The Red and The White

As some might remember, I am working my way though the New Yorker book "Secret Ingredients" which contains a selection of articles culled from the New Yorker magazine relating to foodie things. After slogging through an article giving me more information on Tofu than i would want to know. I have gotten to the section called 'The Pour" which deals with drinks and wines. There is a nice piece by Roger Angell on Martinis, but what caught my attention was an article of the same title as above by Calvin Trillin. who is becoming one of my favorite food writers. The lead sentence reads : Before we get into the queston of whether experienced wine drinkers can actually tell the difference between red wine and white wine, ..." which certainly grabs your attention. While a seemingly frivolous statement, the article goes on to relate an alleged test from UC Davis where red and white wines are put in black glasses, and so called experts are called upon to decide whether the contents are red or white. upon further investigation, it turns out that "the test" may be urban legend. but the subject gets some serious treatment.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that so-called expterts get 3 or 4 out of seven correct. A repetition of the test with representative varietals resulted in a better average. An interesting concept. Maybe a test you could do at home.