This sauvignon blanc captures wine’s flavor dimension in an eye-catching bottle

Is wine art? It is surely art for the nose. We may think of wine appreciation as “wine tasting,” but the nuances of wine’s flavor are technically olfactory sensations. Indeed, no other sense can fully convey wine’s layers of nuance and complexity.

Tastebuds can detect only five rudimentary signals on contact, mainly sweetness, saltiness, sourness, and bitterness, and umami. Almost everything else we think of as familiar flavors vanilla and chocolate, coffee and tea, lemon and lime – are not tasted, but rather smelled through a cluster of olfactory nerves located near the sinuses. An aroma will register as an odor if it arrives through the nostrils from an external source, as when we sniff wine in our glass. If those same scents come from the other direction though, rising into the nasal passages from the back of the mouth when we take a sip, the sensation registers as a flavor instead.

Wine’s most distinctive and diverse sensations all fall in the olfactory realm, and due to a strange quirk of chemistry, wines almost never smell overtly of grapes. The fermentation process acts like a prism, transforming one-dimensional grape flavors into an olfactory rainbow that includes all sorts of fruits and berries, but also accents of herbs, spices, flowers, and more.

There is no better line of wines to choose to illustrate this “altered dimension” of flavor in wine than this line of trippy bottles from Washington. While the name surely refers to the eye-catching packaging, designed to conjure the immersive visual experience of a modern art installation, it also neatly reflects wine’s fundamental mystery, encouraging us to ponder how a liquid made entirely from green grapes like this one can convey non-grape flavors so vividly. Close your eyes. Take a sniff and then a sip to appreciate a fractal kaleidoscope of tropical fruit flavors like mango and kiwi, guava and passionfruit.

$14.99; 13.5% alcohol

PLCB Item #98377

Sale price through Jan. 31 – regularly $16.99

Also available at:

Canal’s Bottlestop in Marlton - $14.96

https://www.canalswine.com/