The privilege of choice

WHY do we like the wines that we do? Simple. They are enjoyable to drink, with or without food. What makes them enjoyable is the real question. "What makes them lovely to drink - at least to me?" Not as easy to answer as it looks. We drink wine to accompany a meal, or we drink it (often) for the sheer pleasure of drinking a good, or hopefully, a great wine. The pleasure comes from a combination of the taste on the palate and the aromas which waft upwards from the rear of the nasopharynx into the nose, as well as the cerebral from the barrage of messages emanating from the sensory receptors in the mouth and nasopharynx. On occasion, this barrage can be quite overwhelming. It can reduce you to a humble silence or even to tears.

A wine does not need to be great or even "near-great" to be a likable drink. Even the simplest of wines such as a Mouton Cadet, can be a nice drink - it is easy to understand why, because this wine like others in the same genre is commercially produced to a fixed style and quality. You cannot go wrong. Better than nothing - unless it has suffered from poor storage.

Freshness, fruit, balance, harmony and finally finesse - if all these attributes check out as expected, the wine should appeal. Not necessarily. The other night I had a glass of a New World Sauvignon Blanc, no it was not Cloudy Bay but from around there, and it was so pronouncedly New World sauvignon blanc, "Chinese gooseberry" that it was like wearing it as a badge.