Does a wine really taste better when you know what it costs?
The same wine can be judged differently once price, reputation and place enter the picture. That does not make wine tasting fake. It makes it human.
Journal
The world around wine.
Reporting, ideas and stories about the people, places and forces shaping what we drink.
Latest
Why we keep buying the same bottle
Finding a wine you like should make choosing easier. Sometimes it makes choosing anything else surprisingly difficult.
Climate change is changing what “classic” wine tastes like
Wine regions are built around the idea that place gives a wine identity. But climate is part of place, and it is moving. Preserving a “classic” regional style may increasingly require changing how that style is made.
Why wine lists make normal people feel stupid
You can be perfectly capable of choosing dinner, booking a hotel and running your own life. Then somebody hands you a wine list and suddenly you need to know what Volnay means.
Gen Z is drinking. Wine still has to earn its place.
The easy story is that younger adults have stopped drinking. Current data is more awkward: legal-drinking-age Gen Z participation in alcohol has risen, while wine still faces a recruitment and relevance problem. The distinction matters.
The wine label is finally telling you more. Just not always on the label.
European wine rules now require ingredient and nutrition information that wine long avoided. But much of it can live behind a QR code. Transparency has arrived in wine in a very wine-like way: real, useful and still slightly hidden.
The heavy wine bottle is losing its status
For years, thick glass could signal seriousness before the cork was pulled. Now wine businesses are trying to remove weight from the bottle without removing prestige from the wine. The change is practical, environmental and cultural.