How to Evaluate Wine

Wine sensory evaluation is as simple as smelling perfume, eating a meal or looking at art.  Wine is really not that complicated.  We make it more complicated than it needs to be.  We insist on making it mystical or something only an expert can interpret.

On April 27th, along with my good friend and sommelier, Ashley Phillips I will be holding a class where you will learn how to evaluate wine. I break it down to the bare essence and teach you how to understand what you are smelling and tasting.  Every aroma we smell in a wine is most likely stored away somewhere in our memory, we just need to get it out. Every wine has a unique taste and since we have been eating and tasting food since birth, it is really easy to identify those tastes.

At the end of the day, wine is like art. We can all see the same art work, agree on the color, texture and sometimes the subject matter. We can agree on what we are seeing, but disagree on the meaning of the work. Now, does that make our interpretation of the art wrong or right? No.  The same goes for wine. We can smell and taste a wine and agree on the generality (color, alcohol, acidity and tannin); but have a completely different interpretation on if that wine appeals to us or not.

We would like to show you how to “feel” wine. Instead of tasting wine and searching for its identifying flavors, ask yourself “how does it make me feel?”  Once you take this approach you will begin to really understand how to evaluate wine.

This Saturday we have several exercises planned to help you evaluate and engage with wine.  During the seminar you will discover if you are a super-taster or not. You will dive into an interactive aroma identification exercise.  We will show you how the color you see effects the flavor of a wine.  Finally, we will show you how music can make a great wine bad and a bad wine great.

All this will be at Island Prime, April 27th 12-2pm. Call 619-298-6802 to make your reservations today!