One of the benefits of studying or working in Higher Education is access to academic journals and the niche specialist knowledge and research that can intrigue and frustrate in equal measure. Fortunately almost all academic journals are nowadays available online and a university, or even an alumnus account, allows you to readily explore the treasure-trove of specialist knowledge 24 hours a day and virtually from anywhere in the world. It is in this context that I have found myself down the rabbit hole of wine research this weekend rather than the more familiar pathways of music education. So what do you make of this .....?
"A velvety chocolate texture and enticingly layered, yet creamy, nose, this wine abounds with focused cassis and a silky ruby finish. Lush, elegant, and nuanced. Pair it with pork and shellfish"
It's clearly a detailed description of a wine, but is it informative? Would you buy it? And how much (roughly) does it cost?
Well, in actual fact, this particular description is made up. It was put together about 15 years ago by Coco Krumme, a researcher at MITT, as a theoretical description of the most expensive wine in the world. And it was part of the dissemination of her research which looked first at whether novice drinkers could accurately identify good wines by their labels and then into the language used in wine reviews and label descriptions and their correlation with the cost and quality of the wine in the bottle. As she writes, "I wanted to know if I could predict the price of a bottle based on the words in the review and see if certain words were preferentially used in conjunction with expensive wines". In short, can you predict the price of the bottle based on the words in the review?
Needless to say, her research was inspired by wine reviews at the time including what she cites as the 'physics-defying garbage' of review statements such as "The 2005 Brunello di Montalcino is a model of weightless finesse". But there had also been a widely read precursor polemic published a few years earlier with the eye-catching title On Wine Bullshit: Some New Software? (see Quandt RE, On Wine Bullshit: Some New Software? Journal of Wine Economics. 2007;2(2):129-135)
Krumme's investigation involved collecting expert descriptors of thousands of wines and making a detailed analysis of the words used to describe the most expensive and the cheapest. It quickly transpired that most of the words used to describe high-priced wines are quite unique and distinct from those used to describe the low-priced wines. Analysis of what was written showed that certain words disproportionately appeared in descriptions of high or low priced wines. They could easily be identified into what Krumme described as "expensive" and "cheap" word categories and these differences could be assigned to various groupings as the following table shows:
More recently another researcher, Kevin Capehart has revisited Krumme's research and applied the same analysis to a different dataset. This has confirmed that "almost all of the 'expensive' and 'cheap' words identified by Krumme are indicative of whether a wine is high or low priced" (Capehart KW. Expensive and Cheap Wine Words Revisited. Journal of Wine Economics. 2021;16(4):411-418).
So let's look at a few contemporary examples
"cinnamon and allspice" - spicy, and an extra dimension?
"supple tannins" - tannin detected but not overpowering?
"graphite finale" - aroma of pencil lead adds a bookish literary quality?
"zesty acidity" - Quite surprising since more typical of a fresh white wine?
Conclusion: With the exception of the last significantly suggestive of a classy expensive bottle of wine.
Wine B - "Simple and light but enjoyable and fresh, with delicate herbal and floral notes to the nose, plus a crisp palate of green apple and fresh pear".
"simple and light" - basic, nothing too serious?
"enjoyable and fresh" - easygoing and definitely not staid and stuffy?
"delicate herbal and floral notes" - see 'cheap' words in Specific v General in table above.
"a crisp palate of green apple and fresh pear" - again, see Specific and General comparison. Implies clean and tasty?
Conclusion: A cheap straightforward, immediately pleasurable wine.
What are they?
Wine A is Poderi Luigi Einaudi, Monvigliero 2020, a highly rated Barolo costing around £50.
Wine B is Sainsbury's House Soave, Veneto 2023, a tenth of the price and just £4.75 in the 'By Sainsbury's' value range.
Clearly my comparison above pretty comprehensibly exemplifies Coco Krumme's thesis. However, rather encouragingly I feel these particular descriptions are honest and true and give a decent feel for the wines in question. You would have to be pretty naive not to be able to interpret the characteristics they are trying to convey. In this respect, I feel we have come a long way in the past 15 years or so in moving away from the overtly flamboyant wine descriptions that say more about the writer than the wine. Nevertheless, I think there a couple of further questions worth considering:
- Do 'expensive' and 'cheap' words change over time?
- What additional words beside those considered here and in Krumme's chart might act as indicators of expensive and cheap wines?
And one final thought ....
Krumme suggested that experts might be "leaving us with a bag of adjectives that say a lot about price, and almost nothing about flavour". Do you still agree?
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