4 ms·

Do More Expensive Wines Taste Better?

19 points by c0riander 16y ago

kondro 16y ago
And, like many things, it is still usually a matter of paying 500% for a 10% increase in quality.
dminor 16y ago
There's a correlation, but it's a weak one. Bad wines are almost always very cheap, but the range between decent and great is too subjective to expect a strong correlation.
- tptacek 16y ago
  And note that's the range between "decent" and "cheap" within a specific bracket of varietal and region. Anyone who drinks wine regularly can pick out a high-end Burgundy Pinot from a collection of mid-range California reds. And here the analysis starts to break down, because if you're looking for the characteristics of a great Burgundy, you probably can't source them from California for $20 a bottle; you can get "cheap" French imports in that price range, but the price gap between "acceptable" and "good" is wider. In short: you're not going to get what you don't pay for. (I'm using Burgundy as an example only because a restaurant blew my mind with one a couple years ago; someone more wine-literate can substitute better examples --- for instance, the same "much larger gap in price between decent and good" may exist for California Bordeaux-style "Meritage" wines). And should this surprise anyone? Does anyone here think there's low price/quality correlation in beer?
  - elblanco 16y ago
    > And should this surprise anyone? Does anyone here think there's low price/quality correlation in beer? Perhaps...there's some superb regular day drinkers that run under $2/bottle...and some of the more expensive specialty beers can cost upwards of $8/pint and taste like sewage. (of course the really cheap beer is pretty universally bad)
    - tptacek 16y ago
      Nobody here is going to claim that you can't tell a barrel-aged Belgian-style ale from a bottle of Newcastle. There's lot of very drinkable wine at a $20 price point, but a $20 bottle is unlikely to surprise you with its complexity.
      - runT1ME 16y ago
        >but a $20 bottle is unlikely to surprise you with its complexity Disagree. I've had 20 dollar wine that I feel is more complex and much better than 60 dollar bottles. Now, there may be better 60 dollar bottles but that doesn't mean the best 20 dollar isn't better than the worst 100 dollar bottle.
        tptacek 16y ago
        There is clearly a lot of overpriced wine. That's not as entertaining a conclusion as the one this post is trying to advance.
    - joe_the_user 16y ago
      some of the more expensive specialty beers can cost upwards of $8/pint and taste like sewage Ah, but it requires special effort to produce a drinkable sort of sewage-tasting-beer and a particular period of training to learn to enjoy the unique sewage taste... of Orval, Flemish Sour Ale or lambic "natural" beer. And don't even mention the engine-oil taste of the great imperial stouts... Well, at least my training myself to like $8 beer was less costly than someone else training themselves to like $50 wine...
      - elblanco 16y ago
        > engine-oil taste of the great imperial stouts That's precisely the taste I'm looking for in a good stout...that or old burned steak and rye bread.
    - te_chris 16y ago
      Just so long as none of you americans try and tell us that Bud is beer, not "beer flavoured substitute"
  - dminor 16y ago
    > Anyone who drinks wine regularly can pick out a high-end Burgundy Pinot from a collection of mid-range California reds. Well, I drink wine quite regularly and I wouldn't be so confident, but I have very little experience with high end Burgundy. Put some Oregon pinots in front of me though and I can make some reasonable guesses. Still, I had one from a small producer Thanksgiving weekend that tasted nothing like a typical Oregon pinot, and in fact reminded me of a Burgundy I had a couple years back.
    - tptacek 16y ago
      You'd know even without knowing varietals. I can tell merlot from cabernet, but I'm mostly wine-illiterate; but the glass of pinot we got with our wine pairings at Alinea was unlike any wine I've ever had in my life; I recognized instantly that it was something special. And that's the only point I'm making: there are special wines out there, and many of them are not cheap, and if you want their particular kind of special, you're going to have to pay. The grandparent commenter made this point more clearly than I have. You can get crappy expensive wine, but for the most part, you won't get what you don't pay for.
