In this fast-paced world where we are often eating and drinking on the run, slowing down to savor a delicious glass of wine is truly a gift. To get the most out of the wine-tasting experience, take your time, involve all your senses, and follow these wine tasting steps.
Four Wine Tasting Steps
Most people talk about these four wine tasting steps:
1. See. Hold your glass to the light or against a white tablecloth, and observe the color and the clarity. Let the wine tell its story. For example, a white wine with a yellow hue was probably aged in oak barrels, as oak adds a yellow tint to the wine.
2. Swirl. This aerates the wine and brings the aromas to the surface of the glass. If you’re new to swirling, place your glass on a flat surface, hold the glass stem, and use the stem to draw circles with your glass on the flat surface.
3. Smell. Think of yourself as a hound dog. You’ll want to take many sniffs. You’ll probably also want to have an aroma wheel on hand to help you figure out what you’re smelling.
4. Sip. Put a fairly large amount of wine in your mouth.
Eight Wine Tasting Steps
If you really get into it, you’ll want to take these eight steps:
1. See. Read above.
2. Smell. This is your first smell, when the wine is a little bit up tight becaus it hasn’t yet been aerated. You haven’t invited it to come out and play.
3. Swirl. This is where you’re encouraging the wine to come out and play 🙂
4. Smell. It’s incredibly fun to see how different the wine smells before and after aerating.
5. Sip. Put a fairly large amount of wine in your mouth.
6. Savor. Move the wine around your mouth for three or four seconds, so that your entire mouth is coated. The notion here is that you have different taste receptors in different parts of your mouth. So you want to make sure to activate all of those taste receptors.
7. Slurp. With the wine in your mouth, open your lips slightly and very gently bring in extra air. Slurping the wine accentuates the olfactory experience. You get a lot more sensation on the back upper roof of your mouth.
8. Swallow. As the wine goes down your throat, notice whether the experience changes at all from when the wine was in your mouth. Also, once the wine has been swallowed, see if you experience additional sensations in your mouth, which are known as the wine’s finish.
Throughout the tasting experience, you also want to invoke the sense of listening. Listen to the sound of the cork popping out of the bottle, the liquid as you pour it into your glass, and the ringing of your glasses as you and your guests make a toast. Cheers!
Please take a look at my video, which highlights these steps.
If you’d like to help people really enjoy their wine tasting experience, consider joining my team as a wine consultant. It’s an incredibly fun business for wine lovers. I’ve been a wine consultant now for 11 years, and I love it. If you’re interested in learning more, please check out my Wine Business page and let me know if you’d like to have a conversation.
As an independent wine consultant with WineShop At Home, I absolutely enjoy bringing a taste of the Napa wine country home to you one sip at a time. Whether you simply love to drink wine, seek a special personalized wine gift, or are in search of a new wine jobs opportunity as a wine consultant, feel free to contact me for a truly unique wine tasting experience!
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2 comments
I loved learning these steps from you at the wine tasting you led at my home, but I don’t always go through the whole 7 steps! I do remember to see, swirl, smell, sip and swallow, so that’s not bad! I can really taste the difference if I don’t at least do the swirl and smell parts.
Thanks Donna. I completely agree with you that swirling the wine makes a world of difference.