by Craig Winchell » Wed Sep 12, 2012 9:09 pm
Yes, these days all I hear is "minerality", on this forum too. And while there may be something that some people taste which is reminiscent to them of minerals, it doesn't come from minerals. We knew that back in Davis, when Ann Noble would be up in arms about the descriptor "mineral", among many descriptors she was up in arms about. she would ask which mineral, and the taster was invariably stumped, because in truth, people couldn't differentiate that far. OF course, to say that something smelled the way lichen on granite smells after a rain, one is differentiating olfactory sensations which may have a valid origin in the lichen. I have never tasted minerality personally, but I have tasted what I think might have been described by other tasters as "minerality", and which I perceived differently. I would be hard pressed, however, to be certain, because we have no common ground for descriptional vocabulary.