Problems detecting Aroma.

As a wine newbie, I've become distraught by the fact that I don't pick up much of anything when smelling a wine. Most notably, the only scent I detect in a Sauvignon Blanc or a Chardonnay is the rubber found in the soles of a pair of Chuck Taylors. What actual scent might I be misinterpreting?

Hi Lyle,
You might have anosmia - a loss of ability to smell. Sauvignon blanc should be reeking of fruit (well, a kiwi sauv blanc would be). And chardonnay can smell of so many things - e.g. peaches and cream, butter biscuits, oak, vanilla, citrus - it really depends on where it comes from and how it is made.
Do you have difficulty smelling other things besides wine?

Like anything it takes practice. As a novice myself I can't really help you [I smell a distinctive aroma and go "I've smelt that before" and can't figure out what it is].

They sell kits to help "study" smells to help you identify them, might be worth trying out.

Hi Lyle,
You might have anosmia - a loss of ability to smell. Sauvignon blanc should be reeking of fruit (well, a kiwi sauv blanc would be). And chardonnay can smell of so many things - e.g. peaches and cream, butter biscuits, oak, vanilla, citrus - it really depends on where it comes from and how it is made.
Do you have difficulty smelling other things besides wine?

No, in fact I often thought I had an acute sense of smell. My fiancee complains that I smell too much; I often bug her with the likes of "Hey honey, is it just me, or do you smell gym socks?" or "Where's that milky odor coming from?"

I suppose practice makes perfect. In the meantime, what am I mistaking for rubber?

HI.

I have had the same problem, but it comes with practice. In fact, I wrote an article about it in my blog, http://www.neovino.blogspot.com

Check it out

Lyle, practice, practice, practice. MRI studies have shown that you can improve your ability to detect a scent by smelling other members of the class. See for example this article about a study at Northwestern University.


Those who had experience with a floral smell became able to differentiate between a variety of different floral smells.

Those who experienced minty, alcohol-based, or ketone-based smells became experts in those categories.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), the researchers found that this passive learning changed the way the scent centers of the brain responded to smells.

The conclusion: "Information about an odor is not static or fixed within these [brain] regions, but is highly malleable and can be rapidly updated" by smelling experience, says study researcher Wen Li, in the news release.

And here's a report on how one person applied the study to identifying wines.

Several years ago I bought a kit with 54 different scents -- practicing with the scents greatly enhanced my ability to enjoy wine.

Regards, Bob

Hi Lyle,
You might have anosmia - a loss of ability to smell. Sauvignon blanc should be reeking of fruit (well, a kiwi sauv blanc would be). And chardonnay can smell of so many things - e.g. peaches and cream, butter biscuits, oak, vanilla, citrus - it really depends on where it comes from and how it is made.
Do you have difficulty smelling other things besides wine?

No, in fact I often thought I had an acute sense of smell. My fiancee complains that I smell too much; I often bug her with the likes of "Hey honey, is it just me, or do you smell gym socks?" or "Where's that milky odor coming from?"

I suppose practice makes perfect. In the meantime, what am I mistaking for rubber?

Lyle,
When I first started 'appreciating' wine, everyone used to say that chardonnay smelled of peaches. I could never get it, not until I started nose training (by accident, mind you). You see I went into a shop that sold perfumed soaps of all kinds, including fruit soaps, and started smelling them to see which one I liked. When I smelt the 'peach' soap it clicked. It smelt exactly like the peachy chardonnay we had had in class!
So you have to start some nose training sessions.
As for what you are mistaking for rubber - not sure. I often get a rubbery whiff on hot climate wines.
Cheers,
Sue

Lyle,

One of the problems with this kind of thing is that smelling wine (and tasting it) often is a process that requires recall of other experiences in order to place the smell or taste. So, unless you have experienced a certain smell, you may not so much miss it in the wine, but you may not have the means to identify it.

As for that "rubber." The other problem with these things is that what some people say they smell others may not smell. What you smell might be so close to something that you do recall that you grab onto that as your descriptor while someone else might have a separate experience for the same wine.

In short: experience and constant practice is the key.

There are kits and wheels and such to help people identify smells in wine--I have experienced them, but I suspect they become more like crutches rather than right-on descriptors. But that is my opinion--it is not a rule. Besides, I enjoy the personal hunt.

Make sure you're using decent glasses. It makes a huge difference.

Make sure the wines are the right temperature; white wines that are straight from a cold fridge will sometimes seem 'stunned' but improve when they warm up.

No, in fact I often thought I had an acute sense of smell. My fiancee complains that I smell too much; I often bug her with the likes of "Hey honey, is it just me, or do you smell gym socks?" or "Where's that milky odor coming from?"

