Every glass of wine is a finely curated mixture of multiple fragrances flavors and notes. To tell a good wine from the bad, you need to use the three senses of sight, smell, and taste to dive into the adventure. A true wine connoisseur can always take a sip and take you back to the vineyards with their knowledge and analytical skills.
Here’s how you can do so too:
Look
You can use your sense of sight to determine the wine’s opacity, color, and viscosity. This will help you judge it better. You don’t have to get sipping right after the bad boy is poured into your glass. Take your time to observe it. It’ll give you hints on the different types of grapes used, the wine’s age, and the alcohol content.
If the wine is more yellowish or brownish, it’s probably older. Red wines are more translucent. If you feel like there is a higher density of the droplets on the glass side, the alcohol content is high. Similarly, if the same droplets flow down the sides slowly, the sugar content is high.
While you’re at a wine tasting tour, you can talk about all of these tiny details with the rest of the tour members for a healthy and immersive conversation.
Sniff
After you’ve given your wine a good look, it’s time to sniff it to get to study it more. If you’re on tour, you wouldn’t want to embarrass yourself by burying your nose inside the glass. Very subtly, giver over the top of the glass, take short sniffs and get your brain to start filtering out all the information.
There are usually three types of aromas that you may be able to spot. Primary aromas are grape-derivatives and may include floral notes. Secondary aromas are yeast-derivates and come from different winemaking practices. Tertiary aromas stem from aging, after being stored in oak barrels and bottles. These are usually savory.
There might be thousands of different aroma components in a single glass. You can’t name them all, but a true connoisseur can trowel out the main fragrances. Naming all the scents, notes, flowers, and herbs could be fun if you’re with a group of equally enthusiastic individuals. It takes a lot of practice to fully discern the aroma, but once you get there, your friends will get impressed!
Taste
Wine is never the same as apple juice; you don't bring it close to your mouth and take a huge gulp. Always start slow and take it upwards steadily. Take your tongue out a bit and touch the wine with the front of your tongue. It'll help you ascertain the sweetness of the wine. If you feel like there is a small tinge of dryness, there is very little sugar added. Similarly, if the wine has high acidity content, it won't taste too sweet either.
You can also analyze the drink's acidity to think of when and where the grapes were first picked. If a wine has high acidity content, it usually comes from a colder climate region. If you're tasting red wine, you might want to pay attention to the tannin. If the wine comes from an oak tannin, it'll taste smoother and hit the center of your tongue. On the other hand, grape tannins are more abrasive.
Artisan Excursion Wine Tours has resumed its wine tasting tours of best wineries in Santa Ynez . Sign up, and we will take you to some of the most notable wineries of Solvang! Contact us for more details.