Wine tasting experience

Wine tasting experience

Wine tasting is the sensory examination and evaluation of wine. Since the 14th century, professional wine tasters are using a formal terminology to describe flavors, aromas and general characteristics of a wine.
Tasting wine is much more different than simply drinking it. Everyone can try it starting with our own basic senses such as sight, smell and taste. It could be easy to learn how to appreciate wines, but you have to keep in mind that taste perception is limited to salty, sweet, sour and bitter.

So everyone can smell thousands of unique scents, but only understanding the combination of smell and taste allows recognizing the right flavor: and this requires a lot of training and experience.
There are quite a few tasting tests to evaluate wine qualities, but if you want to ensure an impartial judgment of a wine you have to (4) use blind testing. Tasters shouldn't be influenced by the wine’s label so the bottle is covered and they have to drink from a black glass to not see the color of wine.
This technique is used because it is known how the power of suggestion in perception has strong effects on expectancy. In fact a French researcher presented a Bordeaux wine in a bottle marked as a cheap wine and tasters gave it a bad judgement. In another experiment, the French researcher served a white wine colored red receiving by testers the usual descriptions for a red wine such as intense, spicy and deep.
One of the most famous cases of blind testing is known as the Judgment of Paris: in 1976 French judges blind-tasted wines from France and California. Against all expectations, Californian wines beat the famous French wines.
First of all the shape of a wine glass enhances the flavor having a fine impact on the perception of the wine bouquet. If the bowl size is rightly chosen, it will affect positively in how the aroma raises the top of the wine when drinking it.
Tulip, beaker, or egg shaped glasses are the most useful in wine tasting.
For example a red wine has to be served in a glass with a larger opened bowl so to allow wine to better aerate and to distribute its aroma. A white wine has to be served in a narrower glass with an elongated bowl in order to preserve its colder temperature and also to exalt its flavors.
Champagnes and sparkling wines are usually served in a flute: this shape allows the gas from natural bubbles to flow up in a longer time.
A dessert wine is usually strong and intense, so if you use a small glass with a small bowl, you’ll sip it in moderation without getting drunk.
The temperature that a wine is served at, can greatly affect its taste and smell. Lower temperatures emphasize acidity and tannins while changing aromas. Higher temperatures minimize acidity and tannin while increasing the aromatics.