House pallet is something that winemakers or winery owners can struggle with, particularly small underfunded ones. What is house palate? Well maybe a better way to explain it is to describe how it occurs. As winemakers they work on their wines and barrel taste their wines and blend their wines and promote their wines and have tastings of their wines and events with their wines and eat dinner with their wines, well you get the picture. It seems that mostly all they drink are their own wines. This affliction can also affect those that only drink from one watering hole as well.
Now while those may be perfectly good wines, one may have a tendency to get too used to a particular flavour profile. So what does this mean and why should anyone care. Well maybe it is of no consequence to anyone. But we feel that without a balanced appreciation of multiple profiles (just go taste) the possibilities of the vineyard may be overlooked. What we mean by this is it’s easy to make average wine if you have good grapes. But the possibility of making something special may be completely missed. It’s that unquantifiable thing that great winemakers seem to possess. The ability, through experience and intuition to determine the exact time to harvest, time spent in contact with the skins or just how much oak and of what type and for how long.
The broader the palate experience we believe the more one may see the opportunity of possibility as to just how great a wine can be made. Tasting wines made from grapes of the same region by different wine makers can expose you to things you may like or not, but it does give you a different perspective on what's possible. Let’s face it we all want to drink great wine! So for all you winemakers that tend to drink too much of what you make and not enough other stuff. STOP IT! Get stuck into good stuff from everywhere and help yourself see the possibilities and maybe see a different vision for those grapes. Befriend a sommelier and some worldly drinkers and get some second opinions that can help break down the profile for you. Once you've done that give us a call and we will come drink your wine and give you our two bits worth (= nothing), but more importantly pull your head out of the barrel and look and taste around and maybe, hopefully, make better wine.
Happy wine making, here's to good wine!
Happy Wine Adventures,
Cheers,
WineWalkabout
Kiwi & Koala
No comments:
Post a Comment
We are always on a WineWalkabout looking for a good drop. Please comment and ask questions about the things you like or would like to read and see. Don't drink without pants on!