WTN: Joguet, Closel, SantaDuc, CroixLabrie, Taltarni, Pride

That's not answer! Come on down and I'll show you some good ole North Carolina hospitality (that's where I grew up). Except instead of white lightning (NC's liquor de rigueur) we'll have to have grappa.

For instance, California along with Australian wines tend to be big and oaky, but of course there are exceptions.

What Australian wines are you talking about?

The small percentage that get exported by the likes of the Grateful Palate and come from a relatively small area in South Eastern Australia with tons of oak, high alcohol and a style that Robert Parker considers singular and worthy of massive praise/high scores, or the stuff that's actually real Australian wine that you'll find on most liquor market shelves and in most wineries' tasting rooms if you actually went down there?

The Aussie wines that I have seen exported outside the country are nowhere near the quality or style of the wines most of us see locally down under there. Look up the notes that guys like David Lole and Graeme Gee have posted online, those are far more representative of the wines from Australia. Victoria produces all sorts of things from higher acid, lighter-styled Syrahs and Cabernet from the Yarra Valley, very elegant Pinots and Chardonnay from Mornington Peninsula, top quality sparklers as well as heavier Shiraz from the Heathcote and big fortifieds in the Rutherglen. (Not to mention some stunningly aromatic but lighter-styled reds and Rieslings from areas like the Grampians). Western Australis is producing some fantastic, structured Cabernets/Bdx blends that are hardly "big and oaky" in the warmer areas, and some great dry Rieslings from areas like Frankland, and Tasmania is hardly producing anything "big", with a whole lot of Riesling, Gewurz, Pinot and Sauvignon Blanc and bigger reds that are usually green as hell.

The exceptions you have in mind may be closer to the norm in other areas. Please don't generalize just based on a small segment of the market share that happens to be exported.

As I've said before - you can't generalize by a country. Australia, France, Italy etc are fairly large and diverse areas of land with a lot of different microclimates, varying grapes and styles of winemaking, and saying that one country tends to favour higher acid or "rounder" wines or another does "big and oaky" wines is ridiculously oversimplifying it to the point that the argument of "French wines" having different traits vs. "Italian wines" has very little merit.

Except instead of white lightning (NC's liquor de rigueur) we'll have to have grappa.

I've not had white lightening but I'm a big grappa fan.

If, on average, it can be said that Italian wine is more acid than French (a huge if, as Rahsaan points out, particularly given the more northernly French latitudes), the best explanation I've run into so far is that the widespread use of tomato sauce requires acidity if the wine is to survive the encounter.

[Jenise]

Now a wine from John: strawberry fruit leather, maple suyrup, oak-ness, dates...merlot? Yes, it had some in it, Spain? Priorat? Yes and yes: 2003 Scala Dei Priorat. Very good and at peak.

I have several cases of this wine and have never tasted strawberry fruit leather and maple syrup. Do you think this was an off bottle or an anomaly?

Drew

Drew, no, I don't think it was an off bottle--notice I thought it was a "very good" wine. But one thing I'm certain was at play was how the wines that came before it prepped my palate for what I (and the group, I write down their impressions when I agree with them) noticed about the wine. Al by itself and not following several drier wines, things might have seemed different. Also, this bottle might have been further ahead on the aging curve than yours--I think John keeps a passive cellar.

[Jenise]

As I've said before - you can't generalize by a country. Australia, France, Italy etc are fairly large and diverse areas of land with a lot of different microclimates, varying grapes and styles of winemaking, and saying that one country tends to favour higher acid or "rounder" wines or another does "big and oaky" wines is ridiculously oversimplifying it to the point that the argument of "French wines" having different traits vs. "Italian wines" has very little merit.

