Raising a wine's price improves its taste, study suggests

WASHINGTON: Apparently, raising the price really does make the wine taste better.

At least that seems to be the result of a taste test. The part of the brain that reacts to a pleasant experience responded more strongly to pricey wines than cheap ones - even when tasters were given the same vintage in disguise.

Antonio Rangel and colleagues at California Institute of Technology thought the perception that higher price means higher quality could influence people, so they decided to test the idea.

They asked 20 people to sample wine while undergoing functional MRIs of their brain activity. The subjects were told they were tasting five different cabernet sauvignons sold at different prices.

However, there were actually only three wines sampled, two being offered twice, marked with different prices.

A $90 wine was provided marked with its real price and again marked $10, while another was presented at its real price of $5 and also marked $45.

The testers' brains showed more pleasure at the higher price than the lower one, even for the same wine, Rangel reports in the online edition this week of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In other words, changes in the price of the wine changed the actual pleasure experienced by the drinkers, the researchers reported.

On the other hand, when tasters did not know any price comparisons, they rated the $5 wine as better than any of the others sampled.

"We were shocked," Rangel said by telephone. "I think it was because the flavor was stronger and our subjects were not very experienced."

Tipping on Wine

While reading an article on the lost art of serving wine in the November Wine Enthusiast by Roger Voss, I was struck by his discussion of tipping on wine, which is apparently the subject of some disagreement. Opinions range from excluding the wine from tip calculation all together to applying the 15-20% rule to the wine as well (the option I was always under the impression was standard). Voss, while strongly advocating tipping for good wine service, does not feel that, even in the case of good service, 15-20% is required. After doing a small amount of informal Google research, it seemed that consensus was 10% was perfectly acceptable and considered something of the norm, especially if the wine is pricey. Maybe this was common knowledge, but I found it interesting and thought I'd pass it on in case it wasn't. Oh, and in case it doesn't go without saying, I believe the 10% tip on wine is assuming a bottle purchase, as opposed to wine by the glass.

On a related note, I came across some interesting etiquette for sending wine back. Of course, corked wines (and oxidized whites), can and should be sent back, but apparently there are even situations where it is appropriate to send back a wine you simply do not like. If you have received a wine recommendation, or if the sommelier/waiter has been instrumental in selecting the choice of wine, it is acceptable to send it back if you don't like it. If, however, you make the wine choice independently, etiquette is to suck it up and drink it.

Tuscany

With our exploration of Tuscan (esp., Sangiovese) wines fast approaching, a post conveying some experiences about the region seemed appropriate.

The experiences we'll convey are from the several days we spent in the region on our honeymoon in October, 2005. The map should help get your bearings.

We'll focus on the roughly north-south axis running from Firenze (Florence) through Siena and down to wear it Ts-off with the east-west axis between Montalcino and Montepulciano. We'll focus on three areas that produce three wines which are deemed DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita): Chianti, Brunello di Montalcino and Vino Nobile de Montepulciano. All three of these wines use the Sangiovese grape (or one of its clones) as their majority ingredient. We'll save focusing on the wines themselves for our tasting.

The Chianti DOCG is divided into eight sub-regions. The autostrada from Florence to Siena bisects the Chianti Classico sub-region (where Chianti originated) with stereotypical Tuscan vistas on either side. Soon after passing the half way point between the two cities, there is an exit to the tiny town of Montereggioni whose towers are old enough to have had a cameo in Dante's Divine Comedy (Inferno, xxxi. 41-44).

Montereggioni lies near the border of the Chianti Classico and Chianti Colli Senesi regions. We stopped for lunch, a little exploration, and to enjoy the view from the hilltop.

That night we went on to our bed & breakfast just outside Siena.

The next day we explored beautiful Siena. The following day it was back to the hills, but this time south of Siena. By lunch time we reached Montalcino and found some proscuitto, pecorino cheese, and bread for a little picnic with a half bottle of Brunello just outside the town's castle.
From there we had a view of the hills descending down from Montalicino's perch.

Unlike Siena and Florence, wine is front and center in Montalcino -- a large map of area wineries is in the main square. Having just served a favorite from Banfi called Col di Sasso at our wedding, we decided to try to find its source. Heading south we quickly descended into the valley as the sun broke through the clouds. We drove past vines on either side from a variety of producers, and as we got closer to the valley floor began to see the logo indicating we had found Banfi's 7,000 acre estate. Banfi is a relatively recent American-owned addition to the Montalcino wine scene. (Montalcino itself has really only gained prominence in the last half-century or so.) Banfi's central "castello", however, dates from the middle ages, at least.





Unlike many Italian producers, Banfi has a consumer-friendly retail operation, though at the time it had no tasting facility other than its restaurant.

From Banfi we decided to head east, eventually ending up in Montepulciano around time for our evening meal. Montepulciano is a bit more imposing and engrossing than Montalcino, though its signature wine, Vino Nobile, is often in the shadow of its cousin Brunello. We enjoyed exploring it at dusk.

The restaurant we had our eye on turned out to be booked solid, so we tried a one-man trattoria next door. As dinner progressed (with a half bottle of Vino Nobile), we were pleasantly surprised to learn first that the pasta dishes were fairly tasty and second that our seemingly passive server/chef/barkeep was an aspiring opera singer.

He sang along energetically and quite capably with the great tenors on the stereo. That evening we returned to our B&B and the next day set out for northern Tuscany and eventually on to other destinations (see other pictures).