Wine Riot! A Chance to Learn About Wine, Sans Snobbery

365 Days

Wine Riot! A Chance to Learn About Wine, Sans Snobbery

Posted 04/19/2009 at 09:28 AM by Cathy

By Courtney Humphries

Wine-tasting events sometimes bring to mind a stuffy atmosphere, pretentious sellers, and incomprehensible wine-speak. An event in Boston aimed to topple that image, appealing to a younger crowd eager to educate themselves about wine without the added attitude.

The Wine Riot, held April 17th and 18th at The Cyclorama in Boston's South End, sought to bring a casual, irreverent attitude to wine tasting and education. The event was presented by The Second Glass, a print and online wine magazine that seeks to demystify wine, and the Weekly Dig, Boston's alternative news weekly.

The event featured tastings by dozens of vendors with wines from around the world. Event sponsors hosted 20-minute "crash courses" in topics like rosés, the wines of Spain, the Chilean Carmenère, or why size matters when buying bottles.

When so many wine tastings seem like reverential affairs, it was nice to see so many people in their twenties and thirties cruising the tables and lining up for seminars at Friday night's VIP event. The plain brick interior of the Cyclorama and background dance music added to the informal atmosphere. Attendees could even Twitter their wine tasting impressions at a computer, or pose for professional photos holding signs with phrases like "I spit" or "I swallow."

The Wine Riot is the brainchild of Tyler Balliet, founder and editor of the Second Glass. Balliet said his primary goal was to educate. Many young people are curious about wine but "there are so few resources out there," he said.

In the spirit of learning more, I sat down for a panel discussion on organic and biodynamic wines, moderated by Jonathan Alsop, owner of the Boston Wine School. He explained how the term "biodynamic" can be thought of as "organic on steroids," in which the farming process is part of a closed, self-sustaining loop.

Although the definitions can seem deliberately confusing—and the panelists lamented that organic farming regulations don't always make sense for vineyards—it was clear that some growers are thinking seriously about sustainable wine-growing and production, whether they meet official definitions or not.

Jayme Moffi, a representative of Michel-Schlumberger Wines in Sonoma County, California, spoke about that company's efforts to go beyond the simple definition of organic and "create an ecosystem within your vineyard that takes care of itself." A commitment to sustainability can be found in the details of how the vineyard operates, from using sheep to mow the vineyards to powering trucks with biodiesel fuel and using a lake on the property for all water needs.

Each panelist's presentation was accompanied by tasting one of their wines, and the fact that we couldn't taste a big difference between these wines and the others at the event was part of the point: organic is something that happens behind the scenes, not in the glass.

In another room, Bertil Jean-Chronberg, general manager of The Beehive in Boston, gave a "crash course" in Champagne, how it all begins with a "love affair" between yeast and sugar that results in the production of carbon dioxide. Champagne, he said, simply holds onto that product to make bubbles. Jean-Chronberg went on to explain how Champagne and sparkling wines can vary by their country of origin, the method used to introduce bubbles into the wine, and the types of grapes used. He even demonstrated, in direct language, the proper way to open a bottle of Champagne: hold the bottle with your thumb up the "ass" of the bottle, and twist the bottle, not the cork.

At the vendor booths, representatives were also happy to entertain even a novice's questions. With a daunting array of choices, I sampled wines from regions I didn't know well: Spain, South Africa, Washington State.

My favorite discoveries were at the Heritage Link booth, an importer of South African wines that is dedicated to wines produced by black Africans, who are woefully underrepresented in the industry.

I was captivated by the deeply smoky M'Hudi Pinotage, and a Sauvignon Blanc by Seven Sisters that had a vegetal bite of green pepper perfect for summer. Though there were some high-end wines on hand, most of the bottles were affordable and under $20.

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About the Author

Cathy Huyghe

Cathy Huyghe writes about drinking wine every day in the Boston area. She finds the quirky characters, the after-hours events, and the surprising stories that make up Boston's vibrant local wine scene. But no matter where she is, what she's doing, or who she's with, she mostly just wants to drink the stuff.

Her first restaurant gig was at Chez Panisse, when she knocked on the kitchen's back door and asked if she could work there. She's also worked for Jean-Pierre Vigato in Paris and Thomas Keller in Las Vegas. She went to graduate school at Harvard (twice), and her writing has run in Boston magazine, the Boston Globe, the Washington Post, Edible Boston, and on Nevada Public Radio and Grist.org.