Can a wine be accurately described as feminine or masculine?

Hi,

That was one of the subjects under discussion last night with my neighbors, whom I had invited over for dinner. I served a wine from Ludon, where they have family ties: 1990 Château La Lagune. This looked far younger than its years and had a delightfully evanescent nose of ripe Cabernet, humus, and truffle. The wine was suave and seamless, by no means powerful, but very elegant and poised. It was as good as it will ever be, even if I’m sure its plateau will be quite long.
It reminded me of a one of the better wines of Margaux.
Anyway, although they’re from the wine country, my neighbors have only an ordinary interest in the stuff and, when I described the La Lagune as feminine, the wife was surprised. She had never heard such a reference, and it puzzled her. “Is this a usual term?” she asked. I replied in the affirmative.

The question I’ve asked above is whether wine descriptions can be gendered in order to convey a meaningful and comprehensible message – not whether they should be.
In this age of political correctness – including a movement to bowdlerize and rewrite children’s fairy tales! – there are undoubtedly people who object on principle, going on the assumption that it is wrong to ascribe characteristics to either sex (since there are strong women and dainty men, etc.). So, I will leave that issue aside. I have even heard women winemakers say that females leave a discernible feminine imprint on wines, which if I find rather hard to accept (that having been said, La Lagune has been made by a succession of women over the years!).
Getting back to semantics, and the way we speak about wines, I believe that it is both useful and understandable to describe a Chambolle-Musigny as feminine or a Châteauneuf-du-Pape as virile, a practical sort of shorthand. What is trickier is to extrapolate from those words to find out what they really mean. Would a WSET or MW student be marked down for using them? Does a woman, for example, have a different conception of what a feminine is wine is than a man? Do wine lovers in Sydney and Montevideo, with different cultures and languages, agree on what a masculine wine is?

In my opinion, any wine geek or professional can relate to the description of 1990 La Lagune as feminine. Rather than lacking punch or character, those attributes are very much present, but restrained and under control – or, as Mitterrand liked to market himself, “la force tranquille”. The French say an aromatic wine is “perfumed”. That, also, can be one of the hallmarks of a feminine wine, where the aromas are subtle, yet distinctive. As for aftertaste, such wines can be long and voluptuous, but not in your face.

And masculine wines? A big, strapping Australian wine fits the bill very nicely thank you, but that is a caricature. Ch. Latour is one of the most masculine wines in Bordeaux, and yet it is a wine of great depth and nuance. In the same way that feminine wines are not lily-livered, neither are masculine wines big thumping ones on steroids. Still, there is the idea of full bodied, straightforward wines with above average alcohol content (although this is not defining).
I’ve heard those terms around for as long as I can remember and am confident that they are here to stay. I do feel, though, that caution should be exercised in using them and that they definitely should not be overused.

Best regards,
Alex R.
www.bordeauxwineblog.com

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I guess every answer is going to be subjective, but don’t believe a male or female winemaker is going to leave a masculine or feminine imprint on the wines they make. I sometimes think of cab/Bordeaux blends as masculine or feminine based on how either burly or silky the tannins are.

I really like the question and look forward to some discussion. Someone once gave me a hard time (I think) for using these terms. But doesn’t it make sense that a Jouan Chambolle is feminine and a Chevillon NSG 1er is masculine? I think so. I also think this does work across cultures.

I think yes, but with caution, as you add.
As far as wines I enjoy, I had had many made by women winemakers; as a general statement, I find a nuance, a sense of balance.

It’s worth adding that I don’t think the gender of the winemaker is a key factor in whether the wine seems masculine or feminine.

Most, if not all wines are non-binary IMO.

Putting aside the fact that stereotypes about Volnay or Chambolle being soft and elegant and Gevrey and Nuits having rusticity and power are increasingly perilous and outdated in their own right, I would rarely choose describe a wine as masculine or feminine unless I really knew the person(s) I was with and would probably throw up some air quotes to make it clear that I thought it was a bit silly to do so.

I do think the terms are outdated and lazy, and while some folks may disagree or find it overblown, the issues surrounding gender can often be fraught and perilous minefields that are difficult for some folks to navigate. Reinforcing stereotypes, however banal the context, can be detrimental especially when there are so many other more interesting and evocative descriptors to reach for.

Some people could likely understand some of the broad strokes of what a taster meant, but I’d argue that’s not the point.

A big part of the issue is that it forces the perpetuation of traditional gender role stereotypes, and exclude others who may not relate to those.

Even taking aside the issue that it forces someone to rely on stereotypical traditional gender role traits, it is an overall lazy way to describe a wine. If one uses those as descriptors, it is still unclear which of those stereotypical gendered characteristics they are finding in the wine. If they say a wine is masculine is it because it is bold? Muscular? Big? Tough? Tightly structured? Just some of those? All of the above? Something else? Why not use those as descriptors instead? Is our grasp of language and wine descriptors so limited that we feel compelled to reduce a wine’s characteristic to a single gendered descriptor?

Agree the terms are useful and descriptive, but like any adjective or metaphor, it’s best not to overuse them.
Vive la différence!

Very well written and I agree that wines, among other things, can be described as masculine or feminine. It conveys a clear point that can be understood across cultures, genders, races, etc that can be very useful. But I don’t think that it necessarily applies across regions or even exclusively to a single producer. The same wine in different vintages can be more masculine or more feminine based on a variety of factors.

I find it easier to think about aristocratic versus rustic, elegant versus brutish. I even resorted to a sword metaphor, a heavy two handed broadsword versus an extremely sharp rapier.

I have to say I used masculine and feminine when I first started writing, and my editor at the time asked me to use different words. Not for any political reason, but because they don’t mean anything.

Except that most people really do understand the reference, perhaps it is just not apropos today. I really just don’t know any more. I would posit that more people understand that reference to a note using the term “rapier”.

Dunn Howell Mountain cab is masculine; Mondavi cabs of the 70s and 80s were feminine.

Gouges Nuits is masculine; Chevillon Nuits is feminine.

Serralunga Barolo is masculine; La Morra is feminine.

Beaucastel is masculine; Vieux Telegraphe is feminine.

Makes sense to me, leaving aside any political correctness.

Do other countries use these terms to describe wines?

I’ll echo what others have said, even putting aside the rather fraught topic of “political correctness” (a scary phrase for some people), it is a rather lazy, hackneyed, and imprecise metaphor. If you want to say that the wine is full-bodied and powerful, just say that, or at least choose a metaphor that is less likely to cause your reader to cringe. If you care about writing about wine, then you should also care about clearly communicating your description of the wine to your readers.

They’re just adjectives that are both generally used in a positive way to describe a tasters mind’s eye perceptions of a wine. It has nothing to do with perpetuating traditional gender roles. Masculine does not mean man and feminine does not mean woman to be sure.

+1. Well said Charlie

It might be easier for men to accept these terms. I have met many people men and women in the States that thought these descriptors were strange.

I think use of the terms intrinsically draws on typicity, even stereotype, to convey meaning which, as others have said, most people grasp quickly, even if they strongly believe those words don’t apply in any meaningful way to the larger and more complex categories of men versus women. That’s useful when describing something as difficult to describe as wine. I do not find use of these terms offensive.

I am in agreement with Sarah, here. They are helpful descriptors and not offensive.