Life> no use

Tips for the perfect wine tasting

(stuff.co.nz)
Updated: 2006-08-24 16:40

Structured wine tastings can be tremendous fun, especially when you organise your own. Not to mention a subsidised way to drink some decent wine.

Here's how to do it:

Suggest it to friends as an informal gathering so that the wine-shy don't feel intimidated. Wine is about enjoyment and sharing it with company: not about arcane knowledge and using the right terminology.

Decide on a variety (e.g.: chardonnay, shiraz-cabernet) to taste and give participants a rough price range to stick to, so you are comparing like against like.

You won't need one bottle per person. Only you know how much wine your mates can drink but if you have 10 people coming, 8 bottles should do. Assign nibblies to the others.

Make sure you have paper bags on hand to mask the bottles, or use the brown ones the bottles arrive through the door in.

Write numbers or letters on the bags so you can match your findings to the label afterwards.

Have water and crackers available to clear the palate, and I would recommend adding some cheeses to the party as well. The experts would tut-tut as it muddies the palate and masks nuances and faults (ever heard the expression "buy on water, sell on cheese"?) but it makes the night exponentially more fun. Besides, trying wines with food is the real test, isn't it?

Serve the wines at a consistent temperature to give them a fighting chance, and make sure they're not too hot or cold.

It's easier if participants can taste all of the wines at once, but you'll need a lot of glasses. The alternative is to issue one glass each and taste the wines in order. As you're only pouring splashes into the glasses, there'll always be more left when you need help forming an opinion.

Hand out pens and paper for everybody to keep notes. Maybe you'll find a tasting sheet to use, otherwise give them blank paper and let them form impressions on their own.

At the minimum, give your pals some guidelines to look for:

1. Colour: How does it look in the glass? Against a white tablecloth? Okay, so colour is something which matters more with aged wine, but it's a good warmup before diving in.