How to Taste Wine

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If you observe an experienced wine taster, they’ll peer into their glass, swirl the wine, take a drink, keep it in their mouth for a long time, then…spit it out?

Yes, to unfamiliar onlookers the process of a wine tasting generally leaves a flurry of questions. Is there a method to the madness or are these just intimidation tactics? How do wine experts recognize hidden flavors? Do they have better noses and taste buds?

Wine experts do not have better noses or taste buds, but they have sharpened their observation skills through a lot of practice. Anyone can learn to describe a wine’s characteristics using the same language as the experts. It just takes following a few, simple steps and practice, practice, practice. It’s also a great idea to keep notes during your wine tasting experiences. Later they’ll help you recall specific flavors, and it’s a fun way to look back at the wines you’ve tasted.

1. Start by pouring no more than 1/3 of your glass’s capacity. (Later you can enjoy a full glass.
2. Really look at the wine. Tilt it a bit to the side and hold it against a white background like a white tablecloth or piece of paper.
3. How clear is the wine? Is it bright and clear, or is it cloudy or hazy? Cloudy or hazy wines indicate there is usually a fault with the wine.
4. What color is it? If it’s a white wine does it have more shades of green, colorless, yellow or gold? If it’s a red wine does it have more shades of purple, ruby, red or brick? White wines get darker with age while red wines get lighter; the two eventually meet at the color brown.
5. How intense or deep is the color? Is it pale enough to read through or so deep you could use it as ink?

It’s amazing how much information you can determine about a wine by simply looking at it. Just in this first step you can start to determine the age and health of the wine.

1. Take just a quick sniff of the wine. Smell accounts for 85% of the wine’s taste. How does it smell? This quick sniff makes your first impression. Does it smell like wine or more like vinegar or wet cardboard? This is your second opportunity to determine if the wine is healthy. Vinegar smells are due to acetic acid turning the wine into, well, vinegar. Musty and wet cardboard smells are indicative of TCA (tricholoranisole) or cork taint. What are some of the initial smells that come from the glass?
2.  Now comes the fun part! Either with your glass on the table or held in mid air by the stem, rotate the glass to swirl the wine. Swirling wine enables more aromas to be released from the wine. You want enough wrist movement to keep the wine moving, but not so much that the wine ends up on your shirt. (Note: White is not a good color to wear while tasting.)
3. Stop swirling and stick your nose deep into the glass. Give it a couple of quick deep sniffs. Really concentrate on what you smell and close your eyes if it helps. Do these smells differ from your initial sniff? Do you smell more aromas than before? How intense are these aromas? Are they leaping out of the glass or are they more subdued?
4. Why do we compare wine to fruits, vegetables and spices? In order to explain something we have to go back to what we know. Most of us know what fresh picked strawberries smell like, or the smell of an apple pie baking with the warm cinnamon aromas wafting throughout the room, or perhaps walking in a damp forest with all those earthy, mushroom smells.
5. Are there additional smells, perhaps vanilla, cinnamon, ginger, caramel, coffee or smoke? These are indicators of oak used either in the fermentation and or in the aging of the wine.

Start building your smell portfolio by smelling the fruits, vegetables and spices as you shop, cook and eat. These memories trigger images in our brain that we can recall and also relate to with other people. However, wine can trigger different aroma memories for different people. What you might refer to as blueberry might be someone else’s blackberry. There is no wrong answer. Just note what you smell, and compare it with others.

1. You’ve been waiting for this, right? When can we start drinking this beautiful, delicious smelling wine? Just one moment! Before we drink, we need to taste. What’s the difference? When you taste wine you continue to use a checklist to judge the wine on various aspects.
2. First, take a small portion of wine in your mouth and move it around with a chewing motion. It should hit all parts of your mouth and tongue because you have different taste receptacles in various parts of your mouth, and we want the wine to visit all of them. Move the wine around in your mouth for at least 10 seconds to acquire the full impression.
3. Fruit flavors are usually tasted right away and should agree with the fruit aromas you smelled earlier. In great wines these fruit flavors can linger for 30 to 60 seconds after the wine is swallowed.
4. How sweet is the wine? This can range from bone dry to very sweet with all stages in between. The tip of your tongue is where you detect sweetness. Beware that sweetness levels can be deceiving. The actual sweetness is measured by residual sugar left in the wine after fermentation. There are other characteristics that can alter your perception of sweetness. Intense fruit flavors can be confused with sweetness, but a wine can be fruity without being sweet. Other components such as acid and tannin can counter balance the perception of sweetness. Some wines taste drier than what they actually are due to higher levels of acid.
5. Is the wine crisp and refreshing? These are terms referring to the level of acidity. Acidity is one of the more appealing characteristics in wine and enables it to be paired successfully to so many foods. Acidity is usually tasted as soon as it comes into contact with the sides of your tongue. In general white wines have more acid than red wines. Acidity gives wine its crispness and provides liveliness and balance. Too much acid will make the wine taste harsh, too little will make it seem flat and flabby.
6. Tannins are usually found in red wines to varying degrees. Although tannin is not technically a taste, it is a perception that you can feel. This is usually noticed with a drying sensation on your tongue, cheeks and gums accompanied by a coating feeling throughout your mouth. It’s the same feeling you would get after a strong black tea. Tannins can range from soft and silky, smooth and velvety, course and rough. Very high levels of tannins can also give a bitter taste to the wine.
7. How does the wine feel? This is how we can determine the body or weight of the wine. Think about milk, there is a difference in the way skim milk feels from whole milk or cream. A wine’s body can be described as light, medium or full. A wine’s body is often linked to alcohol levels. For example, a light German Riesling has lower alcohol than a full-bodied Australian Shiraz.
8. Now it’s time to make a decision, do you spit out the wine or swallow it? I know you must be thinking, “I paid good money for this wine. Why on earth would I spit it out?” or possibly, “Spitting wine is crude and something I would never do especially in public!” But spitting out the wine is essential when tasting many different wines because the alcohol will cloud the taster’s judgment and senses.
9. How is the wine’s balance and finish? Do the components of the wine seem to be in harmony with each other or are they sticking out and disjointed? Determine the length of the wine’s finish. Do the impressions go away quickly or linger and evolve long after the wine is gone? This determines the quality of the wine.

• Fruit (Raspberry, Strawberry, Cherry, Blackberry, Apple, Melon, Pineapple, Grapefruit, Lemon)
• Vegetable (Grassy, Herbs, Spices)
• Floral (Roses, Violets, Honeysuckle)
• Oaky (Oak, Cedar, Smoky, Toasty)
• Other (Buttery, Earthy, Honey, Meaty, Chocolate)

• Light-bodied (Non-fat milk)
• Medium-bodied (Whole milk)
• Full-bodied (Cream)

• Sweetness (Dry, semi-sweet, sweet)
• Acidity (Tangy, crisp, smooth)
• Tannin (Burlap, velvet, silk)