Jeremy Clarke Jeremy Clarke

My initiation into the fellowship of wine (I swallowed)

Things got off to a frosty start but by the seventh sampling the spirit was moving

issue 07 February 2015

This month’s wine club lecture was on red burgundy. The members were settling themselves at two large tables when I arrived, about ten to each one. I took an empty seat at the table farthest from the door and looked diffidently around, hoping to meet a welcoming eye. Not one. Presumably members were tired of sharing the mysteries of their deity with people who came only once, and they had evolved a wait-and-see policy.

Everyone had brought their own wine glass. There were glasses of every size and shape. Most had a notebook and biro also at the ready. The woman sitting directly opposite me now spoke to me accusingly. ‘Where’s your glass?’ she said. I shrugged at her. ‘Didn’t you read the flier? It clearly says to bring a glass and knife. You’ll have to go and ask that man over there if he can find you one.’ So I humbly went and asked the chap she had pointed out if I could borrow a wine glass. Without a word he went and got me one and handed it over in a deliberately non-judgmental manner.

I retook my seat and placed my borrowed wine glass on the table. For a wine glass it was very small. Beside the woman on my right’s gigantic goblet, it looked ridiculous. The lecturer, standing beside a counter with bottles lined up, then commenced to talk about our first red burgundy of the evening, and those with notebook and pen began scribbling. About the first wine I can remember only that it was a 2012 village burgundy. The lecturer was extremely knowledgable and spoke eloquently. He seemed to know the 2012 harvest grape by individual grape. Once, he became emotional and his speech faltered.

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