Wine tasting! 5 S! See wine, swirl,

Wine Tasting

Wine tasting is more than just pouring a small amount of wine into a glass and sipping it. Wine tasting over the years has evolved into an art.

One does not drink wine. One contemplates wine, savors wine and discusses wine with other wine connoisseurs. There is wine etiquette to perform when sipping wine, known as the “Five S’s” of wine tasting:

The Five S's of Wine Tasting

See the wine- Pour the wine into a wine glass and hold the glass up to the light. Study the color. You are looking for clarity and brilliance. If the wine in your glass is cloudy or discolored in any way your palate is about to be disappointed, because something is wrong with the blend.

White wine as it ages; the coloring changes, the color and hue reflect almost a straw or a golden-yellow.

For a red wine, the color can become almost ruby or burgundy depending on how long the wine was allowed to age. White wine is stored in stainless steel vats to age. Red wine is stored in oaken barrels to age.

Swirl the wine- Holding the stem of the wineglass lightly, pick up the glass and swirl the wine around and around. This is to achieve several purposes. You are allowing the wine to breathe, and to pick up the essence of the glass. As you swirl your wine, notice how the wine hits the sides of the glass, and then falls back down. This is known as the “legs” of the wine, giving those knowledgeable enough, clues as to how full-bodied the wine actually is. Swirl the wine several times in order to allow all the components to come together and give you the full experience of a full-bodied taste.

Sniff- Raise the glass to your nose, and sniff deeply. Close your eyes taking in the full impact of the bouquet rising up to meet your nose. What you smell will depend on your choice of wine, as well as your memory. Red wines carry an earthy aroma, reminiscent of pencil shavings, or rich, cool woodsy- type smells. You could smell almonds, or vanilla or even cloves. No one person smelling the same wine will come away with the same memories of another person smelling that wine.

If the wine is a fruity wine, you might envision a field of strawberries, or an apple orchard, perhaps cloves or anise or another spice. All smells wafting up to your nostrils are open to individual interpretation.

Sip- Now, sip the wine. Your mouth will confirm what your sense of smell has detected. A dry red wine with tannins will leave you with what they call the “pucker factor” completely drying out your mouth at the first sip. A fruity sweetened wine will sit on the tongue and play across the taste buds delighting the palate and leaving the mouth moist.

Savor- As you gently swirl the wine around in your mouth savor the flavor. You are checking for the balance of the blends; for each wine bottle is not just the end product of one type of grape, but a carefully planned blend of several types. Some wines contain not just the juice of the grape, but also the stems and the seeds.

Now swallow the wine and enjoy the fruits of this harvest of flavors.

What we've been drinking

Voyager Estate Margaret River Cabernet Merlot 2001
The bottle we tried was a little dried out, but still an excellent example of classic cool climate Cabernet. Leafy, cassis & secondary cedar on the nose, the palate linear, very dry and showing a little meaty developed characters. It's very Bordeaux like in its savoury character & would be fantastic with a lamb rack.

Hoddles Creek 1er Cru Pinot Blanc 2008
Seriously sexy packaging. The bottle is enormous (can't see this fitting into many wine racks) & the label is ornately European. The wine itself is quite European too, with a crystalline honey character to it that is very pure and light. Very dry and pure, this really needs some bottle age to flesh out. Drink with a Thai Noodle salad

How to become a better wine taster

The Spit

Wine has a singular purpose – To be drunk. As a beverage, its intended purpose is to be consumed (via the mouth). The peculiarity of the vinous beverage is that it’s one of the most infinitely variable drinks on the planet – the interplay between fruit, oak, acid, tannins, winemaking influence, sugar etc serves to create easily the most complex drink on the planet.

So that we can better understand this capricious stuff, we need to appreciate how different regions, winemakers, oak maturation or varieties can produce such divergent end products. The way we do this is by the bizarre ritual that is the wine tasting.

The feature this issue is perhaps the most important skill that any taster can master, the one skill that will allow you to remain upright no matter how many wines you drink. – The spit.

Spitting itself is considered to be a dirty, messy habit, but if you want to still be a accurate taster by wine number 24, its almost a given that you can’t empty every glass down the hatch. Rather, in more serious wine circumstances, spitting is the most appropriate action. In France, its almost a given, with tasters spitting with aplomb in the vineyard, in gutters or even on the floor of the barrel hall. The French even have a name for it - recracher

At first it’s a serious challenge to spit out wine – Why waste good wine? But once you get the hang of it, you will only appear more sophisticated (and more sober). Some people have also argued that by spitting it out, you are not getting to fully enjoy the wine or appreciate the finish. In truth, as we have no taste receptors in our throat, the only taste sensation would be the alcohol warmth on the way down.