- joe_the_user 16y ago
  Actually the paper linked to the article found negative correlation... "on average, individuals who are unaware of the price do not derive more enjoyment from more expensive wine. In fact, they enjoy more expensive wines slightly less." (http://www.wine-economics.org/workingpapers/AAWE_WP16.pdf http://www.wine-economics.org/workingpapers/AAWE_WP16.pdf) I love three buck chuck.
illumen 16y ago
Yes.
elblanco 16y ago
I usually find the best wines run between $7-$14. In fact my current favorite wine runs about $8-9. http://www.penfolds.com.au/brand_penfolds/wines/koonunga-hill/shiraz-cabernet/ http://www.penfolds.com.au/brand_penfolds/wines/koonunga-hil... And I've found this gem for under $12. http://wine90.blogspot.com/2007/12/zaccagnini-montepulciano-dabruzzo.html http://wine90.blogspot.com/2007/12/zaccagnini-montepulciano-...
GregBuchholz 16y ago
http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/02/24/fine-wine/ http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/02/24/fine-wine/
- ams6110 16y ago
  That's really surprising that the experiment subjects could not tell that the white wine dyed red was not really red wine. I can't stand white wine and I like reds quite a bit, to me they taste very different.
Charuru 16y ago
Price is a function of supply and demand, not of quality.
- ShabbyDoo 16y ago
  Agree, but the relative pricing of various substitutable goods is a function of the things which are interpreted by the consumer as "quality". W.r.t. this article, we care about this relative ranking.
sliverstorm 16y ago
I had a difficult time swallowing this article. Then I realized that, because my wine budget caps at $20/bottle, I am living in a very different world. Hopefully nobody will try to tell me a $5 bottle tastes worse than a $20 bottle purely because of the price- otherwise, my taste buds must be seriously screwed up.
- ams6110 16y ago
  Heck I buy Franzia in a 5 liter box for $12. Tastes fine to me.
trotsky 16y ago
Like others, I was pretty confused until I reached the part where they said to buy the $20 bottle instead of the $50 bottle. I think what they're really tracking here is that high end wines are (usually) over priced. I'm not an expert at all, but I also think certain varieties tend to be much more represented in the high end offerings. Cabernets is the one that comes to mind off the top of my head. I personally won't buy a cab at any price, and I think that dislike is often shared by my generation and those younger to me, but older generations tend to be much more prone to buying them. I wonder if age is a factor (and hence buying power) in which wines people will tend to rank highly.
- klochner 16y ago
  Who doesn't like cabs? What do you drink with a nice steak?
  - trotsky 16y ago
    usually a shiraz/syrah or a malbec
- enjo 16y ago
  You'll grow into them, and they don't have to be expensive.
blahblahblah 16y ago
I remember reading an article back in the late 80's or early 90's about wine chemistry. I think it was in Scientific American or Discover. Basically, the conclusion they came to was that the difference between a good wine and a mediocre one had to do with the esterification that occurred during aging and the amount of vanillin leeched from the wood barrel. They indicated that you could probably take an inexpensive wine and add a little bit of vanilla extract to it and it would taste like a better quality wine. (Wine producers are prohibited from doing this sort of thing themselves, but you can do it at home.) Of course, this isn't going to make a bottle of mad dog into a palatable table wine, but it could improve an inexpensive table wine.
nphase 16y ago
My favorite wines these days: - 2007 Xiloca Garnacha (~$15) http://www.winechateau.com/vsku1564105_MURET-XILOCA-GARNACHA-750ML-2007?utm_source=Google%20Products&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=MURET%20XILOCA%20GARNACHA%202007 http://www.winechateau.com/vsku1564105_MURET-XILOCA-GARNACHA... - 2007 Lucky Star Zinfandel (~$18, can't find a good source online)
joeycfan 16y ago
I think people just like the constraint factor - that it is hard to make old wine - it takes 20 years to make a 20 year old wine.

