A rating system at last

Many's the time someone has said or written to me, "You need some kind of rating system."  Because ecstatic babblings and lots of exclamation points and CAPITALIZED words aren't precise enough.  OK, I succumb.  When I review or just write extensively about a wine, I will henceforth and forthwith tack on a rating at the end. 

The reasons for the delay are many.  The main one is that no system I've ever come across suits me as a person.  The way I taste, what I taste, what the wine tells me with its perfume -- for me it's very hard to quantify.  Quantifying these things seems pretty stupid, in fact.  I dislike and mistrust the false objectivity and ludicrous precision of 100 point systems.  I am no fan of the 20 point system traditionally favored by the British, although I admit it is useful in comparing vintages.

I sort of like the 3-5 glass/bottle/star systems used in, for example, the Italian wine guides.  They are the visual equivalent of the system used by, say, Fredric Koeppel, who uses regular English words to grade the wines he reviews:  FAIR, GOOD, VERY GOOD, EXCEPTIONAL, etc.  But what appropriate, instantly grasped symbols are left?   And how can I, mr. mondosapore, express my ardency when I find a wine exciting or my lukewarm acceptance of it if I think it's merely OK?  I am not the moderate man that Koeppel is (God knows, anyone who slogs through the mudstorms of my mind can attest to that). 

So what will be my way of rating wine?  How will I combine some sense of objective reality with the (to me) highly important affective results of drinking a wine?  Drinking as opposed to tasting, in most cases. 

Well, I have a name for it.  I call it the H.Q.  The Happiness Quotient.  For a description and explanation, read on, pilgrim.

This guy looks happy

The Happiness Quotient Formula

% Alcohol x # Glasses = H.Q.

I shall elucidate.

The percentage of alcohol is the amount stated on the label.  I tossed off a line the other day in the post about the Reale wines of the Amalfi coast: "Happiness is 13%."  This obviously referred to the degree of alcohol, and it served to remind us all that wine maketh merry.  Alcohol content is at once an objective description of a wine and the bearer of wine's desired effects.  NB: In response to various comments, if I think the wine is too high in alcohol, too unbalanced, I will award it fewer glasses...

The # Glasses is less clear. This indicates my personal appreciation of a wine.  Using a 6-glass bottle as the standard, I list the number of glasses that I could drink / would like to drink of a particular wine.  It's about the intensity of response -- acknowledging the importance of emotion and evocativeness in wine. 

Number of Glasses

0 = pour it down the sink

1 = barely drinkable, "off".  Uninteresting

2 = drink if offered just to be polite.  Uninteresting

3 = pleasant, OK with the meal. Not very interesting

4 = very good. Interesting

5 = very good, liked by all, a mood enhancer.  Interesting

6 = like it very much, would be happy to toss off a bottle.  Interesting, wish to know more about producer,             region, grapes, etc.

7 = compulsively drinkable, superb quality, my heart sings.  Very interesting indeed, even exciting

Now, some will be quick to point out, "How then can you seriously rate a 1945 Petrus with this subjective system of yours?" 

My answer: It depends.  Does the wine fascinate me for what is in the glass?  Can I drink more than one glass?  Would I grab the entire bottle and drink it myself, if I had the chance?  And so on.  The purpose is to assess that bottle in that moment.  (This is entirely moot, given the example.  I'll never get within two miles of a 1945 Petrus.)

Some Examples of H.Q.

Let's take the wines of Luigi Reale on an H.Q. test drive.  Here are the notes on each of the four wines.  And my Happiness Quotient follows each one. 

Aliseo 2007 IGT

This is the white wine, which is named for the sea breeze that keeps the vineyards well ventilated and preserves them from excessive heat much of the time.  (The property faces southwest.)

We tasted three vintages, and the 2007 (just bottled) was the freshest and most appealing, as you'd expect.  Made of 40% each Biancolella and Biancazita with 20% of a very obscure but peppery and lively Pepella, this 12%-strength wine is full of citrus with a somewhat smoky, caramel nose.  About 30% of this one is oak-fermented, which accounts for this warm, rich character.  We found this to be very versatile with the local dishes from Luigi's restaurant "Osteria Reale."

H.Q. 12 x 3 = 36

Getis 2007

This rose' is made of 80% Piedirosso and 20% Tintore.  The 2007 is at 13%, dry and balanced with acidity that makes it an excellent food wine.  Strawberries and plums predominate in the nose and on the palate.  A delicious and versatile wine that sells out completely at Luigi's osteria. The total production is about 1000 bottles.

