Bean sprouts in the nose of a red wine

As I have previously blogged (1 2 3), sometimes we identify the most amazing smells on the nose of the wine. Although WSET and other teaching authorities restrict the vocabulary with which one can describe the nose of a wine, to standardize the language in order that communication be efficient, one need not have such inhibitions when one wants to make notes to record how one found a certain wine at a tasting.

The surprise this time is something quite incongruous - the smell of soy bean sprouts in an Australian wine blended from Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz and a small percentage of Merlot. Perhaps it would do well to remind people that there are two sorts of bean sprouts in Chinese cuisine, one sprouted from soy beans and the other from mung beans. The latter is the one which is often used (minus bean or husk) in stir fries. The soy bean sprouts are larger and is always sold with the yellow seeds on top of the sprouts. It is this latter, with its associated whiff of soy beans that was detected in this Cab Shiraz (with a sprinkle of Merlot).