19 points by c0riander 16y ago

And, like many things, it is still usually a matter of paying 500% for a 10% increase in quality.

There's a correlation, but it's a weak one. Bad wines are almost always very cheap, but the range between decent and great is too subjective to expect a strong correlation.

tptacek 16y ago
And note that's the range between "decent" and "cheap" within a specific bracket of varietal and region. Anyone who drinks wine regularly can pick out a high-end Burgundy Pinot from a collection of mid-range California reds. And here the analysis starts to break down, because if you're looking for the characteristics of a great Burgundy, you probably can't source them from California for $20 a bottle; you can get "cheap" French imports in that price range, but the price gap between "acceptable" and "good" is wider. In short: you're not going to get what you don't pay for. (I'm using Burgundy as an example only because a restaurant blew my mind with one a couple years ago; someone more wine-literate can substitute better examples --- for instance, the same "much larger gap in price between decent and good" may exist for California Bordeaux-style "Meritage" wines). And should this surprise anyone? Does anyone here think there's low price/quality correlation in beer?
- elblanco 16y ago
  > And should this surprise anyone? Does anyone here think there's low price/quality correlation in beer? Perhaps...there's some superb regular day drinkers that run under $2/bottle...and some of the more expensive specialty beers can cost upwards of $8/pint and taste like sewage. (of course the really cheap beer is pretty universally bad)
  - tptacek 16y ago
    Nobody here is going to claim that you can't tell a barrel-aged Belgian-style ale from a bottle of Newcastle. There's lot of very drinkable wine at a $20 price point, but a $20 bottle is unlikely to surprise you with its complexity.
    - runT1ME 16y ago
      >but a $20 bottle is unlikely to surprise you with its complexity Disagree. I've had 20 dollar wine that I feel is more complex and much better than 60 dollar bottles. Now, there may be better 60 dollar bottles but that doesn't mean the best 20 dollar isn't better than the worst 100 dollar bottle.
      - tptacek 16y ago
        There is clearly a lot of overpriced wine. That's not as entertaining a conclusion as the one this post is trying to advance.
  - joe_the_user 16y ago
    some of the more expensive specialty beers can cost upwards of $8/pint and taste like sewage Ah, but it requires special effort to produce a drinkable sort of sewage-tasting-beer and a particular period of training to learn to enjoy the unique sewage taste... of Orval, Flemish Sour Ale or lambic "natural" beer. And don't even mention the engine-oil taste of the great imperial stouts... Well, at least my training myself to like $8 beer was less costly than someone else training themselves to like $50 wine...
    - elblanco 16y ago
      > engine-oil taste of the great imperial stouts That's precisely the taste I'm looking for in a good stout...that or old burned steak and rye bread.
  - te_chris 16y ago
    Just so long as none of you americans try and tell us that Bud is beer, not "beer flavoured substitute"
- dminor 16y ago
  > Anyone who drinks wine regularly can pick out a high-end Burgundy Pinot from a collection of mid-range California reds. Well, I drink wine quite regularly and I wouldn't be so confident, but I have very little experience with high end Burgundy. Put some Oregon pinots in front of me though and I can make some reasonable guesses. Still, I had one from a small producer Thanksgiving weekend that tasted nothing like a typical Oregon pinot, and in fact reminded me of a Burgundy I had a couple years back.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    You'd know even without knowing varietals. I can tell merlot from cabernet, but I'm mostly wine-illiterate; but the glass of pinot we got with our wine pairings at Alinea was unlike any wine I've ever had in my life; I recognized instantly that it was something special. And that's the only point I'm making: there are special wines out there, and many of them are not cheap, and if you want their particular kind of special, you're going to have to pay. The grandparent commenter made this point more clearly than I have. You can get crappy expensive wine, but for the most part, you won't get what you don't pay for.
joe_the_user 16y ago
Actually the paper linked to the article found negative correlation... "on average, individuals who are unaware of the price do not derive more enjoyment from more expensive wine. In fact, they enjoy more expensive wines slightly less." (http://www.wine-economics.org/workingpapers/AAWE_WP16.pdf http://www.wine-economics.org/workingpapers/AAWE_WP16.pdf) I love three buck chuck.

