006-7 fairly carefully before jumping in with both feet. If 2010 is another banner year, anyway, Beaujolais may go the way of Burgundy for the long-term. Then it will be too expensive to build up a Beaujolais cellar.
Click to expand...
Not sure I buy into this doomsday scenario for Beaujolais. Consider the volume available and it's not as cut up into small parcels.
 
I find it hard to believe a great vintage in 2010 will make Beaujolais prices escalate when the great vintage in 2009 that everyone's supposedly frenzied about didn't.
 
originally posted by maureen:

No more - now every tom, dick, and harry who has decided he won't be taken seriously as a wine geek until he masters burgundy simply reads the wine boards, figures out who is taken seriously by burg drinkers, and then buys everything those people rave up without knowing if the wines will be enjoyed.
Click to expand...

when the 05s were released, i bought a bottle of details deliberately withheld gc gevrey from a producer i like out of curiosity, and popped it in the shop to share with the guys who worked there.

it was really good. cool and classic -- exactly the sort of thing i like -- and i think it will be a fabulous wine at some point in the very distant future. the store's burgundy buyer was appreciative enough of my chubby largesse to offer to sell me three whole bottles. (fwiw, he very genuinely thought this was a large favor.)

i sipped the wine again. and imagined opening a bottle 10 years hence. and i imagined depositing it into the ever thirsty fatsink (all the while saying to myself, "i am a fat, impatient tool, and i should have known better" -- which, heaven knows, is a common enough happening in the closed environs of the fatcave).

then i thought about how i might feel in 20 years. and i asked myself, "how long ago was 88?" -- and i sipped again. and i thought about 83, and 72.... and i shared out the rest of the bottle and left the pleasure of buying the other three to some other poor rube.

we'll see how it all shakes down, but, to echo your point, when i read about the way people buy burgundy these days, i wonder how they are going to feel when they come back to the wine in a few years, trash the first few bottles and... that's it. there is no grail hiding down the line in the rest of the case.

fb.
 
I've seen some of those guys buy (and drink) Burgundy. They have rather wide throats and deep stomachs, and I suspect will do just fine.
 
originally posted by fatboy:
originally posted by maureen:

No more - now every tom, dick, and harry who has decided he won't be taken seriously as a wine geek until he masters burgundy simply reads the wine boards, figures out who is taken seriously by burg drinkers, and then buys everything those people rave up without knowing if the wines will be enjoyed.
Click to expand...

when the 05s were released, i bought a bottle of details deliberately withheld gc gevrey from a producer i like out of curiosity, and popped it in the shop to share with the guys who worked there.

it was really good. cool and classic -- exactly the sort of thing i like -- and i think it will be a fabulous wine at some point in the very distant future. the store's burgundy buyer was appreciative enough of my chubby largesse to offer to sell me three whole bottles. (fwiw, he very genuinely thought this was a large favor.)

i sipped the wine again. and imagined opening a bottle 10 years hence. and i imagined depositing it into the ever thirsty fatsink (all the while saying to myself, "i am a fat, impatient tool, and i should have known better" -- which, heaven knows, is a common enough happening in the closed environs of the fatcave).

then i thought about how i might feel in 20 years. and i asked myself, "how long ago was 88?" -- and i sipped again. and i thought about 83, and 72.... and i shared out the rest of the bottle and left the pleasure of buying the other three to some other poor rube.

we'll see how it all shakes down, but, to echo your point, when i read about the way people buy burgundy these days, i wonder how they are going to feel when they come back to the wine in a few years, trash the first few bottles and... that's it. there is no grail hiding down the line in the rest of the case.

fb.
Click to expand...

Let's hope they drink the shit and decide it's too acidic for them. Seriously. I can see how they would like Bordeaux...but I'm thinking that a lot of the wines from Burgundy are not going to appeal to the point chasers who purchased thousands of 2005s because of the hype.

But, the scenario that is even worse is the fuckers who buy the stuff as investment.

I'm kinda anti-trophy wine. I buy stuff I want to drink.

-mark
 
originally posted by Tom Glasgow:
Not sure I buy into this doomsday scenario for Beaujolais. Consider the volume available and it's not as cut up into small parcels.
Click to expand...

originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
I find it hard to believe a great vintage in 2010 will make Beaujolais prices escalate when the great vintage in 2009 that everyone's supposedly frenzied about didn't.
Click to expand...

Jeez, guys, "Always with a bit of humor," as Dr. Yen Lo counsels, in The Manchurian Candidate." Although do I think a series of notable, critically-acclaimed vintages in a region is one of the conditions for entry into the landscape of the popular oenological consciousness.

Re: Maureens' and fb's comments, it would be wonderful to taste through producer after producer in Burgundy over to parse out favorite appellations and producers. Pricing even for simple villages wines nowadays biases strongly towards pre-tasting research, as Maureen suggests.
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:

Mugnier 2008 NSG "Clos de la Marechale" - classic balance, red-fruity and astringent in good balance, worth the tariff.
Click to expand...

I know everyone has his/her own scale for value, so I'm not casting aspersions. But when I spend $70-80 I want more than 'classic balance'.

Of course this means it is difficult for me to find 'affordable' wines from blue chip Burgundy producers, but that's nothing new.

I responded also because I thought about buying this wine recently, but wasn't sure if it would deliver for my more severe value scale.

Regardless, I'm sure it was delicious!
Click to expand...

$54 on pre-arrival at Woodland Hills and well worth that price IMO. One of those Burgundies for which the phrase "haunting beauty" comes to mind.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top