Posh drops

The expression is not mine but I like it a lot. It came from a certain Roberto (I don’t know his surname) who used it in a comment posted on our website in response to my editorial on the “trendy wine snobs”. His is a perfect definition to get the point across and explain the great distance that exists between the hyper-wine lovers who talk about and drink wines among themselves and the vast majority of those who approach wine out of curiosity and authentic interest. Perhaps the difference has to do with an inability to communicate common to many producers who speak too much about technical or ideological questions and pay too little attention to those who buy and drink wine and who are not expert enough to make sense out of complicated arguments.

This is also evident in the media where, from example, certain chefs are invited to express their opinions about wines on talk shows as opposed to representatives from the world of wine, be they producers or specialized journalists. The result is that the world of wine is never explained in a plain and simple way, something not impossible given how TV presenters like Piero Angela and Mario Tozzi are capable of explaining much more complicated subjects to the general public. And so for the general public wine remains something unknown, difficult and out of reach, something posh, self-referential and ideological. This is a stalemate that must be broken quickly and efficiently. Discussions on topics that are difficult to understand must be replaced with explanations and reports about areas, traditions and even flavors. And this must be done without referring to ‘native’ yeasts (which probably don’t exist), biodynamic (which often sounds more like Steven King than Rudolf Steiner), anthocyanins and their sub-varieties, ‘minerality’ (which does not exist but many use the term when they don’t know what to say) and similar amenities.

We need simple scientific explanations that are, when possible, accompanied by stories about places and people. And to do this we need to write in an understandable and thus useful way in order to reach to the largest number of people possible. And this must be done without being smug or self-referential and without just focusing on posh drops.