"Over the next few weeks, I will be teaching you how to taste wine like a professional. It is done by a series of exercises. For example, when you learn to play the piano you have to learn scales. The method in winetasting is known as the systematic approach to tasting and all professionals use this. It allows you to enjoy your glass of wine more and gives you wings to find out why we all love vino!
This week we will cover SIGHT, DEPTH and VISCOSITY
Sight
The appearance of a wine is an essential part of the experience of wine tasting and you should make time to observe what you are about to drink so that it is a more enjoyable journey of appreciation. It is very much part of the pleasure of drinking it. The brilliance and colour immediately offer us a mouthwatering prospect. However, appearance offers us little about the quality or flavour or even if we like it
Depth
It is the degree of colour in the wine and is much easier to see from above by looking down into the glass. if you are drinking sparkling wine then you will be observing carbon dioxide or bubbles!
Viscosity
Oh, the tears of the wine! or the legs form on the side of the glass as a result of alcoholic evaporation. They are related to alcoholic strength and sugar content. While they are interesting to observe they tell you little. It is your palate that will reveal all! The best way to look at your wine is by tilting the glass against a white sheet of paper. Remember always to hold your wine glass by the stem and not the bowl of the glass as that interferes with its temperature and clarity.
What you should know is that the flesh of almost all grapes is clear and that the colour of the wine comes from the skins and the time it has spent in contact. Colour in red wine comes from a group of pigmented chemical compounds called polyphenols found on the skin of the grape. The two important groups are anthocyanins and tannins. On the whole, we prefer to see dark coloured red wines because they promise taste sensations. However, it is not always the case. The colour of white wine increases with age as a result of both polymerisation and oxidation. Sweet wines from nobly rotten grapes are often deep gold, to begin with. Any hint of dullness or excess colour in white wine will prejudice us against it before we start.
Next week I will cover SNIFFING the wine and SLURPING the wine, the most important part of wine tasting.
I hope you have a wonderful weekend and enjoy learning a little background to winetasting so that you may enjoy all the gorgeous wines Bring Me Vino Direct offers you specially selected wines direct from the vineyard to your home."
Maggy Smith
Dip. WSET
Check out our entire wine collection here or if you feel adventurous let Bring Me Vino Direct’s Tom Smith select wines for you from Tom’s Mystery Wine Cases.