Tasting Your Way to Better Wine Selections

So, let’s begin by focusing on the basics of tasting, which should help you establish your own matrix of flavors and which, I hope, will help you select your favorite wines.

Traditional tasting advice often suggests assessing a wine by appearance (color tone and intensity as well as viscosity), then smelling the wine (to define some aromas), next tasting the wine (noting balance, acid level, body, and tannin), then finally reflecting on the combination of these elements and sum up your thoughts about the wine.  

Color can tell you about a wine’s age.  As white wines age they gain color, moving from pale greenish/yellow to deep gold or amber.  While red wines lose color as they age, moving from black, purple, or violet colors through ruby to brick and brown and often lose opacity as well.  Of wines with the same age, deeper color is often an indication of riper grapes at harvest, either from picking later in the season or having been grown in a region with a warmer climate.  

Viscosity often displayed as the "legs" of a wine are not in themselves a maker of quality but simply of alcohol being present. The legs form as alcohol evaporates from the surface of the beverage.  The now slightly lower proof layer on the top of the glass is repelled, on a molecular level, by the higher proof wine below, causing the wine to climb the sides of the glass.  Typically, wines with higher alcohol levels will show more legs. Note that sweet wines will also display more legs, as the sugar adds to the viscosity of the wine.

With regard to smelling, taking a dainty sniff is discouraged.  Really get your nose in there and take a deep, swift inhale, as your sense organ for smell, the olfactory epithelium is deep in your head, about in line with your temples.  Good quality crystal glasses (I like Riedel’s “Overture” red wine glasses) help unlock the aromas of wine, since on a microscopic level crystal is more coarse than glass, providing more surface area for aroma molecules to evaporate.  This is also why one should swirl the wine in the glass, it spreads the wine over a greater surface area, again allowing additional aromatic molecules to evaporate.  

If you may need assistance with naming the aromas of the wine you are smelling, the Wine Aroma Wheel (https://www.winearomawheel.com) is a very useful tool.  It separates more concrete descriptors such as raspberry or vanilla from more abstract terms such as elegant.  It guides the user from more less specific terms to more specific ones; fruity–>citrus fruits–>grapefruit.  Finally, spending a minute or more smelling and then smelling a glass of wine again will likely yield additional impressions of the aromas.  As your olfactory system adapts to the initial aromas you will discover that you often can find a second or third aroma "behind" the initial aromas. These additional aromas noted with repeated nosing of the wine often adds to the "word salad" you read in my wine reviews.

Tasting the wine can be as simple as drinking it.  But with a little more effort on your part as a taster, you will get additional impressions from the wine. Take a measured taste and allow it to warm in your mouth for a moment.  The aromatic portion of the wine is more volatile when it is warmer. You can try to "chew’ the wine with your mouth closed.  Or even better, try to slurp the wine; purse your lips, tilt your head forward, then while inhaling gently through your mouth, open your mouth slightly.  If you are new to this, you will either dribble the wine on your shirt or choke on it.  After you inhale, and with the wine still in your mouth exhale through your nose.  The benefit of the chew or slurp is that it atomizes aromatic molecules and exhaling those liberated molecules allows you to smell them again.  You should notice additional aromas this way.  Much of what we claim as flavor are actually aromas that are sensed retro-nasally (from the back of the mouth and throat). The combination of the ortho-nasal (sniffs from the glass) and retro-nasal (scented air from chewing the wine or exhaling after a slurp) scents and impressions will give you a much deeper idea of the flavor profile of the wine.

Besides the elements of flavor or in-mouth aromas described above, there are the elements which compose the structure of the wine; acidity, sweetness (of lack thereof), tannin, body, and texture, which you can note when tasting wine.  Acidity can range from the sharper malic acid, named for the Latin terms for apples, malus, which tends to reinforce green apple aromas; to the softer lactic acid, better known for its role in milk and cheese and when combined with diacetyl offers a buttery aroma. Tartaric acid is another major acid in wine grapes and the residues of this acid tend to crust fermentation and aging vats.  These deposits have been used to adjust acidity in other foods in the form of cream of tartar.  

