When you read the book as a love song to the cult of the sommelier, rather than a demystification of wine, the New York Times op-ed makes more sense. Cork Dork is a brilliant feat of screwball participatory journalism and Bianca Bosker is a gonzo nerd prodigy.

Also, when you’re at a restaurant, is it better if you pick your wine yourself, or if you ask the sommelier to pick it for you? It's important to note that you don't have to know a lot about wine or be a wine fanatic to enjoy this book (I'm not--I enjoy wine, appreciate it, and know what I like and don't like and that's about it it), but being a foodie or food lover helps. Her description was a lot like Cork Dork – a gorgeous, deliciously rendered little journey for my mind to follow along with that, when all is said and done, remained entirely Bosker’s.But Bianca Bosker’s book stands out as being spectacularly successful in teaching us about wine, in making us love wine, and in presenting a tone of unfailing good humor. An interesting look at those with an unquenchable thirst for those unique bottles of vinicultural perfection. At the end of this description, the student must declare a logical grape variety, region, quality level, and vintage. From endless blind tastings to sommelier competitions to scientists’ labs to the front end of New York’s fine-dining restaurants, Bosker takes us from the armpit of the wine industry to the science behind it.

To quote from the book, Bosker explains that a “flight” was no longer something related to a boarding pass. We drink wine, enjoy wine, and attend wine tastings when we get the chance, but liking and enjoying wine is far different than knowing wine. Bianca Bosker, previously a technology journalist, gave herself a year and a half to learn everything she could about wine in hopes of passing the Court of Master Sommeliers exam.

We use sustainable meats, dairy, and produce as the building blocks of our modern California cuisine. Bianca Bosker’s “Cork Dork: A Wine-Fueled Adventure Among the Obsessive Sommeliers, Big Bottle Hunters, and Rogue Scientists Who Taught Me to Live for Taste” is a compendium of bewitching and sometimes disgusting facts. In this delightfully written and keenly observed book, Bianca Bosker helps us become connoisseurs not only of wine but also of people whose passions would more aptly be described as obsessions.

She starts working as a server in a wine bar, and it's there that she meets the master sommelier, Aldo Sohm, who becomes her mentor. But what really makes this book come alive is Bosker's writing, lively and funny and blessedly masterful—something by no means guaranteed in a young tech reporter, and such a welcome relief.I really enjoyed the discussion of smell as a "forgotten" sense, and how other cultures, which rely more heavily on smell, can pick up faint odors that the standard American would completely overlook. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.

Along the way you'll meet the sort of obsessive types who are always interesting/amusing regardless of what they're obsessing over, go to suspense-filled sommelier competitions and bacchanalian, wine-soaked feasts, tag along with restaurant employees (something I always find fascinating), and learn all about the science of taste. Fascinating…Thanks to Bosker’s sensory descriptions, we get to taste and smell alongside her, without dealing with the thousands of hours of study and endless flashcards first.

Sommeliers are like those little birds that pick food particles off the teeth of crocodiles, the Long-Suffering Wife recently said during a discussion of this book. This is one of the most informative books that I have read this year, as well as one of the best written. The book is not only informative but also entertaining and written in a conversational style, making it easy to read and understand even for those who are not wine experts. More jester than savant, Harris and some others in here — like a somm who licks rocks — paint a pretentious, silly, self-obsessed, and, at times, straight-up loony picture of the profession.