Beyond a lack of smell, another problem that some people face is the issue of organoleptic memory (how easily you can associate a smell with a memory of when you've previously encountered that smell). From the way you describe your behavior, though, it doesn't sound like you suffer from either problem.

I suppose practice makes perfect. In the meantime, what am I mistaking for rubber?

It could be sulfur. New rubber tends to smell of thiols (sulfur-containing organic molecules) and some wines contain low levels of similar molecules. That's just a guess, mind you, but my wife is very, very sensitive to sulfur and can often detect it in wines that smell and taste just fine to me.

Mark Lipton

I also have this nose issue, every wine smells like Tomatoes to me. ha ha. A good thing to remember is that for a wine to give off certain smells, it doesn't necessarily mean that they put that certain fruit, or something in the wine. Somehow there is a chemical reaction that occurs and emulates this certain smell. I.E. there doesn't have to be a nike shoe in your bottle of wine for you to smell it in there. Right?

Now, a question for some of you Nose proficient people.

What is a good list of fruits or smells to become familiar with? maybe a quick trip to the supermarket will help us nose nimkampoops with our issue.

Thanks for your help.
Joe

There are some aromas that you have to track down to understand. Many years ago I noticed that people were using the terms "black current" and "cassis" to describe the aromas in Cabernet Sauvignon. I could not associate those terms with anything I was familiar with. Found out the cassis is a liqueur made with black currents. Finding a bottle of cassis proved a little more difficult than finding a jar of English Black Current jam. That did the trick.

I'm sure there are a lot of other terms that winos thow around that are unfamiliar to others. When we encounter them, we either have to track down the source as above, or make up our own terms. The latter may make your WTNs a little difficult to decypher, but at least you will know what you are talking about.

I also have this nose issue, every wine smells like Tomatoes to me. ha ha. A good thing to remember is that for a wine to give off certain smells, it doesn't necessarily mean that they put that certain fruit, or something in the wine. Somehow there is a chemical reaction that occurs and emulates this certain smell. I.E. there doesn't have to be a nike shoe in your bottle of wine for you to smell it in there. Right?

Now, a question for some of you Nose proficient people.

What is a good list of fruits or smells to become familiar with? maybe a quick trip to the supermarket will help us nose nimkampoops with our issue.

Thanks for your help.
Joe

Joe,

One of the best things to do is walk through the produce department and smell the fruits and vegetables--yes, some wine smells will remind of vegetables. You could do the smelling right there--and get those "looks" or you could buy various items and do it at home. I likied doing it in the store; got a lot of conversations started that way, and met some ladies too...I was younger then

Smell everything that comes into your reach. Be aware of smells. Tek deep breaths. The world around us is as much a palette of smells as it is colors. In fact, being aware of smells was one of the survival mechanisms of early humans--and still is when you go mushroom hunting, and such.

After fermentation, wine lets off a lot of aromas because of the components in grape juice and their reaction to fermentation, which adds new components and then stirs through chemical interactions.

It may just be that the chardonnay was too cold. Most of the whites I'm given to taste have just come out of a chiller; I warm them up with my hands, or try to find something else to do until they've warmed up a bit.

What everyone has said above is true; it's hard to describe blackcurrant if you've never smelled it. So find some fruit and sniff it! I was hiking in the Dordogne last May when I was suddenly struck by a common wine descriptor: "forest floor." Yeah, that's what it smells like! And you don't have to travel to France to have that kind of insight: Go into the kitchen and sniff honey, molasses, bay leaf, star anise, ground coffee, etc. All those aromas show up in wines.

There's something called a "wine essence kit" that provides you with little vials of wine component aromas. I know of one called "Le Nez du Vin," but I've never used it. They're expensive! A cheaper and admittedly less comprehensive way to learn wine aromas is to try the Tomasello fruit wines. There's 100% blackberry, 100% blueberry, 100% cherry, etc. They're quite accurate--better than the actual fruit itself, because they're fruit wines. And much more fun than sniffing a vial. I open a few of them once or twice a year to "reset" my nose and remind me exactly what the fruit aromas are like.

There are some aromas that you have to track down to understand. Many years ago I noticed that people were using the terms "black current" and "cassis" to describe the aromas in Cabernet Sauvignon. I could not associate those terms with anything I was familiar with. Found out the cassis is a liqueur made with black currents. Finding a bottle of cassis proved a little more difficult than finding a jar of English Black Current jam. That did the trick.

I do the same thing; really good jams will be very clear renditions of those fruit characteristics, which you can sometimes find very literally in wine. For example, to me some Barolos smell exactly like red currants, others very much like strawberries. I once had a Gruner Veltliner that smelled EXACTLY like Ruby Red grapefruit.

I like the idea of using jams. I am going to have to pay more attention to my nose than I have in the past.
Thanks for all of the great advice.

Joe A.