possibly the wrong forum

[Duane Meissner]

in which to post about the excellent Bandol we had last night?? It's the one I mentioned recently from La Bastide Blanche. What a fantastic wine. I really enjoyed it much more this time around. Couldn't quite put my finger on what I was tasting, but then my wife tried a sip and nailed it: Band-Aids. I assume that's the mourvedre talking. Other than that, all I can say is it was very well balanced. Enjoyed it with NY Strips med-rare, horseraddish mashed potatoes, and green beans.

[Innkeeper]

You're in the right place. Sounds great.

[Bucko]

Band-Aids is also a term used to describe Brett. Keep in mind there are many strains of Brett. Some are really nasty, whereas others add classic flavors found in many top Rhone wines.

I got to attend a seminar where they took various strains of Brett and innoculated the same base wine, then let it age for varying periods of time. It was a real eye-opener for me. Some strains almost had a rose petal characteristic, whereas others had the nasty horse blanket smell.

[brappy]

How about the type where it smells and tastes like someone took a big ol' crap in your bottle????? [img]http://wines.com/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]

[winoweenie]

Braps....My suggestion whenced that happens is to take that sucker immediately to the terlit. WW [img]http://wines.com/ubb/wink.gif[/img]

[Duane Meissner]

Brett??

[VouvrayHead]

Brett is short for Brettanomyces.
It's a strain of yeast that can totally ruin a wine, though I, and many others, find small amounts of it (in some forms-- the post by by Bucko up there is really interesting!) very good. I think it can add a very sensual quality to wine.

It can definitely give a manure-like quality to wine, particularly on the nose. In smaller amounts, it's "earthy" or slightly animal-y, but attractive. It's an umami-like aroma. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umami)
It's frequently found in rhone-wines and others in the south of France.

A funny story: When I was Wisconsin, one of my co-workers knew very little about wine, but through frequent tasting she was beginning to pick out flavors in wine. I opened a fairly inexpensive Cotes du Rhone that was new to the store to try. It was deifnitely rather "Bretty," but with the right food I kinda liked it! I asked her to smell it and taste it and tell me what it reminded her of... She wasn't very confident about picking out flavors, and she'd never had a wine that was bretty. She took one smell, screwed up her eyes oddly, looked at me, and said "horse sh*t!"


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