Label decoding

I meant to bring this up earlier, for those of you who have an interest in wine packaging: There was a really interesting segment on KCRW’s Good Food a couple of weeks back about “the best method for reading a wine label and finding the perfect wine.” In this case that doesn’t mean evaluating packaging aesthetics, it means “decoding” the factual information about the wine, its geographic origins, production history, and so on, which turns out to be a little more complicated than one might suspect. And a good amount of the information is provided in text form here (scroll down when you get there).

The wine label can tell what the grape is, where it came from and how much of a specific grape is in the bottle. This detail can range from a general location, “California,” to a more detail reference — where in California, what region, what vineyard location and literally which row and vine number within that vineyard. (Think of a vineyard as a neighborhood, within a state, region or country.)

Decoding a wine label can make us more savvy and multiply our pleasure with the wines we select.

Meanwhile, speaking of labels, the International Review of Wine Packaging and Aesthetics returns, after an inexplicable hiatus, later today.