Salil, once upon a time I would have agreed with you, but now I don't. After tasting with Bill Spohn's lunch group for almost six years now, a group wherein there is no theme and all the wines are served blind, I have learned that certain sweeping generalizations have a great deal of merit. True, there are exceptions and some wines defy all attempts at categorization, and yes modern techniques in pursuit of Parker points has blurred a lot of the lines, but in the majority of cases the ability of this group of very experienced wine drinkers to quickly identify a wine as being from Italy vs. France vs North America vs South Africa vs Australia etc usually even before the grape has been identified because of certain traits common to each regardless of producer is impressive and has proven to me, beyond a shadow of doubt, that one can too generalize by country.

in the majority of cases the ability of this group of very experienced wine drinkers to quickly identify a wine as being from Italy vs. France vs North America vs South Africa vs Australia etc usually even before the grape has been identified because of certain traits common to each regardless of producer is impressive and has proven to me, beyond a shadow of doubt, that one can too generalize by country.

Maybe you folks are just that good!

Another explanation is that you are dealing with a fairly narrow band of wines from each country that makes it easier to mark that 'national' style.

Beyond that, there are clearly differences between wines from France and Italy, mainly because they use different grapes and have different terroir! Not a mystery. But I'm not sure that 'acidity' and 'roundness' is really one of those key differences.

And for the record, I think I sort of know what Agostino is talking about in terms of a bitter almond 'Italian' acidic note common to many wines across the north. But once one starts tasting more broadly it seems harder to hold onto these 'national' generalizations.

Salil, once upon a time I would have agreed with you, but now I don't. After tasting with Bill Spohn's lunch group for almost six years now, a group wherein there is no theme and all the wines are served blind, I have learned that certain sweeping generalizations have a great deal of merit. True, there are exceptions and some wines defy all attempts at categorization, and yes modern techniques in pursuit of Parker points has blurred a lot of the lines, but in the majority of cases the ability of this group of very experienced wine drinkers to quickly identify a wine as being from Italy vs. France vs North America vs South Africa vs Australia etc usually even before the grape has been identified because of certain traits common to each regardless of producer is impressive and has proven to me, beyond a shadow of doubt, that one can too generalize by country.

Thank you Jenise! You are my new best friend!

Yes, I wish I lived in Australia so I could find the hidden gems. Yes, in the US we get Australia's supermarket dregs. Bu there's no denying that all of Italy prefers a more subdued cuisine than in the US or Australia. Italy uses garlic, but it's a very subtle use of garlic - in the US the use of garlic gets magnified. And wine follows food. There's nothing to be ashamed about. It's called diversity. I'm sure Australian cuisine is influenced by Asia, being where it is. There's nothing wrong with that. Italians don't like like hot peppers, with some exceptions like the Abruzzo. But even in the Abruzzo I didn't see people slathering their food with hot sauce like I see in the US. There are undeniable differences between countries and thank goodness for that.

There are undeniable differences between countries and thank goodness for that.

I can see that we have different ontological perspectives so we'll just have to learn to live with that.

But again, I don't think that administrative borders are the best way to understand cuisine.

Instead, it seems that geography is more important for the broad contours. With of course the details coming from the history of culture, migration, civilization, etc.

But, within France and Italy it seems more relevant to distinguish between Alpine and Mediterranean cuisines than it does to speak of national cuisines. To make a first cut.

How about Nice? Administratively, it has been Italian and French so what does that make its food?

And however you want to classify it, it doesn't have much in common with Trento or Lille.

[Jenise]

Maybe you folks are just that good!

Make that them folks--I'm still learning.

Another explanation is that you are dealing with a fairly narrow band of wines from each country that makes it easier to mark that 'national' style.

That is in some ways true as this group has a clear preference for 'traditional' wines, but all the same I've seen them quickly unmask wines I and others occasionally bring because they're atypical and more often than not they're not fooled.

But I'm not sure that 'acidity' and 'roundness' is really one of those key differences.

Well, as I said, I certainly believe acidity is re Italy. 'Roundness' is another issue altogether--not a word I would have used to characterize French wines myself.