London – An expensive wine may well have a full body, a delicate nose and good legs, but the odds are your brain will never know.
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A survey of hundreds of drinkers found that on average people could tell good wine from plonk no more often than if they had simply guessed.
In the blind taste test, 578 people commented on a variety of red and white wines ranging from a £3.49 bottle of Claret to a £29.99 bottle of champagne. The researchers categorised inexpensive wines as costing £5 and less, while expensive bottles were £10 and more.
The study found that people correctly distinguished between cheap and expensive white wines only 53% of the time, and only 47% of the time for red wines. The overall result suggests a 50:50 chance of identifying a wine as expensive or cheap based on taste alone – the same odds as flipping a coin.
Richard Wiseman, a psychologist at Hertfordshire University, conducted the survey at the Edinburgh International Science Festival.
“People just could not tell the difference between cheap and expensive wine,” he said. “When you know the answer, you fool yourself into thinking you would be able to tell the difference, but most people simply can’t.”
All of the drinkers who took part in the survey were attending the science festival, but Wiseman claims the group was unlikely to be any worse at wine tasting than a cross-section of the general public.
“The real surprise is that the more expensive wines were double or three times the price of the cheaper ones. Normally when a product is that much more expensive, you would expect to be able to tell the difference,” Wiseman said.
People scored best when deciding between two bottles of Pinot Grigio, with 59% correctly deciding which was which. The Claret, which cost either £3.49 or £15.99, fooled most people with only 39% correctly identifying which they had tasted.
In 2008, a study led by Adrian North, a psychologist at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, claimed that music helped boost the flavour of certain wines. North, who was commissioned by a Chilean winemaker, reported that Cabernet Sauvignon was most affected by “powerful and heavy” music, while Chardonnay benefited from “zingy and refreshing” sounds.
The whole idea is that expensive wines are not always better than cheap wines!!!!! Most expensive wines are just named so because of age and not really better in taste
I knew it! Hint of this and that always sounded like bs to me.
this whole mishigas with expensive wine has now crept it’s way into the frum velt and has become yet another showy way for yidden to waste their money.
they should do the same test on scotch. i would love to see the results.after pesach of course
Asking random people to taste a difference in wines is like asking a child to tell the difference between 18 karat gold and 14 karat. You would get the same results if you asked ordinary people to hear the difference between a 50 dollar violin and a $1500 one, or between a real diamond and a cubic zirconia.
So does that mean I can get away with $5 wine that tastes like candy for Pesach for my guests instead of say wine that tastes normal for $15?
Just because people cannot tell the difference, doesn’t mean that one isn’t there for those who know what they are looking for. Better example. Why get nice mezuzos for $100 each when I can find some for under $40? To most, they look the same. But there is an idea of hiddur mitzvot, of getting better script and nicer quality. I am sure some wines just have hype, but I do know that with some brands, there is certainly a difference between cheap and expensive.
It’s amusing to note that Trader Joe’s Three Buck Chuck has won blind taste tests several years in a row.
To me Malaga is the best. I can’t stand anything more expensive and not because of the price but because of the taste. I’ll take my $3.99 bottle of Malaga any day over the other stuff.
They had a study where individuals enjoyed pepsi more than coke. However that is only when they tasted a sip when they drank more than that coke won. In addition there are many other similar variables i.e. did they drink it with food. Besides it is quite obvious to professional wine tasters that there is a difference in taste. It is possible that normal people are only able to recognize that difference when they understand what they are drinking. Until one knows the mona lisa is choshuv you probably won’t realize its greatness.
The obvious conclusion is that the sense of taste is dulled when one’s vision is blocked.