First Wine Tasting

[NeroW]

Hello everyone--now don't start laughing at me--

First, a disclaimer:

I am new, young, and learning. You all seem to know a ton, and I want to pick some brains. I would really appreciate any and all input. I searched the wine forum for a prior thread on this and could not find one, perhaps because I am the only person shameless enough to admit to the following:

In a few weeks I am attending my first wine tasting.

We only really have one knowledgable proprietor of wines in this college beertown, and she is a family friend. It is one of her tastings. I'm very excited. Truthfully, I still get excited to be of Legal Age, but that's fading. C'est la vie. The distributor/importer Herb Boheim (not that you would have heard of him, he's a local) is bringing six selections from his portfolio.

Couple questions--

What should I eat or not eat on that day? I don't know very much about what foods would interfere with

the tasting. I've heard that I should avoid coffee: is this true? I plan on standing by the wall and not opening my mouth period, except to taste, but what questions should I be secretly burning to ask? What should I be listening and looking for?

Also, what about your first wine tasting? What did you taste, where was it, what do you remember most about it? This is my secret motivation for starting this thread: I'd love to hear your stories and be thinking of them when I go to my first tasting.

Thank you in advance!

[Robin Meredith]

Everyone else will undoubtedly tell you this, but first off, relax and have fun...

You can eat or drink whatever you want that day, but it might not be a bad idea to lay off coffee for an hour or so before the tasting. The biggest danger often lies in food offered with the tasting. I never cease to be amazed by people who put on tastings to try to sell their wines and then surround them with inappropriate snacks. For me, 90%+ of all cheeses will negatively impact any red wine they are served with, and while the odds are slightly better with white wines they are still not in your favor.

Anything even remotely sweet should be avoided like the plague (I recall a winery tasting room I used to visit that always had bowls of slightly sweet crackers on the counter - I could never understand why they did that).

Getting to know the characteristics of specific grape varieties (Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, etc.) can be a valuable learning experiences for any novice wine drinker, so you may want to try to identify the grape varieties that are included in each of the wines you are tasting. This may not help you much at first, but over time you will begin to identify flavors and aromas that are unique to each variety.

Good luck!

[Kim WB]

Good for you!

Actually, it seems that the kind of wine tasting this is is rather relaxed,a nd it might be the BEST time to ask a lot of questions...especially if you preface them with an acknowledgement of your youth and enthusiasm!

As a general rule, wine producers, suppliers and those involved in the industry are helpful and really enthusiastic about their product, and the industry.

I don't know how close you live to Philly, but there is a tasting on May 1 atPenn's landing which, in the past, has been great. A bit crowded, but wonderful wineries have been there in the past, strong CA presence.

www.phillymag.com

[Rail Paul]

Have a good time. The sponsor is there to expose you to the wines they carry, and your job is to sample them. Some you'll like, some you won't like. You'll taste fresh fruit, smoky sensations, maybe some sweet, and prob a little of paint thinner.

If it's a basic tasting, you will likely have a few red wines and a few white wines. Your guide will prob describe a little about the wine, may tell you what tastes to look for (I don't like that approach), and ask you to compare it to a previously tasted wine.

If you're an analytical person, you might want to read ahead a few pages. One place is

Tasting Wine

Edited January 31, 2003 by Rail Paul (log)

[GordonCooks]

THE most important thing I ever learned before going to a large scale tasting was not about drinking - it was how to spit like a pro.

[JAZ]

No laughter from this quarter. I lived with a wine broker for several years, and although I wasn't a complete novice, I didn't know much about wine at the time we met. I went to a lot of tastings, and tried to fake it for a while, until I realized that I wasn't learning much that way. So I started asking tons of questions, and I ended up learning quite a bit. So here, for what it's worth, is some advice from someone who was once in your shoes.

First the logistics:

Probably best to avoid coffee, and also anything really sweet for the few hours right before the tasting. But make sure you eat something, preferably something with fat or oil in it, before you go. You might not think you're drinking much at a tasting, but you are, and if you do it on an empty stomach, you'll run the risk of getting drunk, which you probably don't want to do. If buckets for spitting are provided, don't be embarrassed to spit out a mouthful of wine if you want to drink less but still taste everything.

