There's more to wine tasting then just drinking wine. Follow these 5 steps for a true wine tasting experience.
1. See - Look at the color: is it pale straw, Aztec yellow, blond, golden, green, gold, brick red, ruby red, deep purple, cranberry, red, burgundy? (Hold your glass up to the light against a white backround to really see the true color.)
2. Swirl - Swirl the wine in the glass to release the aroma, bouquet, and fragrance. (This is also a great time to check out the legs of your wine. Yes legs! Legs are the streams of wine that you see on the sides of your glass after swirling. The slower the legs move down the glass and the more there are, the higher the alcohol level in the wine. Legs are good because alcohol is a preservative so a wine with ´good legs´ is probably a good quality wine that will preserve for longer in the bottle.)
3. Sniff - Sniff the wine in the glass. What scents do you detect: apple. apricot, peach, lemon, lime, pineapple, pear, baked apple, butter, butterschotch, yeast, asparagus, plum, raspberry, baked cherry, strawberry jam, prunes, mint, licorice, spiced tea, mushrooms, orange, chocolate, coffee, cigar box, pipe tobacco, cola, beans, almond, bread, biscuits, cinnamon, cloves, honey, ginger, yeast, gardenia, geranium, rose, honeysuckle, chalk, flint, grass, hay, minerals, stone, straw, gasoline, rubber, earth, leaves, grass?
4. Sip - Swirl the wine in your mouth. How does it feel: full-bodied, medium-bodied, light-bodied?
5. Savor - Hold the wine in your mouth. Keep your mouth closed, then breathe in through your nose and swallow the wine. Take a moment to remember how the wine felt in your mouth: full, light, crisp, acidic, bitter, tannic, uneventful, or full and round, comfortable, savory, wonderful, or satisfying like velvet?
Thanks to the Sassy Sommelier aka Lizbeth Congiusti and her Wine-Tasting Guide and Journal for breaking these steps down for us!
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