Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Snob Review

Somehow I came to own a copy of "The Wine Snob's Dictionary" (2008) by David Kamp and David Lynch. It's the kind of book you could read if you were waiting in a long check-out line. Some of the entries are kind of funny, though. A couple of examples:
Grip: Sensation ascribed to a wine with enough acidity and/or tannin that it seems to actually grab hold of the palate. Considered a good thing by Snobs. The '75 had powerhouse tannins and a marvelous grip at first, but it lost its resolve as it got more air.
Juice: Grating hipster term for wine, used especially in the San Francisco Bay Area, where younger, ostensibly hipper Snobs in the wine trade think that, by referring to wine as such, they are demystifying it for a grateful audience of Francophobes and reg'lar folk who will feel less intimidated if they think of wine as fermented grape juice. Except the very deployment of such insiderist terms serves only to intimidate civilians all over again.

... I love new words and slang as much as anyone, but I feel the need to keep this book around so I know which terms to avoid.


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