In blind tastings, most drinkers prefer cheaper wines
The 507 tasters in the blind tasting include sommeliers and winemakers from France; doctors and professors, artists and writers, economists and bartenders, wine importers and lawyers, young and old.
Psssst - Have I got a cheap red wine for you!
NEW YORK, Aug 5 (Reuters Life!) - Wine experts, be they sommeliers and critics or shop clerks and collectors, are routinely asked: "Can you suggest a good wine for under $15?"
Robin Goldstein, who worked his way through Harvard and Yale as a freelance travel writer and critic for the "Let's Go" and Fodor's guide books, has come up with his own answer: "The Wine Trials: 100 Everyday Wines Under $15 that Beat $50 to $150 Wines in Brown-Bag Blind Tastings." (
http://www.thewinetrials.com/).
Published by Workman's Press for $14.99, the paperback is based on research Goldstein and his collaborators presented earlier this year in a paper to the American Association of Wine Economists (
http://www.wine-economics.org/journal), which found that in blind tastings - most drinkers preferred cheaper wines to the storied expensive ones.
"Most wine in the world is cheap wine. It's only in the last 10 years or so that wines over $50 have taken off. It's really a success of marketing, not taste," he said in an interview.
"There have always been good wines and better wines, but the luxury products manufacturers and the mass brands got really smart about marketing their products," Goldstein said. "They created this niche out of thin air."
The 507 tasters were friends of Goldstein and his editor, Alexis Hershkowitsch. Some were sommeliers and winemakers from France; others were doctors and professors, artists and writers, economists and bartenders, wine importers and lawyers, young and old, of all political stripes.
"I was trying for a broad swath of wine drinkers," he explained and held tastings in cities that he knew from writing restaurant guides: New Haven, Austin, Houston, Northampton, Massachusetts as well as New York City.
What he found was that on the whole, drinkers, when they did not see the label, preferred the taste of a $9 Beringer Founders' Estate Cabernet Sauvignon to a $120 wine from the same grape and the same producer: Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon. They preferred a bottle of Domaine Ste. Michelle Cuvee Brut, a sparkling wine produced in Washington State that sells for about $12, to Dom Perignon Champagne, which sells for about $150.
The wine experts preferred the more expensive wines, not surprisingly, but Goldstein noted most wine drinkers are not experts.
"What this proves to me is that people should do blind tastings and find out what they like," he said.
Personally, he is not a fan of the so-called international style of wine.
"I think the worst cheap wine is the mass-produced wine that is trying to imitate the expensive international style. The best cheap wine is one that is just trying to be itself. A nice table wine that's refreshing, or well-balanced, or has a nice acidity."
The tastings involved more wines than the 100 listed, which are accompanied by tasting notes and suggested food pairings. But there are no ultra exclusive or obscure wines because Goldstein wanted to make this a practical guide.
"I love artisanal wines," he said. "But I wanted to make sure that the wines were readily available."
Most of the listed wines are not from the United States, but from: France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Chile, Argentina, Australia and New Zealand.
"I think in this economy, it's important for people to figure out what they really like. And they now have even more of a financial incentive to wine taste and figure out what's behind the label, instead of being seduced by the label."
http://www.soshiok.com/articles/10612 
Psssst - Have I got a cheap red wine for you! 
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