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People who are starting to learn about wine can find it quite complicated in the beginning. From the various types of grapes to the different regions that they’re grown, the information can be overwhelming. Luckily, in-depth knowledge comes with time and shouldn’t stop an enthusiast from learning how to taste and appreciate wine.

Indeed, for wine connoisseurs and investors such as Thomas Noel Collister Jackson (who has an investment cellar with Berry Bros. & Rudd), wine tasting is a skill that comes in handy when figuring out which types of wine to sample and possibly invest in.

Before getting into the process of tasting wine, it’s essential to take note of the glassware used for consuming it. Wine glasses have unique characteristics that are crucial to the tasting process. For starters, the glass should be clear to enable the taster to get a good look at the wine’s colour; the stem should be long enough for proper holding; the rim should be thin to make for easy sipping; and there should be enough capacity in the glass to provide room for swirling.

Once the wine is poured, it’s time to evaluate it based on four actions – look, swirl, smell and taste.

Look

Just looking at a wine when it’s poured into a glass can tell you a lot about it. Many people prefer to hold up the wine against a white background to help make out the hue. Wine gets its colour after coming into contact with the grape skins after the juice has been extracted from the grapes. The longer the contact, the more the impact the skins will have on the wine’s colour.

White wines typically have a shade of yellow that can be light and bright or deeper and darker. The former signifies minimal contact of the wine with the grape skins, while the latter shows that the wine has been aged in an oak barrel. The same principle holds true for red wine: light red wines have a crisp, light taste, while darker reds have aged more in oak barrels.

Swirl

The swirling process helps to introduce more oxygen into the wine, which is important for the tasting process. Oxygen helps to break down the wine, ensuring it softens and gives off a good aroma. However, if wine is exposed to oxygen for too long, the wine oxidises and leads to a flat, unpleasant taste.


Smell

The smelling part of the process helps to prepare the brain for the eventual tasting of the wine. The sense of smell is important as it has a significant impact on how flavours are processed in the brain. When it comes to actual smelling, individuals are encouraged to put their noses into the glass, close their eyes and take a deep breath. As this happens, it’s essential to take note of the scents being picked up. Initially, it might be hard to pick out the individual flavours, and that’s okay as the brain only picks up scents that are in memory.

Smelling the wine also helps determine if there are any irregularities. Corked wine, for example, has an unpleasant taste and it can have the scent of old wet rags, wet newspaper or wet dog. In such instances, feel free to ask the server about the wine and possibly if anyone else is picking up similar scents.

Taste

After coming this far, it’s time to take a sip of the wine and let it linger in the mouth for a while. This helps the individual think about the wine before swallowing it. If there are others involved in the tasting, engage them on the wine. People will have different tastes, so don’t feel there are right or wrong answers when someone else has a different taste.