Nurse the Hate: More WSET Diploma Blues

As I have discussed in my never ending quest for the WSET Diploma, the most difficult exam of the six is the test for “wine” in Unit 3.  The subject matter is so large that it’s almost impossible to cover everything within the realm of possibility.  I went with the strategy of hedging and did deep dives on some areas I felt that would be likely asked and had a more casual understanding of other areas.  For example, if someone wanted to discuss Barolo, I could have gone into mind numbing depth of soil contents, DOCG history and politics, barrel maturation regimes, key producers, climate impact, maybe even pulled off an interpretive dance to illustrate the struggle of the New Wave versus the Old Guard.  Meanwhile if I had been asked about New Zealand, I would have had as much information as a fanny pack tourist on a winery tour.  “Oh!  So you make white AND red wines here?  That’s fun!”

I passed that exam like I did most of my college courses.  It was an odd combination of basic grasp of the material with some random facts that had just lodged in my skull.  I just got lucky in what they asked me.  I pulled a question about the Ahr, a German wine region no one thinks about, but I just so happened to have gone through the area on tour and met a winemaker at a bar.  It’s like the line Clint Eastwood’s character gave in The Unforgiven.  “When it comes to killing folks, I’ve always been lucky.” 

While I was shocked I passed on my first attempt, my classmates and instructor were more stunned.  Most of the people I knew from that group, all of whom had spent a lifetime in the wine industry, failed at least one of the two parts of that test.  There was definitely a perception that I was some sort of wiseass clown that had no chance.  They didn’t know that I read voraciously and tend to remember what I read.  Well, that and I’ve always been lucky.  I still think many of them are sour about the fact that I passed.  I didn’t get the heartfelt “Congrats!!!” text when the group's consoling text messages went around inquiring about how we all did.  I know there was a separate thread which went “Can you fucking believe that dumbfuck passed and I failed?”.  That’s ok.  I would have been bitter too.

The exam was given again last week.  Most of the people I knew went to take it along with a new crop of people that were trying to storm that beach.  I was genuinely interested in how they did, as I hope they all pass.  Despite dire warnings from WSET HQ about revealing the test content, I was able to ferret out what the questions were on the test.  The WSET posted them last week which only confirms what I suspected.  There is no way in hell I would have passed that particular test.

Usually these tests can be counted on to follow a format of questions on major grapes or producing areas, a couple more secondary topics and then a curveball or two.  It makes sense that the test should focus on the wine regions and styles that people actually drink.  While it is cool in certain circles to be able to spout information about the Savoy, the chances of running into one of those wines for most humans that don’t walk into a hipster wine bar in a major cosmopolitan city or the fucking Savoy itself is about the same as seeing a pterodactyl fly past.  Hence, it is key to know about Bordeaux, Burgundy, Rioja, Barolo, Veneto, Rhone, Mosel, Chianti and probably Loire.  They will never ask you about Napa because the organization is British and the British refuse to admit the importance of this region.  The rest of North America has such a low profile, it might as well not exist in the program.  However, on this exam they really jammed everyone up.

That exam opened with a shot.  It was like Zeppelin walked out and belted out "Black Dog" as an opener.  It must have been quite a shock to open that exam and see the compulsory question about comparing and contrasting the relatively low profile Loire areas of Muscadet, Saumur, and the much more popular Sancerre.  I would have been in trouble.  Big trouble.  There were a few questions I could have handled, such as merlot, the Mosel and Languedoc.  Soil compositions in Bierzo?  In depth discussion of Hensche's Hill of Grace Vineyard Cabernet from Eden Valley in Australia?  Uh-oh.  

At this point I would have felt good to spot an American wine question.  That would have melted away quickly once I read this doozy though...  "With reference to the Americas, write about FIVE of the following: a) Wine production in New York State b) Carmenère c) Wine production in Mexico d) Pierce’s disease e) Wine production in Mendocino f) North American liquor monopolies g) Ice wine"  Ye Gods man!

Here's how I would have answered that one...  a)  New York wine production is focused on the Finger Lakes which makes good rieslings in a few places.  There's a shitload of faux quaint barns that churn out sugary sweet shit wine that they sell to nimrod tourists that don't know any better.  You can also buy some thin rieslings and spooky sweet wines made from grapes with Indian sounding names in the area around Lake Erie.  They cost as much as quality German wines that are usually cheaper, so I have no clue as to why anyone buys any of them.  b)  Carmenere is a grape grown by some of the Rhone Rangers.  They usually blend it in with Southern Rhone knock offs.  If they bottle it as a stand alone varietal, they discover that no one in California wants to buy a Carmenere for $26. They usually dump it onto the secondary market. c)  Wine production in Mexico is headed up by really rich guys in Mexico City that want to do a Mexican version of Napa.  They make some decent white wines around Baja that aren't so much "good" as "better than you expected".  Sometimes you get them poured for you in Cancun when you want something else better.  Visiting the vineyards can be fun as long as you don't get your head chopped off by Narcos.  No one wants to end their vacation as a headless corpse hanging off an overpass.   d)  Pierce's Disease was a plague that left tens of thousands of children without the use of their legs.  I think Pierce's Disease was largely eradicated after the Great Depression when kids had scurvy and rickets, but I might have it confused with something else.  It might be a disease of the vine.  It could be transmitted by a bug called the Glassy Winged Sharpshooter that looks like something you'd use as a dry fly in "A River Runs Through It" by the criminally underrated writer James Harrison.  e)  Medocino makes wine that isn't as good as Napa or Sonoma or Santa Barbara.  It's OK though.  There are a lot of hippies up there growing weed and home schooling their kids.  It's a good place to listen to Zappa records.  I think of Doug Sahm singing "Mendocino" with this question.  f)  The Man controls booze, just like in Prohibition.  What are you going to do?  It takes a shit ton of money to age a billion bottles of whiskey.  The government lobbyists will make sure no one can get in the market even if they can afford the cost of entry.  Welcome to the USA bitch!  g)  Ice wine is made primarily for people that go to the Niagara Falls area and don't know what souvenir to buy at the crummy shops by the border.  Ice wine tastes good but most bottles go unopened sitting on wine racks with Sutter Home and Amish fruit wines in senior citizens homes.  Once in awhile someone opens it at Christmas not knowing what it is and then remarks "Oh my gosh!  This is soooo sweet!".  They pour it out in the kitchen the next morning.   




I feel very confidently I would not have scored a "pass with merit" on those answers, regardless as to how correct they might have been.  Thank God I passed an earlier test.  Even gazing upon those questions would have shaken me to the core.  I learned earlier today that I passed the Fortified Wine exam I needed to retake after my well publicized flame out.  This leaves me with only one exam to go, sparkling wine.  I pray that Mexico isn't making sparkling wine that has met anyone's attention in London.  Worse yet, I hope they haven't believed their own hype in their fledgling overpriced English sparkling wine market and shoot out a lengthy question on that.  I don't want to have to go down in flames on that topic, though I will admit the wines are slightly better than you expect.  Like Mexico.

One to go.