Christopher
Certified
Join Date: 2/5/2010
Posts: 20
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Posted: 6/20/2011 1:45:02 PM
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Mr. Vogels,
I would like to make a few comments about the most recent intro you wrote concerning blind tasting.
First off, is a matter of word usage to define to completely different subjects. Blind Tasting and Tasting Blind are not synonymous. Blind tasting is an exercise in which a taster tastes a wine (s) without knowing the specifics and through deductive reasoning comes to a conclusion about what the wine could be. This is a useful tool for analyzing a sommeliers tasting abilities because it links two non-related but important abilities: The ability to taste and break apart and describe a wine accurately. Many fledging sommeliers talk a good game about wine, but many actually have a hard time actually tasting and describing wine. This is a good way to weed them out. In addition, it measures the ability to know what a style of wine should taste like. Tasting blind on the other hand is a process for analyzing a wine without preconceived notions. "Is this wine good?" without prejudging it based on winery, rating, vintage, varietal. It is a great way, especially for beginners to expand their repertoire, but as opposed to Blind Tasting, actually looks to remove typicity. Is a wine that tastes of concentrated blueberries, black berry jam, lush thick viscous texture and mocha ice cream from copious French oak good? Maybe. Is it a good rioja? No. Blind tasting asks the later, tasting blind to former.
In addition, I would like people to stop using the term "guess" in relation to Blind Tasting. Does a banker "guess" weather a person can pay back a loan they are requesting? No, they analyze and draw conclusions. Same thing when blind tasting. A series of observations are made about the color, aroma, flavor, structure and texture and from this, conclusions are deduced, not guessed.
The style of tasting you discuss at the end also does exist, but in the MW program rather than the MS program.
Christopher P. Bates
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David Vogels
Administrator
Join Date: 4/8/2008
Posts: 16
Location: Denver, Colo.
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Posted: 6/25/2011 3:17:50 PM
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Christopher,
I don't really disagree with any of your comments, although I'm not sure everyone in the industry would recognize such a fine distinction between "blind tasting" and "tasting blind." Both exercises as you describe them can certainly be valuable. I, too, would like to see people stop "guessing" wines, which was the main point of my column.
Thanks for your feedback,
David
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Brandon Tebbe
Newbie
Join Date: 8/20/2011
Posts: 1
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Posted: 9/11/2011 3:12:12 AM
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David,
I’m surprised at your pompous response, twisting Mr. Bate’s thoughts on the matter. He was not agreeing with you at all, and only a blind person could not see so.
We do not "guess" wines, as you so ignorantly state. We deductively break them down and come to a conclusion as to the grape in which was used to produce the wine and the location in which is was made. Perhaps this is not a skill which you have acquired. Either way, your article was a blatant slap in the face to a good deal of your readers.
Within the industry your article has generated a lot of anger. Many prefer to be PC, however I feel you should be chastised, not for your inaccurate understanding of blind tasting, but as a Journalist taking sides on a topic that you completely lack knowledge of.
Your suggestion of "real-world tasting skills" includes, tasting three unfamiliar wines from a relatively obscure region - say, the Jura or Patagonia or Macedonia. Really? That is your idea of real-world tasting skills? How many restaurants have you come across that serve any wine from Jura or Macedonia. Please also explain what importance their is in "discussing the cost of certain decisions in the vineyard and the winery will affect price points and the perceived quality of the wine" has for explaining the wine to our guests to assist us with selling and providing a wine the guest will enjoy.
As editor of the "Sommelier Journal" it would appear that you may want to further educate yourself as to what the responsibilities, tasting abilities and knowledge level are required for a professional sommelier.
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Christopher
Certified
Join Date: 2/5/2010
Posts: 20
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Posted: 9/11/2011 8:09:38 PM
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To further drive the differentiation, one could relate it (thanks to all those who have pointed this out long before me) to a diagnosing a disease. To Taste blind I would equate to coffee table talk at home or work where you mention your stomach hurts and someone says, "Ah, I know, you have appendicitis". versus blind tasting, in which you might explain to a doctor that your stomach hurts, and he may look for other clues like, body temperature, blood work, pupils (sorry, I am not a doctor, I have no idea what the real signs are), only to rule out all other possibilities, and return with the deduction that you have appendicitus. This is the difference between a pedestrian and a professional.
