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+--- Thread: tasting tips wanted (/thread-16159.html)
- Major Rex - 12-10-1999
Hello all - firstly what a wonderful site this is!!
I am interested in the procedure for actual tasting the wine.
Specifically where and what to taste for in different parts of the palate. All I remember from a wine course years ago was that tannin is tasted on the upper gum between to top lip and teeth. (make sense?). What about acid, fruit, oak etc.
Any help greatly appreciated to the forum or home email.
Thanks
Rex
- Jerry D Mead - 12-11-1999
There are a number of good books that cover that sensory evaluation subject quite well...The University Wine Course and The Windows on the World Wine Course are two that come to mind.
Tannin, by the way, is a feel more than a taste. It is astringency...like the feel of too strong tea, alum, raw persimmon, etc.
- Randy Caparoso - 12-18-1999
Ye gads! Where did you take that wine course? I'm afraid to ask! But unfortunately, you were not taught well; either that, or you were having too good a time to pay attention.
One does not taste ANY thing with the gums. I think we probably lost that ability somewhere in the Miocene period (some 25 million years ago, I believe). The taste buds most sensitive to tannin -- which gives the sensation of bitterness -- are found towards the back of the tongue. That's why when you taste a red wine with a fairly good tannin level, you don't taste tannin at all at the tip of the tongue; only as it slips down towards the back of the mouth. Conversely, sweetness is tasted at the tip of the tongue. Which is why when you taste a slightly sweet wine, the sensation of sweet fruitiness is perceived almost immediately.
The sense of "flavor," on the other hand, is something smelled -- either through then nose before the wine is sipped, or while the wine is held in the mouth (the vapors rising to the olfactory through the passage at the back of the palate). Which is why when you have a bad cold and cannot smell at all, neither food nor beverages taste like much at all.
A good model for the human apparatus of tasting can be found in the beginning of Hugh Johnson's classic World Atlas of Wine (Simon & Shuster). Otherwise, if you are interested in making wine tasting the subject of intense study, the best possible books you can buy are Michael Broadbent's Winetasting (Mitchell Beazley Pocket Guides) and Emile Peynaud's The Taste of Wine (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
At this point, I could go on and on about "How to Taste Wine." Suffice to say, make sure you start with an actual, clear wine glass -- with rim bending inwards -- which helps to funnel aromas to the nose, and allow you to swirl without spilling on your $50 tie (swirling is necessary to generate vapors, evaporating from the sides of the glass, for you to smell). Then you put your nose right over the rim, breathe it in, and then sip, letting the wine spread across the tongue from front to back and side to side before swallowing. Practice this at home before possibly making a fool of yourself in front of a hot date (don't want the wine to swirl into your nose!)
For online help, Robin Garr's Wine Lover's Page at www.wine-lovers-page.com has a nifty "Questionaire," which leads you to several sources giving detailed notes on how-to-taste. The bottom line is that a good wine should always give pleasure. It should smell good, taste even better, and be smooth and satisfying by itself and/or with whatever you're eating. Simple as that!
[This message has been edited by Randy Caparoso (edited 12-17-1999).]