A blind tasting makes things twice as fun: You get to learn about wine in a different way, and you get to learn about yourself in a different way. The price for this double pleasure is simply honesty.
© Christopher Gronbeck
By honesty, I mean accepting what you taste. Sure, you can try do that without tasting blind, but human nature is to yield to the tempting biases of knowing the producer, the varietal, the vintage, the price, the label, the tasting notes, and/or what rating was assigned this wine by someone who may have an entirely different palate from you. By tasting blind, you have only your senses with which to judge your own personal experience of the wine, and if that’s not what matters about wine, I don’t know what does.
So when the masquerade is over and the wines are revealed, you get to learn what you tasted. And then you get an exquisite opportunity to learn an even more valuable lesson by challenging your preconceptions with the results. You thought you didn’t like Australian wines? Maybe you do like some of them, after all. You thought that the $30 bottle naturally would taste better than the $10 bottle? Maybe not. You thought that France would out-perform Walla Walla? Maybe, maybe not. I really don’t think that you can more reliably make honest changes in your understanding of your own wine likes and dislikes than by tasting blind.
Blind tastings are great to do with friends, but they’re pretty rare in public tastings, especially free public tastings. One of those rarities is this Memorial Day weekend at Fremont Wine Warehouse, where proprietor Michael Cawdrey is pouring half a dozen malbecs from Argentina, France, and the United States. You’ll have a list of wines (I’m not peeking until the end!), but he won’t tell you which is which until you’re done tasting.
I’d like to see more of this in Seattle, so tell your favorite wine retailer how fun it would be to taste blind, especially if they’re tasting single varietals. And if you’re not too busy battling the crowds at the Folklife Festival, I hope that you get a chance to take advantage of this delightful and educational offering in Fremont.
Fremont Wine Warehouse, 3601 Fremont Ave. N, Seattle, 206-632-1110. The tasting is on Friday and Saturday from noon to 7:00, and Sunday from noon to 4:00.