Sweetness can range from none, which is the definition of dryness in wine, to syrupy levels of residual (unfermented) sugar.  A challenge with being able to taste different levels of these elements is that acid and sweetness offset one another in your mouth.  Wines with more acid can carry additional residual sweetness without tasting "sweet."  The sensation of tannin is that of black tea without milk or sugar, a sort of clenching/drying sensation on the tongue. This is because tannins chemically link to proteins, and in this case the proteins on the inside of your mouth.  Tannins are extracted from the plant materials in both wine grapes and tea leaves and provide natural protection for plants against both environmental damage and predation by animals. Tannins are a natural preservative in wine and impact the mouthfeel of wines.  Orange and amber wines can have some tannin structure, but it is more common to sense these elements in red wines.  

For me, the important thing about the tannins is their texture; I might define them in increasing order of intensity from chocolatey, dusty, silty, grainy, sandy, clenching, to drying.  Deeper colored wines have an easier time expressing the softer end of the spectrum as the colored pigments in those wines bind to the end of tannin chains making them feel softer in your mouth.  This is why Cabernet Sauvignon can have a relative lot of tannin and can still be drunk as a cocktail, while paler Pinot Noir or Nebbiolo tend to have a more intense or sharp sensation of tannin and may more often be enjoyed at the table, with food.  It is important to note that sweetness offsets tannin and acidity accentuates it.  

Finally, the body of the wine can be lean or rich.  Consider the difference of skim milk, whole milk and cream; all based on the same liquid but offering very different feelings in your mouth.  This is an analog to light, medium or full body in wine.  

Finally take a moment to think about the wine. Is the color pale or deep?  Are the aromas subtle and reserved or rich, ripe and overt?  Is the wine dry?  Is it sharp with acid or soft and creamy in texture?  Do the tannins support the fruit or overwhelm it?  Perhaps the most important part of thinking about the wine is taking the time to describe your impressions.  These days there are numerous apps and websites, such as Vivino, Cellar Tracker or Delectable, which allow you to keep your own ratings. However, I would urge you to write down at least a few words of description in addition to rating the wines you taste, the act of naming and typing those words will help cement them in your memory.  Even better, keep a basic tasting notebook and write down the name of the wine, vintage, and your impression. The act of copying the name of the wine and handwriting your notes will layer those elements even more deeply into your memory.  

One more way to assess wine is to think about the wine’s Balance, Length, Intensity and Complexity.  I understand that the acronym BLIC was coined by Stephen Spurrier, a British Wine Merchant who was famous for setting up the 1976 Judgement of Paris tasting where two California wines were rated more highly than their French counterparts. When a wine exhibits all of these elements it is generally considered to be a higher quality wine, even if it is not to your taste. Consider balance, is there a single aromatic note that dominates above others?  If there is sweetness in the wine, is it balanced by acidity or sufficient tannin?  Is the alcohol balanced, or does it leave an impression of heat in the finish or aftertaste of the wine?  

Length is about the finish or aftertaste of the wine.  I’ve spoken with many consumers through the years who hoped for no aftertaste. I think this is because less well-made wine often leaves an unpleasant aftertaste and shows its lack of balance in the finish.  If the wine is balanced and the finish is pleasant, a longer impression of flavors is considered better.  

In terms of intensity, a wine with more intense flavors is generally considered to be of better quality.  I would warn that flavors that reach a level of caricature or have been turned up to eleven ala Spinal Tap, don’t qualify as a good kind of intensity (see the first term, balance).  Another way to think about complexity of flavor is to think of layers of flavor.  Does the wine give more than one aroma or flavor?  Moving from the simply "vinous," or smells like wine, into more discernible descriptions such as fruity or spicy, and finally into citrus and vanilla shows a progression of complexity.  When a wine shows good balance, a lingering length on the palate, more intense aromas and complexity in aromas and flavors, it is arguably, objectively "better’ wine.

Context is important for understanding and a few ways to gain context for wine are comparing wines one to another and comparing your impressions with another person.  I would suggest that opening two similar bottles, say a Cabernet from California and one from Chile, on the same night and tasting them side-by-side may give you more perspective on the variety than tasting two California wines side-by-side.  You will likely notice that one offers more intense or completely different flavors, and further that you have a distinct preference for one of them at that moment.  In a scenario like this the context of the tasting matters too.  If you were to open these two bottles and pair them with a hearty chili or grilled steak your impressions of the wines will likely be much different than if you were to taste the wines without food.  Keep in mind that the wine you care for less in one scenario may be a better choice in the other.  

I would also urge you to establish a relationship with a wine merchant, from whom you can get suggestions for wines and provide feedback about your impressions and preferences after tasting the suggested wine.  This dialogue will help you sharpen your perceptions and communicate more clearly about wine.  I often say that my job as a wine merchant is to translate taste into English for my clients.