How to Use Food and Wine Jargon Without Sounding Pretentious

"Ah, this wine is steamy, racy and upside-down. Oh, and with a great nose!"

It's one thing to hear a genuine oenologist make this statement. It's another thing entirely to hear it from someone who just finished Wine For Dummies and now mistakes himself for an expert.


The problem with wine and food (and, for that matter, classical music and art), is that the sensations and experiences of these disciplines are extremely difficult to describe in plain English. Thus, each discipline naturally develops its own specialized jargon as shorthand for difficult-to-explain concepts.

There's more. Jargon can be a useful signalling device (a doctor can easily reveal himself to another doctor by tossing off a few key technical terms and phrases), and jargon can act as a barrier to a profession (lawyers create a comprehension barrier around their field by using a sort of shadow language of terms and expressions). At its worst, jargon can allow two insiders to have an entire conversation in front of an outsider without the outsider comprehending a single word (think two doctors discussing your case in front of you as if you aren't even there).

Food and wine, however, are different. After all, everybody eats, many of us drink, and most of us are on a mission to learn more about what we're eating and drinking. So it's inevitable that we'll pick up at least some eating and drinking terms, if only to help us talk about what we're experiencing.

But there's a distinct line between discussing a subject and slinging jargon like a sanctimonious blowhard. Which reminds me of a former Wall Street colleague named Bentley*, who, in the few short years I knew him, gave me a lifetime's worth of amusing food and wine snob stories.

Within days of deciding that he wanted to become an expert in wine, Bentley began asking for the "head sommelier" at all of his business dinners. He'd then sling ten minutes' worth of inaccurately-used jargon at the poor sommelier, oblivious to the wincing of everyone around him--including the wincing of the sommelier himself, who would be a fool in any event to correct a customer on an expense-account meal. At long last, Bentley would invariably select the most expensive wine on the menu, leading us all to wonder: why ask for a sommelier's help when you knew you what you were going to pick all along?

So, when in the company of friends, family or colleagues, how can we discuss food and wine intelligently without sounding pretentious? Here are a few ideas:

1) If you're the only person at the table slinging jargon, you're being pretentious. It doesn't matter if you're being insightful, it doesn't matter if you use every term correctly, and it doesn't matter if you're absolutely right about everything you say. Just stop.

2) Read the people around you. If you think you might be at a higher food or wine "level" than the people you're with, cut way back on the jargon and terminology. Don't create a situation where the people you're talking to can't understand what you're talking about.

3) Listen. Let others speak and share their experiences, thoughts and preferences. You might be surprised at how much you learn.

4) Ask questions, don't hold forth. Ask other people around you what they think about what they are eating and drinking. Help out by getting the conversation going, and don't expect to be in the center of it.

5) Finally, you can always use finger quotes and a self-deprecating tone of voice whenever you find yourself forced to use a jargon term. After all, finger quotes are the cure for everything, aren't they?

Readers, what else would you add? And do you have a favorite wine- or food-snob story to share?

* Note: Bentley is not (quite) a real person. He's a composite of several people I knew from my Wall Street years, and for obvious reasons I've completely disguised his identity--after all, Wall Street is smaller than you might think.

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5 comments:

Unknown said...

Oh, I can be guilty of this. I've toned it down a lot since we had kids, though. It's tough to be a wine snob when all you can afford is good wine, not expensive wine.

My mom would disagree; she still gives me a hard time about being a wine snob. Of course, it's because I give her a hard time about her jug of room temperature Chardonnay.

I try to remind myself that what matters is drinking what you like. But room temperature Chardonnay crosses some sort of line for me.

MikeV
DadCooksDinner

Daniel said...

For me it depends how badly I want something to drink. If I'm desperate and a glass of room temperature Chardonnay is all that's available, a glass of room temperature Chardonnay will do. We can have very low standards here when necessary. :)

Thanks for reading.

DK

chacha1 said...

I've been known to drop an ice cube in a white or rose that was incompletely chilled ... needs must when the devil drives!

Little Les said...

#1-5 are great guidelines for most all social situations and discussion topics!

Lisa@ButteryBooks said...

Great post, a must read my all wine-snobs. But please no finger quotes! For me, that is the absolute worse thing a person can do with their hands :)