Everything You Need To Know About Wine Tasting

Knowing exactly what you are pouring down your neck in the name of getting tipsy is a skill we should all hone. Put snobby ideas of wine quaffing to the back of your mind, as there is nothing wrong with knowing what you like and when you want it. Like good sex, sometimes you have to do something a little bit strange to really enjoy it!

We have all seen 'experts' on TV sloshing wine around talking about a glass of wine's 'nose' and thought 'what are they on about?' Well there is a reason why they make such a show of themselves tasting a glass of wine rather than downing it. Here is our three step guide to help you find out if you really are a Lambrini girl or if your pallet is ready for the finer things in life...

Look
Start by holding the wine glass by the stem so you can get a good look at the wine in your glass. You may be thinking, why would I want to do that? Well the colour can give you a clue as to the age of the wine. White wines generally gain colour as they age. Red wines lose colour. That is, young red wines are more red or burgundy while older wines tend to show a hint of tawny brown around the rim.

Smell
Sense of smell accounts for 75% of taste sensation - so we recommend that you have a sniff!

The best way to get a whiff is to swirl it. This releases molecules in the wine, allowing you to smell the wines aroma, if you want to be fancy call it the 'bouquet' or 'nose' of the wine.

A good tip is that younger wines tend to smell more of fruit, while older wines are likely to smell more spicy or savoury.

Taste
Now we get to the good bit and one that you are probably familiar with. Start by taking a medium mouthful of wine and give it a quick swirl around your mouth to give all your taste-buds a good chance to try it too. Whatever you do don't spit it out! That is how the experts do it, but people who enjoy wine drink it.

Don't be afraid of expressing what you think about the taste - whatever comes to your mind while you taste it is right.

Now you have the basics down here, are a 5 extra tips:

1.) Don't store your white wine in the fridge for more than a few hours before you plan to drink it. Keeping a white wine at an artificially low temperature for days or weeks will have a bad effect on the wine's aroma and taste.

2.) The quickest way to chill white wine is to put the bottle in a container of ice and water. Rather than taking 2 hours to chill in the fridge it will take about half an hour.

3.) A good tip for opening sparkling wine is to hold the bottle at a 45 degree angle, hold the cork still and gently twist the bottle with your other hand. By moving the cork and not the bottle you have more control and are less likely to injure yourself or anyone else in the vicinity.

4.) As tempting as it is to full your glass to the top, there is a good reason why you should hold back. Filling up to a third of the glass leaves plenty of room in the glass to swirl and for the wine to breathe.

5.) Finally a tip for finding the wine for you. Try lots of different wines and if you like it, try to work out what you like about it. Read the side of the bottle to find out what the blurb says about it. Is it a medium dry white? If so, try others and see if you like them. Maybe it's a powerful oakey red? Next time you're in the off-license take a look for others the same. If this is too complicated, then try to work out your favourite grape variety (e.g. chardonnay, sauvignon blanc or pinot grigio for white, or merlot, cabernet sauvignon or shiraz for red) to make your next selection easier.

Please feel free to take these tips as an excuse to buy lots and lots of wine! (And drink responsibly of course)