Wineology Q & A From Wine and Jazz Magazine: www.wineandjazz.com
What Is The Proper Way To Taste and Evaluate WIne?
To give a wine a fair evaluation just utilize your senses of sight, smell, taste and touch and follow a few simple “rules.”
Use a medium-size, tulip-shaped tasting glass that is clean and free of musty odors or detergent smell and make sure that your own perfume or cologne does not interfere with the wine’s aroma. Also, begin with a neutral palate. This means not having a strong residue of taste from food, coffee, breath mints, gum, toothpaste or candy. Any of these will give a false impression of the wine’s flavor and character.
Fill the glass about a third of the way. Then, tilt the glass and observe the wine’s appearance against a white background, noting its color, depth of color, and clarity. Young red wines will be more deep purple than red. After aging a few years, it becomes more ruby-like. With age of 10 to 20 years, or more, the depth actually lightens a little, and the color takes on a tinge of brown around the edge. With white wines, the transition is different. Young white wines will be very pale, maybe even with a greenish hue. As white wines age to near 10 years and older, the color deepens to a golden yellow.
Now, grab the stem of the glass with the base flat on the table and swirl it in small circles. This aerates the wine, letting oxygen mix in and bring out all of its natural aromas and flavors. Take three to four short sniffs inside the glass, pull away from the glass and think about what you just smelled. Ask yourself whether the wine smelled “clean.” By this I mean that it has no obvious faults. If you drink wine on a regular basis, a bad wine with aromas that are “off” will stick out immediately.
Take the first sip of the wine. You can swish the wine around in your mouth to take in its full effect, or suck in some air, in a slurping sound, in order to evoke more flavor. Whatever method you choose, the important thing is to concentrate on your first impressions of flavor, weight and texture. Think in broad terms first, then narrow down your impressions. Some broad questions are “Is the wine light, medium, or full body?” “Is it sweet or dry?” “Crisp or round?”
Take another sip and narrow down your impressions a little further. Are the fruit flavors light, like cherry, or more concentrated with dark fruits like black cherry? Are there additional impressions of texture from tannins, which give red wine its drying, mouth-puckering effect? Use whatever words come to you to describe what you taste. There are no right or wrong answers when it comes to tasting wines. Your own impressions count more than what others think.
What conclusions can you draw about the wine you’ve just tasted? Is it pleasing, but ordinary? Is it unique, but not your style? Another question to ask yourself is whether or not you would recommend the wine to other wine lovers. Also important, is whether you think the wine is worth its price.
It takes some effort to expand your wine experience to a wide variety of wines. It can be expensive, too, especially if you are purchasing bottles of wine just for tasting purposes, not being certain that you’ll even like the wine. But you can make it entertaining and learn a lot in the process. Just remember to use all the senses--including when you hear the sound of a popped cork. Let the fun begin.
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