One of our ‘family stories’ tells the tale of how it was I came home from university one year and was picked up at the station, as ever, by my dad. I threw my stuff in the boot, got into the passenger seat and chatted about this and that most of the way home.

About 20 minutes into the journey my dad asked if I’d noticed anything different. I looked around, checked he hadn’t lost two stone that I’d missed and said no.

It transpired that my dad was driving a brand new car. Notable in that we’d had the previous one for the best part of my entire teenage life. It was a different colour, style… everything really. Problem was, I wasn’t interested in cars, at all. For me they are a means of getting from a to b and that’s about it. So, I read the news that at a blind wine tasting at the recent Edinburgh Science Festival members of the public were only able to differentiate between ‘cheap’ and ‘expensive’ wines 50 per cent of the time with a touch of suspicion.

Lead researcher, psychologist Professor Richard Wiseman, said: “These are remarkable results. People were unable to tell expensive from inexpensive wines, and so in these times of financial hardship the message is clear — the inexpensive wines we tested tasted the same as their expensive counterparts.”

Well yes, it’s one argument. Of course, there is a fair assumption that more expensive means better quality. It should and it can, but there are other factors to take into consideration.

Some bottles at say £30 (which was the price of some included in the tasting) may have been made for long-term cellaring and perhaps weren’t opened at the appropriate time. Other wines are very much made to be drunk with food and have the acidity and tannin profile to make them successful in that role. These wines are not likely to show well in such a tasting.

Also, ‘cheaper’ wines have a tendency to be ‘sweeter’ in style, making them more immediately appealing and accessible.

For less-experienced wine drinkers, these wines often prove the most forward and easy to appreciate.

Studies such as these are frustrating because they don’t encourage people to take the time to consider and appreciate the wine in front of them. They also push consumers to demand wines at a barely realistic price.

In all the years that I have been leading tutored wine tastings I have met only a handful of people who, when presented with two wines at opposing ends of the quality spectrum, have been unable to tell them apart. It’s not to say that a less-expensive wine cannot be an enjoyable wine, but let’s not leap to conclusions about them ‘tasting the same’ as those at the more premium end of the market.

As I’ve gotten older I have started to appreciate nicer cars and I do enjoy a journey in something a bit sporty . . . That’s the result of being married to a car nut.

Meantime, I think it’s fair to say that he’s acquired a slightly more discerning palate over the years.