By Elspeth Brown
My 13-year-old son has the palate of Auguste Escoffier. It is amazing. He can pick out different flavors in food, loves to cook and will taste and eat most anything. It is a dream for a mom who went to culinary school. My 9-year-old daughter also has a wonderful palate. She can pick out all the flavors she does not like and tell you why she hates them. She won’t try as many different foods, and is a lot pickier, which can make dinner time tricky. But I can appreciate that they both have such different, particular palates. The same goes for wine drinkers.
Maggie B’s has been in business for 18 years now, and the business has grown to find wines for everyone and every occasion. If you want a sweet wine to end the night with, we will recommend an aged Madeira from Portugal, or a sweet, red Brachetto from Italy. When you are roasting lamb, we will send you home with a Pinotage from South Africa. Sauteed fish will be paired with a dry Muscadet from France that will complement the salinity in the fish. There is a wine to pair with every ingredient and everyone’s taste.
Each of our employees has a different wine profile, too, which makes it really fun to sell wine. Susan leans toward Old World wines. She prefers red wines that are earthy, smoky, dry and a bit musty. She will always recommend wines from Italy, Spain and France. Plus, she loves more expensive wine like Mas La Plana Cabernet from Spain, so I always love to have a glass of wine with her at her house!
Patty is a New World woman. She appreciates big, bright, fruit flavors that are smooth but not sweet. Patty likes a wine that is drinkable the day you open it, which most of us do.
I have a couple of new employees who are fresh to the world of wine, and it is exciting to experience what they find interesting in wine, and what they gravitate towards. They have a fresh outlook, and I really appreciate hearing their feedback and their suggestions for customers.
And then there is me. I feel as if my taste evolves every year. Some days I prefer lighter, easy-drinking wines like Pinot Noir, and other days I enjoy a red wine with tannins that go on for days. Other times, all I drink is white wine. Right now, I am choosing wine to pair with what I am eating. While I love to sit down on the porch and sip a glass of dry Riesling, I’m finding excitement in choosing the perfect grape varietal to pair with my dinner.
There are so many different flavor profiles when it comes to wine that there is a wine for almost everyone. Whether you drink wine like me, Susan, Patty, or a novice, the wine world is your oyster. Our taste buds are always changing, so explore and try different wines all the time. Get out of your comfort zone, find your palate and have fun!
Elspeth Brown is the owner of Maggie B’s Wine & Specialty Store, 10 C South Main Street in Weaverville. For information, visit MaggieBsWine.com or call 828.645.1111.
