Very Like A Whale -- The Art of Wine Tasting

Hamlet. Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in the shape of a camel?
Polonius. By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed.
Hamlet. Methinks it is like a weasel.
Polonius. It is backed like a weasel.
Hamlet. Or like a whale?
Polonius. Very like a whale.
Hamlet, Act III, Scene II

David's practical iconoclastic tips for successful wine tasting.

  1. You are tasting wine to learn what you like. There is nothing wrong with disliking a wine.
  2. There are no right answers. You will never have Robert Parker's taste buds, so how the wine tastes to you is all that matters. Even when there are genuine differences, if you cannot perceive them or dislike them, they are useless to you. As a corollary principle, pay a higher price only if you are tasting a measurable quality difference as you go up the ladder.
  3. Don't be intimidated by ratings, especially their false precision. A wine rated 90 will taste quite a bit better than one rated 80, but one rated 87 may be indistinguishable from one rated 83, and you may well like the lower-rated wine better. If you must ask about ratings, do so after you have tasted.
  4. Smell it. Smell it a lot. Your tongue can sense only four tastes -- sweet, sour, salt, and bitter -- but your nose can handle thousands of distinct aromas. The prominent proboscis takes the most pleasure from wine.
  5. Taste is what wine is about. So while you might select what wines to taste based on winery, grape, or region, once it hits your mouth forget all that stuff.
  6. Wine is like a Rorschach blot with a friendly psychiatrist. Salespeople will almost always encourage you by echoing or ratifying positive adjectives you offer, no matter how silly ('very like a whale').
  7. Wine is a food that comes from a fruit. Most often it echoes the tastes of other fruits -- apple, pear, lemon for whites; cherry, raspberry, plums for reds. Think about fruit as you taste the wine.
  8. Verbalizing your impressions helps you remember a wine later on. While there are commonly used terms, some of which have actual meaning, they help you only if you can associate them with particular tastes in your mouth. So develop your own vocabulary.
  9. When tasting, identify foods the wine would taste good with. This is important, because unlike other forms of alcohol, wine improves the taste of food and food improves the taste of wine.
  10. When selecting words, use those that connote your feelings, either positive or negative. (I once described a bad champagne as Chateau de rubber tubing.)
  11. When in doubt as to a wine description, and if you want to look sophisticated, use words that would make sense if applied to a person, preferably one of the opposite sex. (There's a lot of sublimated and not-so-sublimated eroticism in wine tasting and its rituals.) You can indulge flights of fancy as a joke, for instance by describing a wine as "self-important but unable to sustain the illusion throughout." Now, this may actually mean something, but whether it does or not, it sounds knowledgeable.
  12. Terroir is a French word that means, essentially, dirt -- the elements of taste that come from the soil (and sometimes taste like it). Too much terroir yields 'barnyard,' which means, essentially, shit. (A famous wine critic began a chapter with, "Good burgundy smells like shit." Fortunately, it doesn't taste like shit.)
  13. Wine hits your mouth in three distinct phases, the front (initial impression, heavily influenced by aroma), the middle (as you swish it around), and at the finish (as you swallow and thereafter). A given wine can taste quite different in each phase, and you should be alert for the distinctions.
  14. Wine is more reliably tasted when it is warm -- warmth brings out the aromas and cold can disguise taste flaws.
  15. The more wine you've tasted, the better the next one tastes (generally) but the less reliable your opinion. Don't buy late in the day!
  16. In between wineries, drink lots of water and please eat bread or a similar neutral carbohydrate.
  17. You're better off not even tasting something in which you have no interest. If you know you dislike gewurztraminer, pass it by. Otherwise you'll confuse your mouth and dull your taste.
  18. If you dislike a wine but are pressed to describe why (which happens seldom), you can always say, It's not a style I like.
  19. Never feel under pressure to buy. (At least in America.) If they are charging a tasting fee, you paid for the tasting. And if they offer it free (as is common in Sonoma), they want you to know their winery. If you want a kind gesture in escaping, always ask who their distributor is in your area, and take a price list.

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ã Copyright 2002 David Alexander Smith