Just been sent a link to an San Francisco Chronicle article where a wine guru introduces us to art of “pairing wine with people”. In fact, it amounts to nothing more than a guide to how to pick a wine as a gift rather than “pairing”, but it’s an indication of how “matching” or “pairing” bonkers the wine community has gone.
The “with people” effort (sample: “steer clear of giving wine to anyone who you’re not certain drinks alcohol” – Oh, OK then) comes hot on the heels of the most recent attempt to “match” wine with music. It’s a trend that started with vaguely serious academic studies of how types of music could drive supermarket customers to specific countries or styles in the wine aisle, but has quickly degenerated into any excuse to bung out a press release by making up a few jokey “tasting notes” that might, at a stretch, describe a particular recording artist.
Posh London wine merchant Berry Bros & Rudd was the latest to fall into this particular publicity trap with a set of playlists compiled by its board members, but does it really amount to anything more than a list of their favourite tunes and wines, with the hope that they can flog a few of each in promotional tie-up with 7Digital? And is anyone really going to say “actually, I quite like Fleetwood Mac’s Go Your Own Way [I don't, by the way] so I’ll see if it really is enhanced by a bottle of Sheridan Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2005 ‘because it’s serious, intense but bright, with a vibrant, uplifting personality’.”
The one place I have seen this stuff work is at Cambridgeshire wine merchant Smiling Grape, largely because the laminated pictures of the matched cultural reference point lifted the place above the mundanity of most high street off-licences (best tasting note: the Sauvignon to go with early Pink Floyd – “lots of grass and acid”).
Maybe the wine crowd have been startled by a new generation of beer writer that’s started to queer their pitch on food matching and just got a bit carried away in the panic.
I can sense keyboard fingers drifting over the characters that spell out “lighten up”, but I say it’s time to call a stop, so we don’t have to find out where it all ends; descriptions of the perfect wine to go with your shoe size, bus stop and underwear are probably already at the draft stage.
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