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Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

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BMcKenney

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Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by BMcKenney » Wed Mar 05, 2008 9:56 pm

I checked the lexicon lookup and did not find these two terms that I have seen used often. I know bricking is a visual thing, and spoofy is a palate thing, but I can't figure out what they mean.

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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Dale Williams » Wed Mar 05, 2008 10:10 pm

Bricking is when a red wine's color (often just around edges) changes as it ages to a bit browner/oranger (like house bricks)

Spoofy is short for spoofulated, a non-technical term to refer to a wine that the taster feels is faked/tarted up. For non-traditional wines, usually means very ripe and often very oaked. Implies a lot of technology involved, though that's not a guarantee of actual production methods.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by David Creighton » Wed Mar 05, 2008 10:16 pm

hey dale, your dealing with a near virgin here - can't you make this stuff sound a little more romantic?
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Bob Parsons Alberta » Wed Mar 05, 2008 11:33 pm

Dale could organise Betsy to play some nice cello music for you!! Sort of background ambiance?
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by BMcKenney » Thu Mar 06, 2008 2:12 am

David Creighton wrote:hey dale, your dealing with a near virgin here - can't you make this stuff sound a little more romantic?


I'm a cellar rat and hardly a virgin.

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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by David M. Bueker » Thu Mar 06, 2008 8:31 am

Actually to get the full feeling for "spoofy" you need to have it explained by Manuel & Otto in harmony while drinking a mixed flight of California Pinot Noir and Right Bank Bordeaux. :twisted:

Just my 2 cents though, spoofy to me is not nearly as critical a term as the full spoofulated. When I see spoofy it gives me the impression of a little too much makeup. When I see the full term of spoofulated I get the impression of a full botox treatment plus Tammy Faye Baker makeup. :shock:
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Steve Slatcher » Thu Mar 06, 2008 9:21 am

Dale Williams wrote:Bricking is when a red wine's color (often just around edges) changes as it ages to a bit browner/oranger (like house bricks).

Exactly. But like a lot of other wine terms, I suspect people have different ideas about what colour a brick should be. I can sort of imagine a "standard brick colour", but bricks have the colour of the clay they are made from, and in England can very from light beige to a very dark red. And that's before you even start to consider blue engineering bricks :)
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Doug Surplus » Thu Mar 06, 2008 9:30 am

David M. Bueker wrote:
When I see spoofy it gives me the impression of a little too much makeup. When I see the full term of spoofulated I get the impression of a full botox treatment plus Tammy Faye Baker makeup. :shock:


Great definition David. I may borrow it sometime to explain this to my non-wine-geek family and friends.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 9:54 am

David M. Bueker wrote:Actually to get the full feeling for "spoofy" you need to have it explained by Manuel & Otto in harmony while drinking a mixed flight of California Pinot Noir and Right Bank Bordeaux. :twisted:

Just my 2 cents though, spoofy to me is not nearly as critical a term as the full spoofulated. When I see spoofy it gives me the impression of a little too much makeup. When I see the full term of spoofulated I get the impression of a full botox treatment plus Tammy Faye Baker makeup. :shock:


La-la-la-la-la-la-laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...

While Otto gets here, let me do a few warm-up riffs on this spoofy thing.

I agree that "spoofy" could be construed as somewhat more benevolent than the proper term "spooflated". Somehow "spoofy" could be used to mean "spoofulatedesque" or "to a degree in the manner of the spoofulated". I would have trouble using it as a term of endearment, but can see it happening, particularly in the hands of my friend Chris Coad.

Now, to "Spoofulated". This refers to "wine" products in which a "flavor profile" is attained or maintained through technological means which mess with the natural properties of the wine, as it would have resulted had nature been allowed to keep its course. It is usually unhealthy wines which need bolstering through spoofulation. By unhealthy I mean, of course, absurdly overripe or otherwise structurally compromised. Of course, one can also spoofulate a mean, green little thing, but mean, green little things don't happen that often these days.

Methods of spoofulation are wide-ranging. They start with commercial super-yeasts intended to deal with the exaggerated sugar levels of absurdly overripe grapes. You can also use any number of lap-generated enzymes to "potentiate" (I swear, people actually use that friggin' word) aromas and flavors. And then there are those wonderful processes, reverse osmosis, electrodyalisis (or whatever it's called; thank you Alice Feiring for complicating my life further and making me read up on this crap...), spinning cones, etc. And there are commercially available additives like the infamous Mega Purple, or those funny liquid oak tannins that have a name like a hair-growth product. And there's also Michel Rolland's pet thingie to "round out" wines and make them supple to the point of utter flaccidity--micro-oxygenation. And let's not even get started on various acidifications, oak chips and all sorts of other wonderful stuff. The ways of the spoofulista are many and varied.

