I have been reading the excellent One Thousand Vines by Pascaline Lepeltier and have reached the section on wine tasting. I was very interested to read about the geosensorial tasting process here and the differences to “established” tasting and evaluation methods. What do the JR team think of this approach? Should and could it replace methods based on aromas or be an additional approach which can reveal certain aspects of a wine? Is it only applicable to “wines of terroir”? Or is it perhaps just a modification dressed up as a revolutionary approach?
I see that the Wine Scholar Guild (about which I know relatively little) are putting some effort behind it
Jacky Rigaud wrote a book about this. His thesis is that new big wine glasses emphasize aroma over terroir. We should all go back to tastevins. I thought I had a copy, but I can’t find it.
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I did talk to WSG about the approach a few years ago when they were running various experimental tastings. There’s more on the WSG site here: GeoSensorial Tasting: A New Way of Assessing Wines of Terroir?
I remember thinking at the time that it was a very interesting approach but, as you suggest, I was not sure it could be applied to all wines but I did not perhaps pursue it enough to come to a proper conclusion. I’d be very interested to hear other views.
I didn’t get too far into this issue. I am more interested in the taste of wine than some hypothetical construct. And when all is said and done, terroiristes are more interested in soil than climate, weather, vineyard management etc., even tho they write books about great winemakers.
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That is a fair comment, I am not sure (mostly through complete lack of experience and expertise) about the terroir vs taste.
If nothing else it has led me to be more focused on palate and texture than I had been, whereas previously I had put too much emphasis on aromas I think.
For example, this chenin blanc from Domaine Cady, a previous bottle of which I was a bit cold on. Paying proper attention to palate (texture, flavour, shape, whatever you want to call it) brought out much more complexity and pleasure for me. So it has been an interesting and worthwhile exercise
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