Last Saturday night, my husband and I hosted a Wine Tasting Party for five guests. It was supposed to be Wine and/or Beer Tasting, since we assumed that not all of our guests would like wine. But only one couple brought beer, and everybody agreed to just drink Pinot Noir for the evening.
My husband had made a delicious spinach/artichoke dip, and we served it in bread bowls. I also brought out a variety of cheeses and artisan breads. A bit carb-heavy, but delicious! The Parmesan cheese was particularly good with the wines.
Everyone got a scorecard and a wineglass, plus their plateful of goodies (which we later brought to the table for easy reach). We did not hide labels, but instead recorded the name and year of each wine. My husband poured a little of one wine into each glass, and we all studied our goblets. (We repeated the process for each wine.)
We examined the color – ranging from clear red to deep garnet. We learned about legs – the viscosity of the wine, which also indicates the alcohol content; those of us who had the cut-crystal goblets had a tougher time seeing the wine cling to the glass. We stuck our noses in deep, and inhaled the bouquet – did we smell grass or oak or mushrooms? We read the label to see if we could tell. Everybody took a sip with a mouthful of air, and let the wine wash through our mouths – we tasted jam and cherry and once tasted licorice. We commented on the aftertaste. Some left our tongues feeling dry, and some stayed on the palate a long time. We all finished our glasses and sometimes had a little more before starting the process again with the next bottle.
Next to each of these categories, we wrote down scores – for color, bouquet, taste and finish. Some recorded only numbers, while others of us wrote long explanations. When all of the wines had been tasted, we each totaled the scores and ranked them. We tried five different wines (one we tried very cold vs room temperature to see the difference). We all agreed which was our least favorite, but the rest of the results were mixed.
We ended the evening with champagne and chocolate fondue and dippers (strawberries, bananas, pineapple, marshmallows, Nilla Wafers). And the beers – locally brewed – were tasted and evaluated by several guests.
A fun time was had by all. And the leftover bread made great French toast this morning!
Sunny with a Chance of Clouds 