In the wine profession distributors have exclusive rights to represent wineries. As part of their marketing, they promote trade wine tastings.
Some events take place in large places. Last week I attended one at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square. Others are in restaurants that, space-wise, are too small to accommodate hordes of wine buyers.
Keep in mind that tasting wine is a time consuming process. One sniffs, swirls, tastes and spits into a dump bucket. Then note taking, questions and discussion may ensue. Add up the time it takes to do this per bottle times a hundred bottles – multiplied by three hundred people and well… chaos is generally the result.
I have stood in lines of five people, with an unsatisfactory wine churning in my mouth, just to get access to a dump bucket. This isn’t a pretty sight.
One of my distributors is notorious for holding events at small venues. Last Thursday night may have been their personal best effort. One of my favorite hangouts is the Manhattan wine bar “Terroir” on East 12th Street. The place is tiny. I would guess it seats about 25 people. So imagine my surprise when I was invited to a wine tasting being held there featuring the Washington State producer Charles Smith.
Because I love the bar, I couldn’t resist attending, even though it would be tantamount to having the event aboard a rush hour IRT subway car.
Before I go into detail about the tasting, I must discuss Charles Smith, winery owner and winemaker. Smith is a really big man. He has big hair. And I mean BIG hair. Imagine a white hair Afro, about twelve inches high that imploded into a morass of ringlets flowing over neck and shoulders.
Before becoming a winemaker, Smith was a rock band promoter. This fact makes sense when you consider how he markets his wines. The winery’s official motto is: “It’s just booze – drink it!” -- Kind of reduces it to the lowest common denominator, huh?
The wines and their black, slickly designed labels reflect his artistic oddness: Velvet Devil Merlot, Kung Fu Girl Riesling, Boom Boom Syrah and Skull Syrah. While a big fan of Washington State wines, I’m underwhelmed with Smith’s efforts. For those who enjoy the big, in your face, red fruit forward style, Smith’s wines are worth trying. If you seek a touch of finesse or complexity, there are many more interesting Washington producers out there (Novelty Hill for example) at a similar price range.
Within an hour, Terroir was jammed with what seemed like sixty persons. The room was getting hot and so I made my way next to the front door and was revived by the evening air. My friend James DeThomas, owner of the Larchmont fine wine store “Tangiers” joined me and as we surveyed the crowd, Jim offered this observation: “Maybe next time, they will hold a wine tasting in a phone booth.”
With my back to the wall, people on every side, my view of the room became quite limited. I found myself focusing on a woman sitting on a barstool. Well not exactly the whole woman. It was her shoes that captured my attention. She was wearing black stockings and a vivid color of fire engine red, six-inch stilettos. Now maybe it was because I was drinking a wine called Velvet Devil, or I get more perverted as I age, but I became transfixed with her iconic red high heels.
I found myself visualizing a photo ad campaign for the HBO series “True Blood” – those red stiletto heels stabbing deep into the heart of a vampire portrayed by, who else but Charles Smith?