In between wines, eat a cracker or some bread if it's available. It'll help clear out the flavor from the previous wine, so you can taste the new one better. If you really want to concentrate on the wines, don't eat anything else while you're tasting. If there's food available, you can eat it afterward.

It sounds as if the tasting will be conducted by one person, who will pour the wines one at a time and talk about them. If that's not the case, and you can taste any wines in any order, start with whites and then move to reds.

As for the tasting procedure itself, start out by smelling the wine. If you swirl the glass a little, it will release the bouquet and aroma better. Try to think back in your memory bank of smells and tastes to see if the smell of the wine reminds you of anything. Vanilla? Melon? Berries? Grass? Metal? Don't stress out if you don't recognize any smells; sometimes they're very pronounced and sometimes they aren't, and it can take some practice to identify them even if they are there.

Tnen when you sip the wine, hold the wine in your mouth for a few seconds before swallowing. Some people audibly swish it around in the mouth, which is perfectly acceptable at a wine tasting. The point is, you want to give the flavors in the wine a chance to develop before you swallow it. I think you get more from a wine by taking several small sips rather than one big mouthful.

As for what you're tasting for, well, wines are fairly complex, but here are some of the main elements to taste for. Some of these are truly tastes and flavors, and some of them have to do with the texture or "mouthfeel" of the wine. (As an aside on the term "mouthfeel" -- I know it sounds pretentious and sort of off-color, but it's a very necessary term if you want to talk about wine, or food, for that matter. All that's meant by it is the way a particular food or drink feels like on your mouth and tongue -- for example, does it feel heavy and viscous or light and "refreshing"?)

First off is fruit. The fruit flavors in white wines tend to be described in terms of melons, apples, or peaches; the fruit in red wines tends to be in the berry, plum and cherry families. (Oddly enough, people never describe wine as tasting like grapes. Go figure.) These sorts of fruity flavors in wine, if they're pronounced enough, can sometimes trick you into thinking that the wine is sweet, but sweetness is something else entirely.

Second is acid. Acidity will come across both as a taste and as an element of mouthfeel. Think of the difference between a Golden Delicious apple and a Granny Smith. That's acid. The acid in wine kicks your salivary glands into action, and if you're eating, it can cut through the mouth-coating quality of rich foods. And I'm talking in very broad generalities here, but acid is more of an issue in white wines than in reds, providing what is usually called "structure" to white wines. Wines with lots of acidity are described as "crisp;" those with insufficient acidity are deridingly called "flabby."

A third thing to look for is the tannins, present in red wines. The tannins in wine are what give it a bitter aftertaste if it has one; they also have an astringent quality (which is why sometimes drinking a red wine by itself seems to dry your mouth out). If you've ever had overbrewed tea, that's what tannins taste like. Tannins, like acid, also contribute to what wine people call "structure." Tannins come from the skins of the grapes and the wood the wines are aged in. Some white wines will pick up some tannin if they're aged in oak barrels, but nothing like the amount in red wines.

A fourth factor, speaking of oak barrels, is oak. Wines aged in oak take on some flavors from the wood. Any flavors you would describe as "toasted" or "roasted" or caramel or vanilla derive from being aged in oak.

Unless you're tasting dessert wines, true sweetness will probably not be something you'll taste. If you taste any Rieslings and Gewurstraminers, then they might be the style that's referred to as "off-dry," in which case you might detect a hint of sweetness.

Now, there are a lot of other flavors and textures to notice in wines, but these are some major characteristics that are relatively easy to pick out, so they're good for beginners to focus on.

The only way to get a real feeling for what these terms mean is to try wines that have these characteristics and remember what they taste like. That's where asking lots of questions comes in. As you taste the wines at your tasting, the wine guy will probably give you descriptions of what's there; he'll say those things you hear wine people say, like "a crisp wine with hints of apples and peaches and undertones of vanilla." If he doesn't, ask him. When I first started dating the wine broker and I got over my fear of seeming unsophisticated, I asked him to describe virtually every wine we tasted. After a while, I tried describing them myself and I found that I'd learned quite a lot. I remember the day we tasted a wine and I said, without even really thinking about it, "this wine is flabby" -- that was when I realized that I was finally getting it.

