Since I went out to lunch with wine writer Robert Camuto last week to talk Italian wine, I felt obligated to read his book South Of Somewhere. I’m very happy I did, as it’s a highly-enjoyable romp through some of the less-recognized wine regions of Southern Italy. One particular segment that caught my attention takes place in the little-known Calabrian appellation of Ciró, a region that makes a rustic red from the Gaglioppo grape.
While somewhat lamenting the lack of recognition the area receives from wine drinkers, one of the winemakers explains the purpose of Ciró: you take a bite of food—maybe sardines, or something with olive oil, capers, and Calabrian chili—then you take a sip of wine. The point of Ciró is to cleanse the palate in between bites, readying the taste buds for the next onslaught of intense Calabrian flavor. The Ciró wine is made for exactly that purpose. Hence, if you take the wine out of context—like pouring a glass of Ciró after work to unwind—you’ll likely misunderstand its function.
I thought about this story yesterday while driving home from work, talking to my longtime friend Lester Lopez on the car speaker phone. Since we both work in the industry, we often discuss consumer trends and where we think the market is headed. With the push toward premiumization likely to continue forward, we were discussing how much we still liked inexpensive American beers like Coors Banquet and Coors Light. At one point, Lester said: “Each sip of Coors Light I take prepares my mouth for the whiskey. I rinse my palate with the cold, refreshing beer, then I’m ready for the next sip of Scotch.”
So often when wine and spirits reviews are written by both professionals and amateurs these days, the liquids are tasted and evaluated in a vacuum. The point is to isolate the product from any outside influence and breakdown its merit. But to do that is to often completely miss the point. Coors Light may not hold up to Pliny The Elder in a side-by-side taste test, but I sure as hell don’t want to drink whiskey with a super-hoppy, 8% IPA as my back. Sometimes it’s not about what you’re drinking, but how you’re drinking and why. There’s a reason the term “session beer” exists in the UK.
As I’m preparing for the Scotland trip I have coming up at the beginning of May, I’m thinking long and hard about the future of our industry and where Mission stands in the grand scheme of things. Do we really want to be the 100th retailer in American to bring in a barrel of cask strength Tormore or 20 year old Strathisla? Does anyone really want these single barrel whiskies anymore given the price and lack of provenance? And do we want to keep pushing the market in that direction? We’ve put so much focus on what we’re drinking over the last ten years that I think we’ve forgotten why we drink and for what purpose.
People weren’t meant to come home at night and line up five or ten bottles on the table, with little thimble-sized tastings of each to contemplate flavor. They’re meant to gather with friends and talk about their day over a beverage. They eat a meal together. They sit on the patio in the evening to find a social communion. To sit alone in your bunker with hundreds of unopened bottles is a lonely existence. That’s not what alcohol was meant for, and it’s been taken out of context for far too long now.
-David Driscoll