Good taste(1)

Discussions about good taste are interesting. It can be provoking, and specially people who are sensitive will find the subject uncomfortable. In fact, the only time when the subject comes up and is discussed without hard feelings is when very few persons are envolved, and these persons have the same, or almost same, point of view in this matter. Why are most people afraid of discussing this issue? I'm not!

A while ago me and a friend of mine was uncorking a couple of bottles to try later on that evening. He had just returned from Switzerland where he visited a wine maker in Valais, a region from where I haven't tried so many wines, so I was really curious about what he brought to our informal tasting. I had already opened up a full bodied Refosco dal Peduncolo rosso (2001) "I Ferreti" and the potent Cabernet Franc (2003) "Vylyan".

I chose these as I knew that they were unknown to my guest, and hereby we could surprise each other.

After the first sips from the first glass my friend suddenly says:
- People have bad taste.


First I was a bit surprised by his sudden comment. Not provoked, only a little confused because the comment was so sudden and not directly related to his previous comment on the Refosco wine - which he liked.

After three seconds of thinking about what he said and ment I replied:
- I totally agree.

This may sound like we are some kind of self appointed judges of what is good or bad taste, and you may think that this is snobbery. Well, think again...

What I mean is when so many of the wine drinkers, or let's say, wine consumers, drinks so much lousy wine, and many times pays to much for it too, we can't accuse them for having good taste.

And it's not about money. Because we all know that money doesn't buy class - or good taste.

There are many examples which demonstrates this fact. One is when the middle class couple goes to a restaurant. They will probably spend at least 25 euros on the wine. Some people spend lots of more of course, but thats another discussion...