What does wine smell like?
Flowers, strawberries, cherries, currants, apples, peaches; milk, butter, yogurt; leather, tobacco, wood; and so on, a long etcetera that we can fine-tune based on multiple variables.
If we ask a child what a wine smells like, he will give us a completely obvious answer: wine. Because it’s true, wine smells like wine. All the aromas and flavors that we find when tasting it are only associative memories. Depending on the variety, the production process, the area, a specific vineyard and other factors, a wine brings to mind certain objects, whether edible or not. Evocations, nothing more, that are associated with the characteristics of the wines and the production area. The pinot noir and the cherry; Gredos Grenache and strawberry; syrah and black olive… are some of the significant examples, because all grape varieties have an associated olfactory memory.
These memories can be very diverse and come from the most unexpected flowers or foods, but they all have an explanation. There are primary aromas, typical of the grape variety, that generically reflect floral and fruity notes; There are also secondary ones, which are typical of wine fermentation and give milky and yeast nuances; and there are tertiary ones, which are acquired through aging and aging, and provide roasted notes of wood, leather, coffee, toffee, tobacco, etc.
The smell box of a wine can be infinitive, because, in addition, each person forms their own record of it, which on many occasions will coincide with ours, although this will not necessarily be the case. There will always be someone who will discover some nuance that you had not noticed. Smells from the past, smells that transport us to lived moments, even smells of people. Because in the infinite world of aromatic notes there is room for an endless number of olfactory perceptions.