Blind Tasting Wine

Welcome to Vine to Wine this is your host Linda Moran. If you’ve started a fairly serious wine tasting group, then no doubt you are looking for ways to test yourselves. Today we’re going to discuss some methods of tasting wine to help develop your skills.

When doing any serious tasting I recommend doing it blind – I mean taste without knowing what the wine is. Have a person who is not involved with the tasting put all of the wines into brown bags. Don’t unveil them until everyone has tasted, scored and ranked the wines. It’s fun and it takes away the influence of the brand name. Another great exercise that will help you to identify some of the characteristics of wine; is to find a neutral white wine, a jug white wine could come in handy. Pour the wine into 4 glasses, use one as a reference wine, add nothing to it. Now add a few drops of citric acid or lemon juice to the first glass, a bit of sugar to the next glass and a drop of vanilla extract to the last glass. Smell your samples and taste them as compared to your glass which has not been changed. Slowly increase the amount of additive to each glass and record how it changes. Note the difference in smell and texture of the wines. You’ll learn to identify these characteristics much more readily after you practice this. A triangle test is another tasting builder. You must have three glasses - all different sizes. Using the same type of wine - have someone place the same wine in two of the glasses and a second wine in the third glass. You’ll be shocked at how different types of glasses and not knowing what you’re drinking, will force you to rely on your nose and your mouth to tell you what’s what. Have fun being serious about your wine education and thanks for joining me on today’s Vine to Wine.