How to Taste Wine

Professional Wine Tasting

It takes time and fine tuning to develop a deeper understanding of wine characteristics, and to be able to tap into the full range of aromas and flavours that come through when drinking wine. It’s not something that comes easily to everyone, which is why sommeliers train for years to hone their craft.

A professional wine taster follows a specific set of steps when analysing wine, starting with appearance before moving on to aromas, flavours and characteristics. To maximise their chances of picking up on every little nuance and note in a wine, a sommelier will even avoid pungent food and drink in the half hour before conducting the tasting and ensure the room is free of overpowering perfumes and cleaning products.

It may all sound a bit extreme, but, in the world of wine, it’s essential for experts to be able to pick up on a wine’s quirks and put those sensations into words. After all, it’s the words that draw us in on a wine menu at a restaurant, giving a flavour of what’s to come.

Wine Tasting Steps

So you can do your best sommelier impression at our next wine tasting event, we’ve put together a step-by-step guide in how to taste wine like a pro. But before diving in, make sure you’ve avoided food and drink for a while so you don’t detect notes of your lunch!

The first step in a professional wine tasting is to check the wine’s appearance. Pour a small amount of wine into a glass and hold it against a plain, white surface, allowing you to assess the colour and clarity. By slightly tilting the glass at an angle away from you, you’ll be able to easily see the clarity of the wine and density of its colour.

Clarity
Clarity is key in immediately knowing if the wine is faulty, as a hazy appearance with hints of brown may indicate it’s corked. Although, if the colour is as expected and the appearance is only slightly cloudy then it’s more likely a sign that the wine was made biodynamically and is unfiltered.

Density
While tilting the glass in this way you’ll also get an idea of the wine’s body and flavour intensity. If the colour of the wine is translucent and the edges appear almost water-like, this tells you it’s a lighter style of wine with delicate flavours. If the colour is deep and dense, it’s a full-bodied style with a richer mouthfeel, bolder flavours and higher in alcohol. If tasting red wine, a denser appearance also tells you that the wine is high in tannins.

Colour
The overall colour can give you an indication of what to expect from the wine. For instance, a ruby red may indicate a younger wine with vibrant red fruit flavours, while a garnet red will likely be much older with notes of toast, nut and leather. To find out more about different shades of red, white and rosé and what they mean, check out Colours of Wine Explained.

The second step in sommelier-style wine tasting is to assess the aromas, or “the nose”. The best way to do this is to swirl the wine in the glass to encourage the aromas to jump out.

Up Close
Bring the glass right up to your nose and give it a quick sniff. At this stage, you can tell pretty much instantly whether the wine’s gone off and you need to stop the tasting! You’ll also be able to get an idea of the style of wine and even where it’s from by the notes you’re smelling in the glass. Toasty aromas, for instance, suggest the wine has been aged in oak, while tropical fruit notes imply it’s from a hot climate wine region.

From A Distance
The further away from your nose you can detect these aromas, the more intense (and therefore good quality) the wine is. So, lower the glass to your chest and see if you can still smell the fragrances from there. If you can only pick up scents when the glass is right under your nose, it’s probably a cheaper, lower quality wine.

Next up is the all-important tasting. Take a small sip of the wine, allowing a little air to enter your mouth at the same time. Doing this will accentuate the flavours on the palate.

Swill It Around
Whether you plan on swallowing the wine or using a spittoon, you need to swill the wine for a few seconds and let it completely coat your mouth so you can assess the wine’s body and balance of flavours. You’ll also be able to tell how dry or sweet it is, which will give you an idea of how the wine was made.

If you can only taste primary notes like fruit, flowers and herbs, then you know it’s a simple, lower quality wine. But if you’re also getting secondary notes like bread, cream and butter, or tertiary nuances of nut, spice, coffee and smoke, the wine in your glass is complex and high quality from ageing and skilled production methods.

Tilt Your Head
To assess acidity, there’s a little trick you can do. After tasting the wine, tilt your head forward to see how much saliva rushes to the front of your mouth. A mouth-watering sensation indicates that the wine is high in acidity, which would then tell you that the wine was probably made in a cool climate region.

Aftertaste
This is also known as “the finish”. If the flavours linger long after you’ve swallowed, that’s a sign of a good quality wine. When tasting red wine, you’ll get a good idea of the tannins in the wine by how dry and astringent your mouth feels afterwards. Much like a cup of tea that’s been stewing for too long, a wine with high tannins will leave that coating.

With so much to consider, it’s time to discuss and gather your thoughts. A professional wine taster will score the wine based on its structure, the balance, intensity and complexity of its flavours, and whether their description of the wine could be a few basic words or a short novel with unexpected twists and turns.

At this stage, you can make an informed judgement on a wine’s quality and better understand how this all correlates to the price of the bottle. The main reason we encourage giving this a go, though, is that being so attentive to the wine in your glass really elevates your enjoyment and appreciation of wine. We’ll drink to that!

Wine Tasting Video

If you fancy hearing a Wine Buyer’s take on it, sit back and watch our very own dynamic duo, Andrew and Dave, explain how they taste wine when sourcing new bottles to add to our range.

Did You Know?

• Chewing a piece of bread will remove lingering food and drink flavours from your tongue, making it a great palate cleanser before wine tasting (much better than chewing gum!)
• Being unwell, overtired or suffering from hayfever can dull your senses, meaning the wine may not taste as it should
• Trying wine with certain foods can completely transform the wine’s flavours and character, which is why wine and food pairing can sometimes be so tricky. Earthy asparagus with the wrong vino, for instance, can increase bitterness in the wine and decrease body and sweetness, generally resulting in an all-round unpleasant experience! Check out our Wine and Food section for tips on how to avoid the pitfalls and pair like a pro