Wine Tasting Guide For Wine Newbies

Intimidated by all the sniffing, swirling, and swishing at a wine tasting? Relax. All wine connoisseurs started out just like you. Being a wine newbie, it would be great to learn the basics of wine tasting.

To master the wine tasting basics, there are three things that you have to consider: the wine’s appearance, smell and taste.

Appearance: Color and clarity

Tilt up your glass in front of a light then notice the color - it can indicate the wine’s age and freshness: A white wine’s greenish tinge indicates that the wine is young, while a brownish hue could mean that that wine is old or was not stored properly. For red wines, purplish tinge indicates that they are young while a deeper red color shows that they are old.

To assess the wine’s clarity, look at the glass from the side while holding it up. There should be no floating particles present. You may also look at the thin clear layer on the wine’s very top to make sure that it is free from any sediment.

Smell: Swirl and sniff

After checking the color and clarity, lift the glass to your nose to smell the wine. Remember this mantra: Swirl and sniff.

Swirl the wine around to release its aroma. Then take a long sniff. To guide you, here are the most common wine aroma:

• Woody – has a scent of wood
• Spicy – has a spicy or peppery scent
• Vinegary – has a smell similar to vinegar (not good)
• Metallic – this smell indicates contamination (not good also)
• Fruity – smells like ripe fruit or berries

Taste: Sip and swish

After pleasing your eyes and nose, it’s now time to taste. Take an initial small sip and then swish it around inside your mouth. Sip and swish. It’s okay if you wouldn’t notice anything. The first taste often serves as preparation for the full taste as it cleanse your palette.

Savor the wine on the second sip. To get a full taste, wash it around in your mouth. Exhale slowly after swallowing. Let the taste and aroma linger for a bit.

Enjoy the flavor and try to pick out all the different hints of taste in each wine. As you practice the basics of wine tasting, you will learn more about the characteristics of every wine.

A Wine Tasting at Home with Friends

For most people, they only get to go to wine tastings at certain special food and wine events or in vineyard tours. While these are perfect places to hold wine tastings, one wonders if bringing wine tastings closer to people especially if you have friends whom you want to introduce to the different nuances of wine or to new wines that you have encountered. But what to do if you can’t drag your friends over to vineyards or bring them to events? Why, hold a wine tasting in your home, of course.

Wine tasting works wonderfully well when you are introducing wine appreciation to people who want to start drinking wine or want to know more about it. It doesn’t even have to be particularly expensive since there are a lot of great-quality inexpensive wines. You can buy a sampling of these wines to introduce some close friends to the art of wine drinking and appreciation. You may want to choose the best wines from that low price point – and there are surprisingly great wines at unbelievable prices.

If you are already a wine drinker, you will already have the proper wine glasses to go with whatever wine you want to have a wine tasting for. Assuming you will only have a small group of friends over, your glassware will be enough. You will need to educate your visitors about the importance of using the right glass and stemware.

With regards to the actual wine tasting, there are three stages. First is its appearance. Characteristics such as color and clarity will have to be observed for both red and white wine varieties. What’s the color of the wine? For white wines, is it colorless, yellow, amber, etc? Is your red wine burgundy, purple, dark red, or almost brown? Assess the clarity by observing whether it is clear, cloudy, opaque, brilliant, etc.

Next comes the aroma of the wine. Before you taste the wine, you have to smell it first. Stick your nose down into your glass and inhale. Describe your first impressions. Is it woody or fruity? Sharp? Do you smell flowers or citrus? Different wines have different characteristics with regards to their aroma, and with practice you would be able to discern each more easily.

Finally, we now come to actually tasting the wine, but even this has three stages, namely: The attack, evolution, and finish.

The attack refers to your first impression upon the wine hitting your palate.

The evolution refers to the middle range phase, or mid-palate, and is the actual taste of the wine. In this stage you start to discern flavors — whether they are fruity, spicy, woody, etc. Do you taste herbs and flowers?

