Never tell a Frenchman the wine is not good, just drink it!

Around 10% of wines is faulty. Most of them are corked or cooked. Some of them have other causes like sulphur or oxidation. That means roughly that out of 10 visits to a restaurant, you should be asking for a new bottle at least once. If you don’t reach that average it is likely that you have drank some faulty wines without noticing it and happily paid for it. Or maybe you weren’t happy with the wine, but just didn’t know how to explain that to the waiter.

But as with everything, practice makes you better. Our first experience was on a beautiful terrace in Piedmont. We ordered a Barolo 2000 for 80 Euros. We were excited because it was the most expensive bottle we ever ordered in a restaurant. That must be good! Bottle was presented, wine was tasted, we nodded our heads, and wine was poured.  Still in love with the view and each other we were taking our first sips. Then the doubt hit us. What was this ‘specific Barolo aroma’? Mushrooms? Autumn leaves? I think I was the first who dared to accuse this expensive Barolo for being faulty. A little (read a lot) unsure we asked the waiter for his opinion. He frowned his eyebrows took a sip and spitted it on the ground. “Spaventoso! No è buono!”. He gestured us to don’t worry and he came back with a new one that was perfect! In the end, we had a amazing dinner, with a beautiful Barolo and a waiter who spoiled us with a few ‘extras’ from the house. Since this moment we always follow our instincts and return the flawed bottle.

In France everything is different. The French are polite, very polite. So be careful were to be so courageous to make a comment on the faulty wine. At a wine tasting in Paris last Friday, an American lady very politely asked the sommelier to please taste the wine for any faults because she thought it was corked. Immediately he made us all very clear: “You never tell a Frenchman that the wine is not good, you just drink it!”. So there. You just get your act together and drink the moldy, stinky wine and do so for the rest of the bottle. You just do not say the wine has a fault that absolutely nobody could tell from the outside. You just might accuse the host for not being clairvoyant. Point taken, the American and the rest of us played our role and poured the wine discretely in the spittoon. 

So, if you ever are invited by a Frenchman and there is something wrong with the wine. Think happy thoughts and try to drink it with your nose closed. Mind you, this doesn’t mean that you can’t return your faulty bottles in a French restaurant. If you paid for it, you can return it.

The most common faults

Cork taint: musty, moldy aroma that suppresses other aromas.

Brettanomyces: aroma of horse stable, horse urine, damp leather

Oxidation: Sherry aroma (often part of the style of the wine, rather than being a fault).

Sulphur: aroma of mothballs, burnt matches.

Volatile Acidity: aroma of vinegar or acetone.