Is It Easier For U To Spend $50+ On French Or CA Wine?

[dteng]

@todd waldmann

@Carl Jensen

@Daniel McIntosh

There’s no accounting for taste.

spoken like a true snob

I buy almost no CA wines, but when I hear dismissive comments like that, it makes me think about Parker & all the bitching that goes on here about his condescending demeanor when faced w/ someone whose palate differs from his.

Agree with Todd.

[Roberto_Rogness]

Much easier for me to drop $50 in Spain or Italy 'cause I know I will get much more bang for my buck.

[Leah_Amir]

French with no hesitation…

[RDHudak]

Cali all the way, especially with the way their producers are blowing out decent wines. You can easily get a quality Napa cab under $50, although a very good CDP as well. A lot of Parker 95 pt 07’s could be had for that amount. I bought the Vieux Telegraph CDP 07 for $54, but I simply prefer Cali wines. With that said, my experience with French wines is quite limited.

[Richard_T_r_i_m_p_i]

@Bob Hughes

Rich, I’m not even sure if we are arguing here? Is it possible for a random bottle of Gilbert Picq’s wine to outperform a Raveneau at a given moment/tasting? Sure. But absent a faulty bottle, I feel pretty confident in saying that Raveneau will win the race 90 out of 100 times, and in at least 60 of those tastings, the Raveneau will literally blow the Picq off the table. Now the obvious question is whether or not that margin of superiority is worth the additional tariff for the Raveneau, and I guess that’s a question every wine buyer has to answer for themselves when they make purchasing decisions. But at least to my way of looking at it, wines like Raveneau are objectively better than wines like Picq, and that will come across to any kind of experienced taster who knows what to look for in a chablis regardless of whether it’s blind or otherwise.

Bob, according to Michael Palin: “Argument is an intellectual process…a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition”. FYI, I’m better equipped for Contradiction.

Your confidence and proposed odds certainly support the premise that great wines will rise to the top, almost every time and often by a huge margin. I’m less confident and very skeptical that even an experienced taster could immediately pick out a “great” (ie.: unusually high priced) wine if served blind and not in a flight. Greg made a good point about whether one believes in “diamonds in the rough”. Preconceptions of quality and numerous other factors, not directly related to the “juice”, have a significant effect on one’s perception of wine greatness.

RT

[Bob_Hughes]

By that logic, you seem to be saying that countless tasters who have had the pleasure of drinking, say, the '82 Pichon Lalande, only were wowed with the wine because they were predisposed to be wowed given RMP’s 100 point rating. While I guess in some alternative universe that is a possibility, wouldn’t the easier, dare I say “less contradictory” reason that virtually everyone liked it is simply that the wine is exactly what it is advertised to be, i.e., a kick-ass wine from a great vintage?

While I have had the good fortune to drink Raveneau on any number of occasions, one time I recall in particular was at a dinner with about six other folks at Sola in Bryn Mawr. We were all BSing around the table, and I hadn’t paid any attention whatsoever to what had been poured in my glass. I took a sip and immediately had one of those “OMG, what is this stuff” moments. Now, I obviously did not know I was drinking Raveneau, and if pressed I’m not even sure I knew it was a white Burg, but one thing that was undeniable was that it was a great wine, the kind that can stop six guys in mid-conversation just to savor what’s in front of us.

[Randy_Sloan]

This sounds like a fun opportunity for some blind tastings… $60 Burgundy versus $60 Central Coast Pinot, $60 Bordeaux versus $60 Napa Cab, etc.

[Douglas_Breen]

Bordeux and Burgundy buys are usually for further down the road comsumption. My average bottle price is $10 more for the french. But, if it wasn’t for Aubert and Peter Michael, French would be an easy winner for higher priced wines.

I buy more California wine now due to them being ready to drink sooner; a generality that is changing by makers like Rhys though. And, I like a lot of age on most of my California clarets.