I must confess a certain perverse admiration of the cynicism of the enotrashionistas who peddle their spoofulated technoproducts as if they were "artisanal wines born of the love of our precious terroir", blablabla.

There you go. I've warmed up now. I hear someone asking: "Whatcha gonna play now?" And I reply "Whatsoever I playsas got to be FONKY".

Oh, and if I had my way and we lived in a better universe, bricking would be something one does to spoofulators.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by David M. Bueker » Thu Mar 06, 2008 9:57 am

Otto? Otto? it's time for your aria. :wink:

Seriously I agree with you Manuel (even if I do occasionally enjoy a spoofy wine on a Tuesday after a bad day at work).
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 10:08 am

David M. Bueker wrote:Otto? Otto? it's time for your aria. :wink:

Seriously I agree with you Manuel (even if I do occasionally enjoy a spoofy wine on a Tuesday after a bad day at work).



Aria? Hell no! That was a kicking guitar solo on one of the illest, fonkiest grooves EVAH! And now, Otto, on the one...

M.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Mark Lipton » Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:06 am

David M. Bueker wrote:Otto? Otto? it's time for your aria. :wink:

Seriously I agree with you Manuel (even if I do occasionally enjoy a spoofy wine on a Tuesday after a bad day at work).


No, what we now need is Clark Smith, singing basso profundo in the role of Mephistopheles, to "explain" to LL how all the techniques he cites (and more besides!) are actually used by scrupulous winemakers in the service of terroir and simply replace those unreliable methods of the ancients such as racking and bottle aging.

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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:56 am

Mark Lipton wrote:
David M. Bueker wrote:Otto? Otto? it's time for your aria. :wink:

Seriously I agree with you Manuel (even if I do occasionally enjoy a spoofy wine on a Tuesday after a bad day at work).


No, what we now need is Clark Smith, singing basso profundo in the role of Mephistopheles, to "explain" to LL how all the techniques he cites (and more besides!) are actually used by scrupulous winemakers in the service of terroir and simply replace those unreliable methods of the ancients such as racking and bottle aging.

Mark Lipton


Oh, I assume you mean Clark Smith interrupting my groovalicious funkfest and singing "I'm a little bit rock'n'roll" à la Donny Osmond...

Of coruse, there are many more techniques to be cited. I just didn't want to scare the newbies. I have been reformed.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by David M. Bueker » Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:57 am

Scare the Newbies: the latest sensation in internet-based, funk-rock bands.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 12:08 pm

David M. Bueker wrote:Scare the Newbies: the latest sensation in internet-based, funk-rock bands.


Well, "Newbie Massacre" was going to be the name of the punk salsa band I'm forming on the occasion of my midlife crisis. I shall play guitar.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Oswaldo Costa » Thu Mar 06, 2008 12:19 pm

Is chaptalizationg spoofing, spoofulating, or neither? :twisted:
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by David M. Bueker » Thu Mar 06, 2008 12:37 pm

As far as I am concerned, chaptalization is not a spoofing technique in certain instances (e.g. trying to get a Riesling QbA to 8% alcohol & enough body to avoid shrillness). If it's used to take a 13% wine to a higher level then perhaps yes, we may have entered spoofland.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 12:39 pm

Oswaldo Costa wrote:Is chaptalizationg spoofing, spoofulating, or neither? :twisted:


Ultra-purists see chaptalization as the original spoofulatory practice. Apologists of spoofulation often point to it to excuse their own doings as simply "today's equivalent of chaptalization". I'm not so sure I'm ready to put chaptalization in the same category as the addition of oak chips, liquid tannin, etc., or the various alcohol-removal-concentration technologies. But, given the choice, even if I can forgive chaptalization (I've had quite a few lovely wines that were chaptalized, something I can't say for RO or mechanical micro-ox or oak chips, or even acidulation), I'd rather drink unchaptalized.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Dan Donahue » Thu Mar 06, 2008 1:25 pm

One could argue that almost all European wine (any vines using American rootstock) is s.......d. My biggest problem with the term is that it often tends to close all intelligent discourse about the wine. Too many taste notes are nothing more than "I didn't like this wine, it is s........d" What help is that?


This liquid tannin thing is new to me. My guess is that its use is not likely to produce an enjoyable wine, which to me is the real issue.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Oswaldo Costa » Thu Mar 06, 2008 1:41 pm

Perhaps the ends justify the means, or the proof (the spoof?) is in the pudding...

