What A Patient Wine Drinker Always Nose

Although I hardly consider myself an expert on wine, I have had the privilege in the past 4 years of learning to appreciate German Rieslings. Aside from the trashy "Liebfrauenmilch" and "Michelsburg Piesporter" exported in mass to the US exist some excellent wines, particularly from the Mosel-Saar-Ruher and Franken regions. Recently I learned a valuable life lesson from partaking in an aged Beerenauslese. In our economically and societally conditioned drives for immediate satisfaction, we sometimes forget to stop and smell the alcohol.

After a summer living and studying in Trier and Karlsruhe in 2002, I purchased a 1993 bottle of Riesling Beerenauslese, grown at the Randersackerer Teufelskeller vineyard in the Franken region, and produced by Buergerspital in Würzburg. According to many experts on German wine, 1993 was the best vintage of the '90s. Instead of rashly opening the bottle when I returned to the states, I followed the suggestion of the wine merchant who sold it to me; I decided to wait a few more years. Interestingly, I had not intended to buy the 1993 Beerenauslese, but had expressed interest in a 1997 silver medal Auslese. However, when I returned to purchase the bottle a week later, it was gone. The merchant I had conversed with felt bad and recommended the '93, which he kindly parted with for the '97 price. He told me that in a few years the '93 would be "ein Wundergetraenk."

As a few friends and I celebrated our completion of master's degrees over the past year, for the first time I tasted a wine that I myself had deliberately aged. Not only did I marvel at the golden color the Riesling had turned and its elegant nose and finish, but I felt the reward of my own patience. Were I wealthy, I could open such a bottle any night. But on a graduate student salary, this self-made privilege stands unmatched. Now that California, Oregon, New York, and other regions of the US are cultivating internationally acclaimed wines, and more average Joes are learning to appreciate its delights following the success of _Sideways_, it's time we consider what benefits "aging" can have on our hectic schedules. Providing a hand and a bit of time into something otherwise pre-packaged for immediate consumption yields a priceless satisfaction no label can guarantee. As maxims like "quality over quantity" and "only time will tell" gradually lose their meaning in popular discourse, perhaps we can revisit these lessons in our own lives over a bottle of wine.