Is It OK To Blend Your Own Wine At Home?
What started as a slightly unhinged kitchen experiment turned into a bigger question about taste, confidence, and why wine drinkers rarely think to tinker with what’s in their glass.
by Devon Parr for Forbes
There I was. Alone in my kitchen. I’d just opened up a promising blend from a producer I love. I had that giddy excitement where your mouth waters a bit because you’ve definitely earned a drink and what you’re about to taste sounds delicious. My nose prickled in anticipation as I lifted the glass. Hmmm. Floral. Too floral? I took a sip. Very floral. Disappointment. The wine was fine—well-made, layered, complex. But, for my palate, it was just a little too perfume-y. The texture was slightly oily, almost viscous, and it was missing that bite of acid I was craving. And as I stood there in my kitchen, fridge door still open, I spotted an open bottle of New Zealand sauvignon blanc. Don’t ask me why, but I got a harebrained idea. Before anyone could stop me, I opened the screwcap and splashed some in my already poured glass.
…“When I was first starting out as a winemaker, I saw a friend doing this who’s a chef, and I did think it was cringeworthy because I know how much time and effort goes into perfecting every little nuance from aroma to the flavors of the finish,” winemaker Alisa Jacobsontold me via email. “However, at my ‘wise’ age of 30 years in the industry, I now have a different opinion.” What once struck her as sacrilege today feels more like a creative impulse and a natural extension of how people engage with taste. “I personally am an experimenter,” she says. “Anyone who cooks, bakes, is a cocktail mixologist is. You play around with mixing flavors to help you find that perfect balance and outcome you’re looking for.”
That distinction matters because tinkering can also read as curiosity or even a deeper kind of engagement with wine itself. Jacobson points out that if blending at home helps people understand what they like, it may ultimately help them shop more confidently. “I make a Picpoul wine and I usually tell people who don’t know the variety, it has the acid and brightness of a Sauv Blanc but the depth of a Chardonnay,” she explains. “So, in a similar vein if you had played with those flavors at home you might be able to imagine better what my Picpoul wine tastes like.”…