Arts & Manners: Plonk

I have before me a number of bulletins from wine merchants in New York and in other parts of the country, with their current offerings and prices. They remind me of the signs that you see at gas stations on the edge of the desert, telling you that this is positively your last chance et cetera. In the wine bulletins, panic prose exorts you to buy now, now, now, before prices go up again in July and by the end of the year—all because of increased European labor costs and the devaluation of the dollar. Oh, those wicked European workers and American money men, forcing up the astronomical wine prices even further!

All the more so since those same merchants have spent the best years of their lives (at least, many of them) promoting the notion that only French wines, notably Bordeaux, and chateaubottled ones at that, are kulturni to serve, drink, and study. Now they have to retreat. I quote from the Sherry-Lehman catalogue: “If he [the costconscious wine consumer] insists on drinking wines below $5 the bottle, he simply will have to avoid the famed names of Bordeaux and Burgundy, such as Lafite-Rothschild. . . . This does not mean that he will not drink good wine, it simply means that he will have to seek out ‘sleepers’ or else less wellknown appellations that meet with his taste demands. Trial and error, the fun of comparative tasting, will become more important than ever, and the more adventuresome should solve the problem in happy fashion.”

NH

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Nika Hazelton

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I have before me a number of bulletins from wine merchants in New York and in other parts of the country, with their current offerings and prices. They remind me of the signs that you see at gas stations on the edge of the desert, telling you that this is positively your last chance et cetera. In the wine bulletins, panic prose exorts you to buy now, now, now, before prices go up again in July and by the end of the year—all because of increased European labor costs and the devaluation of the dollar. Oh, those wicked European workers and American money men, forcing up the astronomical wine prices even further!

All the more so since those same merchants have spent the best years of their lives (at least, many of them) promoting the notion that only French wines, notably Bordeaux, and chateaubottled ones at that, are kulturni to serve, drink, and study. Now they have to retreat. I quote from the Sherry-Lehman catalogue: “If he [the costconscious wine consumer] insists on drinking wines below $5 the bottle, he simply will have to avoid the famed names of Bordeaux and Burgundy, such as Lafite-Rothschild. . . . This does not mean that he will not drink good wine, it simply means that he will have to seek out ‘sleepers’ or else less wellknown appellations that meet with his taste demands. Trial and error, the fun of comparative tasting, will become more important than ever, and the more adventuresome should solve the problem in happy fashion.”