illumen 16y ago

Yes.

elblanco 16y ago

I usually find the best wines run between $7-$14. In fact my current favorite wine runs about $8-9. http://www.penfolds.com.au/brand_penfolds/wines/koonunga-hill/shiraz-cabernet/ http://www.penfolds.com.au/brand_penfolds/wines/koonunga-hil... And I've found this gem for under $12. http://wine90.blogspot.com/2007/12/zaccagnini-montepulciano-dabruzzo.html http://wine90.blogspot.com/2007/12/zaccagnini-montepulciano-...

GregBuchholz 16y ago

http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/02/24/fine-wine/ http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/02/24/fine-wine/

ams6110 16y ago
That's really surprising that the experiment subjects could not tell that the white wine dyed red was not really red wine. I can't stand white wine and I like reds quite a bit, to me they taste very different.

Charuru 16y ago

Price is a function of supply and demand, not of quality.

ShabbyDoo 16y ago
Agree, but the relative pricing of various substitutable goods is a function of the things which are interpreted by the consumer as "quality". W.r.t. this article, we care about this relative ranking.

sliverstorm 16y ago

I had a difficult time swallowing this article. Then I realized that, because my wine budget caps at $20/bottle, I am living in a very different world. Hopefully nobody will try to tell me a $5 bottle tastes worse than a $20 bottle purely because of the price- otherwise, my taste buds must be seriously screwed up.

ams6110 16y ago
Heck I buy Franzia in a 5 liter box for $12. Tastes fine to me.

trotsky 16y ago

Like others, I was pretty confused until I reached the part where they said to buy the $20 bottle instead of the $50 bottle. I think what they're really tracking here is that high end wines are (usually) over priced. I'm not an expert at all, but I also think certain varieties tend to be much more represented in the high end offerings. Cabernets is the one that comes to mind off the top of my head. I personally won't buy a cab at any price, and I think that dislike is often shared by my generation and those younger to me, but older generations tend to be much more prone to buying them. I wonder if age is a factor (and hence buying power) in which wines people will tend to rank highly.

klochner 16y ago
Who doesn't like cabs? What do you drink with a nice steak?
- trotsky 16y ago
  usually a shiraz/syrah or a malbec
enjo 16y ago
You'll grow into them, and they don't have to be expensive.

blahblahblah 16y ago

I remember reading an article back in the late 80's or early 90's about wine chemistry. I think it was in Scientific American or Discover. Basically, the conclusion they came to was that the difference between a good wine and a mediocre one had to do with the esterification that occurred during aging and the amount of vanillin leeched from the wood barrel. They indicated that you could probably take an inexpensive wine and add a little bit of vanilla extract to it and it would taste like a better quality wine. (Wine producers are prohibited from doing this sort of thing themselves, but you can do it at home.) Of course, this isn't going to make a bottle of mad dog into a palatable table wine, but it could improve an inexpensive table wine.

nphase 16y ago

My favorite wines these days: - 2007 Xiloca Garnacha (~$15) http://www.winechateau.com/vsku1564105_MURET-XILOCA-GARNACHA-750ML-2007?utm_source=Google%20Products&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=MURET%20XILOCA%20GARNACHA%202007 http://www.winechateau.com/vsku1564105_MURET-XILOCA-GARNACHA... - 2007 Lucky Star Zinfandel (~$18, can't find a good source online)

joeycfan 16y ago

I think people just like the constraint factor - that it is hard to make old wine - it takes 20 years to make a 20 year old wine.