So, taste, ask questions, taste again, and then remember what you've tasted. Relax, and don't worry about being a beginner. Wine people (aside from the snobs and show-offs) love an interested beginner.

[Tonyfinch]

An Old Burgundian Introduction translated, (not by me) from the local patois.

Come here, boy so I can teach you

What you need to do to taste wine.

Are you ready? Knock the bung out.

First of all, and this is important,

You put the silver tastevin on your finger

Whose ring as it were betrothes you

To the metier you will stoutly undertake.

Plunge your pipette into the bung hole.

Right. Pour out the juice a bit askew.

And then look at it a moment.

Is it clear, hazy, or at least thick?

Halt there! I saw you starting to drink

You're hurrying like a horse dealer

Contemplate it in all its glory

Has it the colour of onion skin?

Before tasting it , it should please you

You should see it moving about, lively

Watered silk to the eye, like embers

You'll know the rest when you drink it.

Wait! You've still got to smell it

Let that great nose of yours have a look at it!

How does it appear?

Does it smell of grapes or vinegar?

Now yes, take a mouthful

Without swallowing it of course

Make it turn, make it move around

As one might say: Rinse your teeth!

There! Now swallow a mouthful so as to know

What it'll have to say when it's down below.

The merchants who pass, spit it out

You-drink it-it's not poison

That's not all.So there's no possible doubt

You let a moment slip by

You say nothing. You reflect! You listen to it

Afterwards you'll know how to talk about it.

It's not a question of saying, after that pause

Oh, it's capital!, what a bouquet!

For you to say that or anything else

You really must be full of your subject.

At the start you must have your wits about you

Pinot-Passe-tout-grains-Gamay?

Here I know you're no fool,

That you've an honest nose, and free,

But if it happens to be a bit sour?

Or if it needs resting

Or if it's young or if it's thin...

Lack of tannin, you say: that's a crafty one !

If it's good you clap your tongue

And say: this is good, loyal!...

There you are boy, out of mould

And from private soldier promoted Corporal!

[Beachfan]

My approach is fairly sensual, and not intellectual

1) Have fun

2) Pay attention to your senses

3) If you like cheese, by all means eat the cheese. A lot of people don't agree with the red wine is hurt by cheese theory. Decide for yourself.

4) Have fun

5) Eat beforehand

6) If the hors d'ouerves are good, eat them before they're gone.

7) Get a ride home

[David De Silva]

You are starting on a great and long journey of getting to know and appreciate one of the true treasures of life. Everyone started at the beginning like you and you are approaching wine with an open and honest attitude. Definitely go on a semi-full to full stomach so it doesn't go straight to your head. I usually don't spit but you may want to. Eating a cracker in between is good advice as is drinking some water to clear the palate. If you are ever in Philly there are some awesome wine tastings and wine dinners offered by Marnie Old (www.marnieold.com). I recently took her three part Italian course (my favorite wines) and it was interesting, informative and very yummy. Have fun and welcome to the world of wine.

[tommy]

swallow.

and if you're going to spit, it's a good idea to practice (at home) with water. purse the ol' lips and give it a good "pwwut".

[Suzanne F]

Robin Meredith, Beachfan, and David De Silva have it right: have fun. Keep an open mind, as well as an open palate and nose. Don't feel you have to talk "wine-speak" -- but DO comment about your reactions, in your own way -- you might be surprised how accurate you'll be. When you like something, think about WHY you like it; ditto when you don't -- all in your own terms. Assume that the other people there also want to learn, and probably also don't want to be thought idiots -- if you are willing to ask your questions, you'll allow EVERYONE to learn. This isn't about what they think about you, it's about what can you learn. Be brave. Have fun.

And remember that this is one learning experience that MUST be repeated over and over and over again. Because you'll never learn it all, but it sure is fun trying!