From famous labels to club tastings, a developing wine palate is about knowing what you enjoy, not agreeing with everyone else.
PHENYO MOTHAGODI
There is a particular kind of pressure that comes with drinking wine. Someone pours you a glass, you take a sip and immediately realise that you do not particularly like it. Perhaps the tannins make your mouth feel as though you have been chewing a particularly dry piece of furniture. Then somebody at the table announces, usually with considerable confidence, that it is an excellent wine. Suddenly, you are faced with a decision: do you trust your own palate, or do you assume that your tongue has somehow failed an examination?
For reasons I have never fully understood, many wine drinkers seem to believe that developing a palate means eventually learning to like everything. After enough tastings and conversations with people who can say things such as “tertiary characteristics” without blinking, you are apparently expected to admire every glass. Rubbish. Developing your palate does not mean training yourself to enjoy every wine you encounter. It means learning to understand what you enjoy, what you do not enjoy and, perhaps most importantly, why.
TASTE VS QUALITY
Saying ‘I don’t like this wine’ is an expression of personal preference. Saying ‘This is a bad wine’ is a judgement about the quality of the wine itself. Those are two entirely different things, although they are often confused.
You may be drinking a technically excellent, beautifully made and highly rated wine that simply does nothing for you. It may have balance, complexity, a long finish and a pedigree capable of making collectors slightly emotional. Yet, after tasting it, you may simply not enjoy it. That is perfectly fine.
The opposite can also be true. You may love a wine that a critic considers simple, unremarkable or not particularly distinguished. If it gives you pleasure, works beautifully with the food you are eating and makes you happy to pour another glass, then it has succeeded in one of wine’s most important functions. Your palate is not defective simply because it disagrees with someone else’s opinion.
FAMOUS BOTTLES
We are particularly vulnerable when a wine arrives with a reputation. Give a bottle a famous name, an impressive price tag and a story about limited production from vines that have apparently been surviving heroically since before modern plumbing, and people approach the wine with an entirely different mindset.
The danger is that we become afraid to admit when we do not like what is in the glass. I have watched perfectly intelligent people drink wines they clearly did not enjoy and then describe them positively because everyone else at the table appeared impressed. There is usually a great deal of nodding in these situations. Serious nodding.
But personal enjoyment is not a democratic vote, and you do not have to support the winning candidate simply because everyone else does. One of the most useful sentences in wine is: “I can appreciate why this is a good wine, but it isn’t for me.”
GROUP OPINION
At the Gaborone Wine Club, one of the things I enjoy most is disagreement. Yet put the same bottle in front of the room and you will receive remarkably different reactions. One person loves it, another is unconvinced, somebody else is already trying to find out where they can buy a case, and there will occasionally be one person looking around the room as though the rest of us have collectively lost our minds.
The most interesting conversations often begin when someone says, “I don’t get it.” That is not ignorance; it is an invitation to conversation. Is there something about the style that does not appeal to you? Is it too heavy, too acidic, too sweet or too dominated by oak? Sometimes you may simply agree to disagree. Both outcomes are perfectly acceptable.
PALATES EVOLVE
There is also a persistent misconception that developing a palate means moving in one direction, usually towards increasingly dry, expensive, complex or obscure wines. This is how people eventually find themselves apologising for liking sweet wine.
A wine journey is rarely a straight line. You may begin by enjoying Moscato and later discover Cabernet Sauvignon. You may spend several years convinced that powerful, structured red wines are the pinnacle of civilisation, only to find yourself drinking Chenin Blanc with alarming enthusiasm every weekend. You may dismiss Pinot Noir for years and then encounter one bottle that makes you reconsider every confident statement you have ever made about the grape.
You may eventually discover that you do not dislike Sauvignon Blanc; you simply prefer a different style of Sauvignon Blanc. You may realise that your issue with Chardonnay was not Chardonnay at all, but a particular winemaking style that tasted as though someone had fermented a particularly enthusiastic piece of oak.
The point is to keep tasting with enough curiosity to allow yourself to change your mind.
TRUST YOUR PALATE
Of course, acknowledging personal preference does not mean pretending that quality does not exist. Wine is made by skilled people, and a poorly made or badly stored wine can have genuine faults.
That does not mean closing yourself off from wines you have previously disliked. One disappointing bottle is not enough evidence to dismiss an entire grape variety, region or style. Do not swear off Chardonnay because of one unfortunate experience that tasted like somebody had placed a tree in a blender. Explore again. Try another producer. Taste the grape in a different region or style. You may change your mind, or you may not. Either is fine.
So, the next time someone hands you a famous, expensive and critically acclaimed bottle and asks what you think, do not panic. Taste it properly. Think about it. Give it time in the glass. And if, after all that, you still do not like it, you are perfectly entitled to say so.
You can even do it without apologising. “It’s a good wine. It’s just not for me.” Then, with a clear conscience, pour something you actually enjoy.