"I smell black currant, Its Bordeaux" vs. "I smell Black Currant, let me see, is there pencil lead, gravel, bell pepper? yes, yes, yes. Is there olive, meat, smoke? No, no. no. Its Bordeaux". (I am not a sommelier either, but I know a lot more than I do about doctoring).
Now, just because I like to argue, I will counter, that Master Tebbe may have missed a valid question. It is important that my doctor can deduce by my symptoms what is wrong with me. And I agree, Blind tasting is a very important skill, and if I am paying someone $150 an hour to identify what a case of unlabeled wine I have is, I think it should be a part of a certification process. But, it is a valid question as to why it is important for a sommelier to be able to blind taste. I know what I always here is, is to test two skills at once escentially. Do you know what each of the classic wines is supposed to smell and taste like, and can you actually detect the things you talk about? But, I would also be interested in how often sommeliers have USED their blind tasting skills in the real world. (I swear this is not because I am bitter).
Just playing Devils advocate. Would love to hear what others think.
Christopher P. Bates
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Kent Benson
Newbie
Join Date: 9/1/2011
Posts: 2
Location: St. Cloud, MN
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Posted: 5/12/2013 10:07:03 AM
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Christopher,
In all my wine studies I have never heard the distinction you make between blind tasting and tasting blind. (I'm familiar with single blind and double blind.) It seems to me, you are merely assigning different objectives to the order of these words. While the objective of each may differ (identification vs. quality assessment), the circumstances are the same - you are tasting a wine without any knowledge of its place of origin, grape variety, producer, etc. In the sommelier exams I have taken, we were asked to identify and assess wines simultaneously. So, by your definition we are blind tasting and tasting blind at the same time. This seems to be a distinction without much purpose and one I see no need to make.
With regard to guessing, I understand your point, but really, no matter how adept one becomes at identifying wines, it's still just a guess - an educated one, yes, but still little more. Knowing how often even the best of us are wrong, I can't say the word is inappropriate.
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Phil Vogels
Administrator
Join Date: 4/7/2008
Posts: 294
Location: Denver, Colo.
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Posted: 5/16/2013 10:59:26 AM
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So I somehow missed this back when it happened (Brandon and Christopher's further response). Totally my fault, I check these forums (more regularly now since we have the newsletter) and somehow didn't catch that Brandon had made a new post in this topic. David is currently traveling and we're getting the May issue completed so he can't reply to Brandon's post immediately but he will. Here also is the link to the offending column in question, for those new to the discussion (it is free to all): http://www.sommelierjournal.com/articles/article.aspx?year=2011&month=04&articlenum=6
I'll let him speak for himself, but because like Christopher I also like to argue, I just want to point out one thing that I believe David was driving at.
To Christopher's analogy, I agree that there are some similarities between diagnosing a patient and blind tasting a wine. Like Kent, I can't agree that there is a unavoidable distinction between tasting blind and blind tasting, to me in the doctor example it is still the same activity whether in a formal setting or no or whichever order the process is done in, so I'm going to use the words interchangeably.
But at this point the sommelier has the option to simply reveal the wine, or to taste the wine knowing exactly what it is while the doctor may not be so fortunate: an autopsy may be the only thing that answers the question "for sure".
So in the real world, the sommelier is setting an intentional handicap by tasting blind. And, as has been pointed out, there are good reasons to have the ABILITY to do so, since it makes quality analysis of the wine more likely if you can do it without knowing beforehand what it is. But in the real world, no doctor would intentionally set this handicap to diagnose a patient, they only would do so in training to increase their diagnostic ability.
I think everyone is missing the next important step, including our poor doctor. The patient has appendicitis, now what? Well, the doctor hopefully knows what to do since he presumably was taught how to treat appendicitis in medical school (and tested on it). For the sommelier working in a restaurant, you've correctly identified the wine and it's sub-component elements, the next step is fitting it into your wine program and selling it to your guests (leaving aside the question of if you're even evaluating wines for your program blind, some somms do and some don't). And here is where David's column comes in. I'll let him address it himself, but to me, the argument is too much emphasis on blind tasting and pure tasting ability is not leaving enough emphasis on that next step, in essence we're getting doctors who can diagnose appendicitis but have more trouble effectively treating it, including managing the patient.
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