#226 A prostitute with a chastity belt - Tasting wines with a cold.

 

I feel like a prostitute with a chastity belt on.  Granted, a prostitute still may be able to do many elements of her chosen profession, whilst wearing such a garment, but ultimately if the lady of the night is unable to have sex, it defeats the purpose of hiring her!  And when you are a wine retailer, or a blogger, and you have a cold, it is as if your talent is being restrained by a phlegm coated chastity belt.  You can’t unleash the two senses that you need the most to try wines, and because of this all the other elements of my job are just pointless.  Sure, I can waffle on about the colour of the wine, the legs and how clear it is, but bottom line, if you can’t sample the goods, opening the bottle is pointless.

As I write this, I have a stinker of a cold, and no matter how many Vicks inhalers I shove up my nose, how much Vaporub I smear over every part of the upper half of my body and no matter how many cold & flu capsules I take I can’t shift this bug, and it means that I can’t taste a damn thing.  And so I am resorting to eating spicy food, and lots of it. 

Normally I am a wimp when it comes to chilli and am frequently told to ‘man up’ by my chilli chomping friends, but when I have a cold, I tend to overdose on it.  I made a chilli that would normally kill me, but I managed to munch quite happily on a bowl full of it.  Tonight, the Thai takeaway had seriously slipped and thrown full chillies into my curry, and I didn’t realise until my numb taste buds felt just a touch of heat and I looked down and saw several green heat bombs swimming around amongst the red pepper and chicken.  When I have a cold, I may act like a pathetic child who moans and mopes around thinking that he about to die, but when it comes to eating, I am (finally) a real man, and eat very spicy food, as it is the only thing I can actually taste!

So I decided to try various wines to see if I could actually taste them when I had a cold, and was stoned on Beechams.  And this very unscientific test came up with the following conclusions, so take note as there will be a test later.  A majority of red wines from France are undrinkable, having their fruit totally masked, all you get is the bitter secondary flavours and a shed load of alcohol.  Bigger new world reds have their fruit power through the cold a bit, but you do really need a lot of sweeter flavours to taste anything,  Port works too for this reason, but the alcohol is more noticeable as the fruit is muted somewhat and the booze tends to become a bit too powerful.

Whites aren’t much better.  Rounder flavoured whites, Chardonnays and Semillons, instigate a gag reflex, and whilst you can taste tarter whites, you might as well be sucking on a lemon.  In fact, do suck on a lemon, you’ll get some much needed vitimin C.  Sparkling wine doesn’t work, regardless of whether it is Champagne or not, the bubbles make you want to sneeze and then there is the unfortunate problem of juggling a glass of wine and trying to find a tissue before you have to sneeze the contents of your nasal passages into the palm of your hand.

So really, what it comes down to is Germany, and here lies the salvation for any wine lover with the sniffles.  A cheap, but decent, German Riesling has the sweetness you need to be able to taste it, but also has the citrus flavours that your body is now craving due to the multiple honey and lemon drinks you have been downing.  Finally, it goes well with Thai food, so bring out the chillies again.  This cold has made me hungry!