Wine experts, how did you learn?

Glaucus

Glaucus

Glaucus

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Joined
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I know there's a few clued up on wine. How did you learn about wines and more importantly how did you learn which wine matches which food. Is there good books on this? did you take some courses?

I've been on a fair few wine tastings and know a lot more about how to taste wine, but that's about it. Not how to identify good wines or how to match them to food types.
 
it usually says on the back of the bottle what food goes with the wine, usually enough for me :o

but heavy reds go well with red meat and cheese, whites with white meat and rose with duck, pasta, etc..
 
for me, good wine=tasty wine, as mjt said red with red meat, white with white meat, rose with anything else, but it all comes down to personal preference for me
 
Perhaps you could visit a vineyard or something, do a little research into the manufacturing process and such. Might help you to explain the different tastes e.g. "This wine is ......... because .......... and goes well with .......... because .......... and ............ [do/have/cause] ..............

That said, just try everything and decide what you like and don't like. I remember some wine buffs saying they write down everything they taste in a notebook, with notes on taste, smell and such.
 
apeZ said:
That said, just try everything and decide what you like and don't like. I remember some wine buffs saying they write down everything they taste in a notebook, with notes on taste, smell and such.
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I've started doing that. As I simply can't remember what I like and don't. Now there are some wines that obviusly match certain foods. Like I tried a dessert wine which had an undertone of burnt sugar. Which would taste amazing with any caramel type pudding.

But for the most part things are a lot more subtle than that,
 
Join a wine club. My ultimate boss at the moment is hugely into wine tasting and has a myriad of qualifications in it. He runs a wine tasting group. If you email him, I know he has a load of Wine tasting podcasts that he highly recommends.
 
I worked for a while at an international wine merchants and I believe the highest accolade for wine is a Master of Wine (lol, no joke: http://www.mastersofwine.org/)

There are some other, more simpler quals you need first, more info: Wine and Spirit Education Trust.

IMO the above are, for if you really are into wine, I suggest just joining an informal wine group for now and getting some experience with others in the group.
 
AcidHell2 said:
do you think it would be useful to go to something like one of the tesco wine nights.
http://www.tescowinefair.com/index.html

Master of wine, now there's a title.. :D
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That would be perfect for an intro to wine tasting, I was only ever involved in order processing , but we used to get a wine tasting session every Friday afternoon!!!! Needless to say, it was a very good job! Whenever a new customer mail campaign was issued = we'd off course need to have tasted the wines and spirits that were advertised in the mailing!(Good excuse IMO :D)
 
MattandJet said:
I worked for a while at an international wine merchants and I believe the highest accolade for wine is a Master of Wine (lol, no joke: http://www.mastersofwine.org/)

There are some other, more simpler quals you need first, more info: Wine and Spirit Education Trust.

IMO the above are, for if you really are into wine, I suggest just joining an informal wine group for now and getting some experience with others in the group.
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Same here. I have the WSET higher diploma through the old employer.
 
What are the wset course like? is it like a training course that you just do a test at the end? Are they worth, do you actually learn a lot. or just learn how to pass the test,.
 
To be honest, a lot of it will just be trying a LOT of different wines, and taking notes on their origin, grape type, and any other distinguishing marks. Then you get to know what you like, what you don't, and what to look out for in unfamiliar wines... You might even start to recognise years for being 'good' or 'bad' from any one region, as it depends on the weather.

The point of a dessert wine is to be really quite sickly to a fresh pallette - because if you ate some kind of sugary dessert and then took a sip of a normal wine, it would suddenly taste REALLY sharp as the sweet food has spoilt it for you... So remember when trying dessert wines that they'll taste completely different again when eating it with say a creme brulee ;)

Oooh. Fancy a nice glass, now...
 
AcidHell2 said:
What are the wset course like? is it like a training course that you just do a test at the end? Are they worth, do you actually learn a lot. or just learn how to pass the test,.
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There a re a few and they're kind of like OU courses. You buy textbooks and you sit an exam at the end of it.

I found them very interesting and obviously the higher you go, the more detail they go into e.g. for the basic level (can't remember what that's called), you're expected to know roughly what kind of wines you would get from grape varietals and also styles from different countries/regions. At the "higher diploma" level, you're expected to know how the concept of "terroir" effects wines, about vine diseases and their effects on grapes and a whole bunch of other stuff.

I'm not sure how important sitting the exams would be IRL, as you can get the study packs and learn how much you want.
 
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