[Richard_T_r_i_m_p_i]

Bob, I like your 82 PLL example. How about this…I attended an 82 dinner a few years ago and a particular bottle of “lowly” Branaire was simply showing better than the other higher classified, priced, and rated Bordeaux. 1 out of 10 luck? If I poured it in an 82 PLL bottle, brought it to your house, told you it was WOTN and asked you your opinion…you’re positive you could tell me it wasn’t?

Clearly, great wines have redeeming qualities. They better! Yet, it’s hard to underestimate personal preferences. If I popped a bottle of 05 Martinelli Blue Slide Pinot, would either of us be inclined to love it?

RT

[Glenn_L_e_v_i_n_e]

@Douglas B.

My average bottle price is $10 more for the french. But, if it wasn’t for Aubert and Peter Michael, French would be an easy winner for higher priced wines.

Should be mentioned these days I buy high-end, aged, California Chardonnay at the $50-100/btl level way before I’ll buy the same from Burgundy.

[Rick_Gregory]

Well duh. No one in their right mind would buy white Burgs from 96 on for aging.

That reminds me, I need to put together an older Cali chard tasting for my tasting group…

[Glenn_L_e_v_i_n_e]

And if I am looking for drink now Chard I pretty much stay local too, buy some Chablis which I can’t seem to kick despite pouring a few of those out this past decade.

[Bob_Hughes]

Rich, are you saying that an '82 Branaire outperformed an '82 Pichon Lalande? When you say “other highly rated '82’s”, I have no idea what that means. If your Branaire beat out a La Lagune on this particular night, I have no problem understanding that. As a few of our compadres can attest to, I’ve been to a tasting where the '82 Calon Segur held it’s own with the '82 Ausone, and one would never guess that by price tag alone.

I stand by my original point (and quite frankly, despite all your “contradictory” posts, you’ve done nothing to refute that), which is simply that if all one does is shop in the bargain bins, they miss the opportunity to drink a lot of great wine.

[Luis_DeCubas]

Everything that I buy are CA wines except for about 2 cases of Sauternes.

[M_Dildine]

@Daniel McIntosh

There’s no accounting for taste.

Tell me Daniel, did you dabble in new world wine when you were young and foolish, or did you inherit this profoundly acute pretention at birth?

[Richard_T_r_i_m_p_i]

@Bob Hughes

…if all one does is shop in the bargain bins, they miss the opportunity to drink a lot of great wine.

Bob, no need to move away from your original point.

Viewed a bit differently, if one focuses on shopping for great wine, wouldn’t they miss out on the opportunity to drink a lot (significantly more actually) < $50 bottles that would be considered: “outstanding wine of exceptional complexity and character. In short, these are terrific wines”?

Can one enjoy and understand Burgs without DRC?, Chablis without Raveneau?, Champagne without vintage Krug? Bordeaux without Lafitte? Cote Roties without Guigal Landonne/Mouline/Turque? The list goes on. I truly don’t know. How often and how much reference wine is required to calibrate one’s palate? Once these experiences were splurges. Now, for most wine drinkers, the $'s involved are simply nuts. And for those of us still in the game, a good banker/broker might not be optional.

No doubt I’ll be spending more than $50/bottle in the near future. Still, parting with those Ulysses (blame it on my formative years among the PA Dutch) just doesn’t come “easily”.

RT

[Rick_Gregory]

@Bob Hughes

that if all one does is shop in the bargain bins, they miss the opportunity to drink a lot of great wine.

Oh please. Under $50 is the ‘bargain bin’? Must be nice to be rich…

[Roberto_Rogness]

Our store is located in a seriously wealthy area by US standards, we have a very sophisticated, well travelled clientele and MOST of them balk at anything over $35 these days. Yes, we sell BOTTLES of nice Barolo, Amarone and Sagrantino but the days of socking away cases on a whim are just happy memories…

[Brian_Tuite]

@Rick Gregory

@Bob Hughes

that if all one does is shop in the bargain bins, they miss the opportunity to drink a lot of great wine.

Oh please. Under $50 is the ‘bargain bin’? Must be nice to be rich…

What he said.

[Jeff_Cassetta]

The only wines I still buy from California are in-expensive chards, for my wife’s quaff’s, and Kutch, for my non-Burg and Oregon Pinot fix.