H.Q. 13 x 4 = 52

Cardamone 2006

Made with the same blend of Piedirosso and Tintore as Getis, the 2006 will be released in the fall.  Its special character leaps out at you even in this still very young vintage.  Rich, peppery notes combine with  zesty black-cherry to create a compulsively drinkable wine that goes well with a wide range of foods and is, I think, delicious on its own.  The smokiness in the Getis is much more pronounced here. Cardamone sees no wood, by the way, so the smoke is a function of grape and soil.  The 80-90-plus year old vines do their bit.  This is sensational wine that I could drink every day.  Copiously.

H. Q. 13 x 7 = 91

Borgo di Gete 2005

This is 100% Tintore that's been in first-passage oak, half in tonneaux and half in barrique.  The wine weighs in at 13% happiness. Newly released, this needs a year or two more before its extraordinary fruit and "organoleptics" harmonize.  "Tintore" suggests color and depth, and it was used by local farmers in the old days to add color and heft to other varieties.  Reale's Tintore in purezza has a deep almost plummy color yet manages to be clear, no muddiness at all.  This vintage possesses an earthy nose that really is reminiscent of Burgundy, although there the similarities cease.  This is no disparagement of Borgo di Gete; it's an acknowledgment of its complex individuality.  I'll be very interested to see how it evolves over the next few years.

H.Q. 13 x 5 = 65

To me the most important number isn't the one at the end.  It's the one in the middle.  Does this wine call out to you to drink more because it's so delicious, interesting and even thrilling that you want to keep tasting it as it opens up over a few hours?  That's the key.  Everything else is oenological number-crunching.

Comments

[justine]

By George I think you've got it! Well, nearly...I hear what you're saying about alcohol, but I don't agree that it's so critical to enjoyment of wine as to need to part of a rating system. Quaffability, on the other hand, is right at the top of the tree (oh, and I guess you'd have to qualify it as mouthfuls, not glasses for dessert wines: I could eat, and savour a teaspoon of honey, but 7 would make me throw up).
So many have theorised about point systems that we need a point system to rate the point systems and another for the theorisers.
As a producer, point ststems are, to a large degree, unimportant (although getting a shiny badge is always nice). Unimportant because we cannot replicate that wine the following year, and we have already produced the rated one to a quantity that we beleive we can sell anyway. Perhaps most importantly, we produce wines that WE like, and we sweat grape juice every year trying to make them so we like them even more.
From a consumer side though, I think points and guides and the whole shebang are much more important. A producer is ostensibly only concerned with his/her own wines, whilst the lucky buyer has to stand alone and bewildered in front of the wineshelves. Where to start? Price and a pretty label as a fumbling beginner, but anyone wanting to become an experienced wine lover needs a bit of guidance from someone who has done it all before.
As someone who thinks there's an inordinate load of snobbish tosh sluicing around the wine industry, I would say this: a rating system from a critic whose palate is similar to your own is a fairly good yardstick to use when deciding, rather than chancing, upon a wine, and a rating system such as you suggest (minus the alcohol bit) which pegs how slurpable it is , is very very close to how 99% of us rate a wine to ourselves. Good show.

[Terry Hughes]

Coming from a wine producer, this is high praise indeed.

The point about alcohol is a good one. I was looking for a factual anchor, if you will, for the subjective, personal response to a wine. If a wine is too alcoholic, I can/want to drink less than if it is at a reasonable level (usually 12-13.5). I considered doing a special thing for dessert wines and thought, well, the glasses are teeny, so go ahead. Also, the 7 is a notional number - I'd LIKE to drink that much of a wonderful wine, although it may not be available or physically possible.

It's a work in progress.

BTW, Gianpaolo once told me that you're witty. You really are. Dump him and the kids and we'll have a great laugh-in here in NYC.

[Morgan]

careful - as with most things, i find wine gets significantly better after seven glasses...

[justine]

mostly, as with careful things, I'm better finding wine after seven significant glasses. hic. this is my eighth.

[Terry Hughes]

@ Justine: Oh you Limies!

@ Morgan: Oh you Hughes!

@ Gabrio: See, I added the thing about too much alcohol. Fast response time, huh?

[gianpaolo]

Hey Terry, be careful with Justine, you'll have to get all the package (which includes three lovely children under the age of 6... ;-)) or nothing!

[Terry Hughes]

Oh, damn. I was just thinking of a rollicking long weekend in New York. No kids!

[Ronald]

T,

why don't you just use the number of glasses as your happiness quotient instead of multiplying it % alcohol?

and why bother with rating system in the 1st place when you're really good with words? i found your explaination 'methods' of the wines you tasted better than just tagging a no on it..

be careful...anti Parkerization move is on the rise *is it?*..
but it would also be nice to have your rating system..imagine in 5 years time...anti 'Terry-rization'...

[Terry Hughes]

There's already anti-Terryization. It begins at home, sadly...