Another very interesting "technique" that I don't think was mentioned here is the use of concentrators. In his reviews of Claude Marechal's 2000 and 2001 wines (respectively), Allen Meadows wrote some paragraphs that seem to the point (Robin, if you think this quote is a copyright violation, let me know and I'll remove):

"Like most vignerons in the Côte de Beaune, Claude Maréchale lamented both the necessity of discarding over 30% of the crop at harvest time but also the rotten luck of having the torrential rainstorms that hit just before harvest, exacerbating not only the rot but also swelling the grapes. However, as we tasted through his 2000s, they did not seem especially dilute or lacking in material; in fact, they seemed reasonably dense, very ripe and quite different from what I had tasted elsewhere over the course of the prior 2 weeks. Thus, I naturally posed the obvious question as to how this could be, given that Maréchale waited almost 10 days to harvest after the storm and consequently, there was ample time for the vines to have pumped the rain water to the grapes.

The answer lay in what is ever so slowly becoming a reality in Burgundy - a concentrator, or in this case, a reverse osmosis machine which removes "excess" water from the pre-fermented grape juice. Maréchale observed that when he harvested, he had on the order of 45 hl/ha (after discarding the 30% of rot tinged fruit) and around 54 hl/ha for the two Bourgogne wines. He estimates that the solid to liquid percentage was somewhere between 20 to 25%. The accepted ideal ratio is on the order of 1/3 solids to 2/3 liquid and that's exactly the proportion the use of his concentrator gave him according to his calculations.

The use of concentrators has become an increasingly controversial subject, particularly in Bordeaux (there are several methods of accomplishing this concentrating effect and reverse osmosis is only one of them). These machines are less common in Burgundy because they are very expensive and in order to justify the expense, it is usually necessary to amortize the cost over a large production, something few domaines in Burgundy are blessed with. Maréchale shares this particular machine with his brother and this is the approach that most in the region who have such machines have taken; for example, three of the four Gros exploitations share such a machine (Anne Gros does not use one).

In the face of my various questions, Maréchale argued passionately that all his approach did was simply to remove what Mother Nature had added at the last moment and nothing more. And in fairness, in an absolute sense his 2000s did not seem unduly pumped up though they struck me as atypical in the context of what other domaines had achieved with their 2000s.

The use of these machines, and others like them that essentially accomplish the same effect, e.g. produce wines that do not necessarily reflect accurately the vintage, raises all manner of philosophical questions. One can argue that the use of a saignée is essentially the same thing and is not only less precise but removes that portion of the must that is richest is sugar. Thus, the reasoning goes, is it any worse to use a concentrator versus bleeding off a portion of the must and then adding back the requisite sugar to achieve the desired degree of alcohol? This is a topic that will be explored further in the pages of Burghound.com in a future Issue but those of you who are curious about the effects of concentrators, I urge you to try the Maréchale 2000s. They are interesting wines and not freaks of nature but they are also not typical of the vintage."

"I noted in Issue 6 that Maréchale uses a concentrator but there is more to the story than this and it deserves a better explanation. Maréchale does indeed use one but in a rather specialized way compared to most domaines, who concentrate everything, sometimes with less than propitious outcomes. The Maréchale approach is to concentrate only the must that has been bled off through the saignée process and then he chaptalizes the original must with this now super sweet liquid; Maréchale is careful to note that if he employs the concentrated juice, he never adds sugar. In one sense, if one is going to concentrate at all, this approach makes perfect sense because the juice from a saignée almost always is richer in sugar than the remaining juice. The other advantage of course is that by separating the saignée juice cuvée by cuvée, the essentials of the underlying terroir are preserved as well. This may very well explain why Maréchale's last three vintages do not seem denatured and relatively pure compared to the wines of other domaines who have employed concentrators."
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 1:51 pm

Claude Maréchal? This scares the hell out of me...

I must call Dressner on this one. I found strange the spelling Allen uses repeatedly, "Maréchale". Could this be another domaine?
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Bill Buitenhuys » Thu Mar 06, 2008 2:21 pm

Manuel Camblor wrote:. I shall play guitar.
Not Vernon Reid? Blood Ulmer? Come on. I thought you were after some serious ass kicking here. :twisted:
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Manuel Camblor » Thu Mar 06, 2008 2:29 pm

Perhaps Prince. Reid is unavailable.
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Re: Terms: Bricking and Spoofy

by Ian Sutton » Thu Mar 06, 2008 3:16 pm

FWIW I tend not to use the term 'bricking', as, I see the faded colour at the rim different depending on the wine/grape. Nebbiolo wines are often more of an orange colour at the rim when aged, so bricking would be a misleading term.

It's shorthand, which I can understand and have no problem with others using the term - it's just not for me.

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