Most Australian wineries cater for spitters by integrating spittoons into their cellar door designs or at least providing plenty of buckets/containers to spit into. Considering our very strict drink driving laws & Responsible Service of Alcohol legislation it is of no surprise that pours are small and spitting accepted. At larger wine trade shows and wine festivals they will even use plastic bins filled with sawdust (reduces smell and splashback). In some US cellar doors (where payments for tasting are the norm) many staff will be more likely to let you try an extra wine or two if they recognise you are serious enough to be spitting (and not just another freeloading pisshead).

So what makes a good spit? Natalie Mclean of Nat Decants puts it best

‘The art of spitting (or expectorating, if you prefer) can be comfortably mastered at home. Start in the shower, then move to the bathroom sink, and finally, when you're ready to work without a net, graduate to the dining room table. The technique is simple: when you've finished tasting your wine, suck in your cheeks, purse your lips into a slightly open O, lean forward and expel a steady stream into the bucket. It's considered bad form to dribble, spray or ricochet.’

The best spitters I have ever seen are truly remarkable in their ability to hit targets from metres away – in wide, winey arcs of fluid that fly on a predetermined course and hit the target spittoon/bucket/winemakers leg with such precision that the wine looks to be travelling by wire. The better the spitter, the more defined, accurate and longer the spit (with the least amount of dribble).

Finally, the most important thing for novice spitters to consider before they leave home is attire – Only a novice (or someone very confident in their spit abilities) wears light coloured clothes at a wine tasting!

For more information, check out this glorious article on wine spitting:
http://www.slate.com/id/2071619/

Cheers,

Andrew Graham

Blind Wine Tasting? Take the Pepsi Challenge!

No, we aren’t talking about some sort of bizarre drinking game for people with disabilities, but Blind Wine Tasting can be an excellent way to get seriously good value wines.

Blind Wine Tasting is essentially when a wine is presented without the taster knowing what it is. Whether you use a brown bag, bottle covers or an old sock, the main objective of blind tasting is to allow you to try wines without being influenced by what’s on the label, unbiased by the wines reputation, vintage or even the variety.A far more challenging (and intimidating) extension of this is the wine options game – where a group of suitably foolhardy individuals gather around with a clutch of mysteriously obscured bottles and attempt to guess the vintage, variety, region and maker of the masked bottles. This can often be a hilarious game, as it is simply too easy for even the most seasoned, knowledgeable taster can get things very, very wrong.
To add a further dimension, try blind tasting with your eyes shut – Cabernet Sauvignon has a reputation for smelling exactly like Sauvignon Blanc with the lights turned out!

The clear advantage of blind wine tasting though is that it is a great leveller – it is amazing how often when presented with a lineup of masked wines, the $15 bottles end up just as popular as the $30 bottles. This can be used to your wine buying advantage, as you may discover wines that you thought were too expensive/cheap & happily discover great wines.

Pepsi wheeled out a blind tasting road show several years ago, attempting to emphasise how much better their product tasted than its Coca Cola competitor, showing that once you take away all the perceptions associated with packaging & the inherent marketing spiel, its ultimately ‘let(ting) your taste decide’.

But don’t just take our word for it, organise you own blind tasting party! Gather together a likeminded bunch of wine drinkers and tell everyone to bring a bottle of wine (Choose either reds or whites). Stick all the wines into identical bottle bags or socks (No peeking) and randomly mix them up. Then taste away!


Look for:
1.Colour- Is it bright or dull? Does the colour go all the way to the tip? This can indicate the wine age, with the colour on more youthful wines going all the way to the rim. . Note any major differences between the wines, particularly in whites.

2. Aroma- Are the smells pungent or restrained? Write down any obvious smells and particularly note anything that smells ‘un-wine like’ as these are usually dead giveaways to wine faults (Which will ruin any of your attempts to guess the wines identity).

3. Taste- Don’t drink too much too quickly! It’s a tasting after all, so only pour yourself small drinks until the unveiling – then you can decide what you really want to drink. Look for more than just fruit flavours: note if the wine is dry, sweet or rich. If it’s a red, look out for tannins (the drying effect on the back of your tongue) and any other sensations in your mouth.

And finally:

4.Guess what your tasting- If you get it wrong, don’t worry, everyone does! It’s more fun to connect the dots and work out why certain wines taste and smell like they do. If you are only very new to wine tasting, try to guess only the price- It is easily the most surprising factor, and if you find a wine you like and it turns out to be a bargain, then the whole exercise is worth it!
The best advice? Try absolutely every wine you can, regardless of the price, and this will lead you to find the wines you really want to drink.