Saturday 31 January 2015

Spitting it out

Today I learnt a few new skills at my wine tasting course.  Hosted by the Wine Society, I went to a fairly intensive course called Introduction to wine - Level 1.  

It was a 6 hour course starting at 10am (which I had thought was a little too early to start drinking!). The course included learning about how wine is made, different types of grapes, learning what goes with what food, different harvesting methods, what regions produce what types of wine best due to their climate.  The course presenter was great, he has been in the industry for 35+ years, working at wineries, working in the industry, being a sales rep, being a taster and a judge, his knowledge was fantastic and he ran a great day.

And there were 36 wines to taste!  We had 6 chapters and each one had 6 wines.  We were advised that they encourage when learning to taste wine, to use the spittoon and literally swivel and swish the wine around your mouth and then spit it out like the professional tasters do. As I'm racing the next day and had to drive to dinner, I decided that it would be a good idea, I was also intrigued on how the wine was going to taste without swallowing it.  The answer... it tastes exactly the same except it doesn't affect your mind and body... I tasted 36 different wines and was sober!  We got to take home leftover wines from they day so I took my 2 favourites from the day - a Pinot Noir and a Merlot.

Thoroughly recommend doing the course, whether you think you know a lot about wine already or know nothing... we had a range of all in the room!


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