The finish is wine tasting’s final phase. In this stage you observe for the aftertaste or how long the flavor profile stays after you swallow it. You also assess the body of the wine, whether it is light-bodied like water, medium-bodied like milk, or even full-bodied like cream. This is called the mouth feel. You also want to observe for the last flavor impression and whether it lasts for a short or long time.

All these descriptions come together to become your overall impression and observation of a certain type of wine. You may want to write these observations down so you could come back to it later on. In time and with practice you’ll be able to compare different observations and describe different wines more easily based on the ones you have previously had.

Wine 101-Discover The Complexities Of Flavors While Wine Tasting

If you are a wine lover, you know that when it comes to tasting it, it can be difficult. . If you need to describe a wine, then you should break it down in categories as to how it tastes to you.  Many of us have been out to dinner with others and may have totally disagreed with what they thought about the taste of the wine.

When you taste wine a good idea is to put in context with other flavors, such as sweet apples, or sour grapes.  This will help you define it better to others. You also make want to give it a grade of one to ten, and use that as a descriptor. For example, if the wine has a strong flavor, give it a ten.  If it has a weaker flavor, give it a one.

You may want to consider if the wine is dry or sweet.  This can be a great way to help you describe a wine to others after tasting it.

When you think of the body of the wine, consider this analogy, the different varieties of milk.  For example, you may have whole milk, two percent, and one percent milk.  All three of these have different variations and textures.  So, when you taste your wine is it light, medium or heavy in texture.  This is a good component to add to your tasting description.

You may also wan to consider the oak component of the wine. Does the wine have any oak or wood in the taste?  Generally, you do not want a wine that is at either major extreme because it will have a strong affect on the taste of the wine.

Tannins are the lifelines of the wine and come from the skins and stems of the grapes. They can have a strong affect and on taste, can often have a drying feeling. A lot of tannins can often mean that the wine is “shut down” or “too young” and is hard to get a sense of what is really there, as it is overpowered by the tannins. This is very important that you have just the right balance to have the best taste.

Complexity is the last component of the taste mix. How many flavors do you get when you drink the wine?  If you only get one or two, it’s not complex at all.  If you get five or six, then it’s certainly leaning towards being a much more complex wine.

When you utilize all these components in your wine tasting, you should be able to give a thorough description of the wine to anyone who is interested.

Wine 101-Wine Tasting Tips For Beginners

There is a lot to know about wine. Wine tasting is a favored past time for many wine enthusiasts. You don’t have to be sophisticated to be a wine taster. In addition, it is easy to learn the basics about wine that will help you become a very good connoisseur.

Have you ever sat around with family members who seem to move a glass of wine around in front of you and you have no idea what they are doing? You don’t have to sit and wonder anymore. Learning the basics about wine will help you understand the different types of wines, how to assess a wine’s value (not based on the price), and more.

Hold a Wine Tasting Party…

Teach your friends about wine and how to properly taste wine. You don’t just drink the wine. There is a special way to taste wine to give a proper assessment and be able to score the wine the right way. You can learn how to score wine, what you are looking for in wine, and more.

Wine has been produced around the world for thousands of years…

Wine Tasting…

This guide will teach you how to hold the best wine tasting party around…

You can learn which people are the best guests to invite to your wine tasting party, how to prepare for it, and learn about how to properly taste wine. In addition, you will learn everything you need to know about the different types of wine tasting parties you can hold at your home…
Discover  :

1) How to Properly Assess a Wine by Looking at it

There is no reason to sit around and wonder what people are doing when they are swirling their wine glasses anymore. You can learn too.

2) Wine Tasting Parties

There are tons of ways to hold a wine tasting party. Discover the different ways to hold a party and the different methods for wine tasting.

Wouldn’t it feel great to impress your friends with your new found knowledge about wine?  Imagine showing your friends everything you know about wine by holding a wine tasting party.

Look, don’t kid yourself, knowledge like this could cost you hundreds of dollars in wine bottles learning about the different varieties and learning.

Wine tasting is a lot of fun when you have a party with your friends.