Hey guys, I hope you managed to apply your new set of skills and impress someone last time around, if not, then it's Friday, and YES, I am about to give you some more new information that will help you to become that "wine charmer"
“I cook with wine; sometimes I even add it to the food.”
― W.C. Fields
So last time around I gave you some basic rules on how to match your food with your wine (that is of course if you have any food with your wine).
I had quite a few responses and some of the readers asked me to go more into detail on understanding how to taste wine.
Off we go then:
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To break it down, wine can be understood by the body and the color. And those 2 things are closely connected.
Now you may say : "hold on pal, you ain't fooling me here, there are only 2 colors...". Well you are almost right, but in fact by breaking the wine further down into the body category, we will get at least 11 colors (here I must say, that different experts argue different numbers).
So before I give you a picture for better understanding, what is a body?
Well the body is exactly what influences on how the wine will taste!
It is broken down into 3 categories:
Light bodied - generally under 12.5% of alcohol, crispy and re-freshing, like Riesling (mmmmm...)
Medium bodied - those have between 12.5% - 13.5% of alcohol, most rose wines fall into this category. Also the well liked Sauvignon Blanc
Heavy bodied - those wines have over 13.5% of alcohol, mostly red, although a Chardonnay is a full bodied wine. The taste is accompanied by mouth coating. A good example is Merlot or my personal favorite - Tempranillo
Now for those of you, who really want to understand this, please look at the following picture:
(From left to right, you can see a light bodied to a heavy bodied wine. Followed by a young wine, and an old wine. Yes, they have a seperate color)
“The HAPPIEST people don’t have the BEST of everything… They just drink WINE.”
― Tanya Masse
I mentioned an 11th color, well I personally put rose wine on its own, hence 11 colors.
Now that you know this, how do you use this?
- Well, first of all when you about to taste a wine, stop for a minute and look at the color, try to swirl the glass. Heavy bodied wines will tend to stick to the walls of the glass, whether lighter wines will not.
- Heavy wines will be darker in color, and have a much more "mature" taste
- Heavy wines will have a sweeter taste in comparison to a more acidic taste of lighter wines
- Lighter wines are tenderer but more "prickly"
Remember the rule, the heavier the food, the heavier the wine? Use it!
Think about what you are going to eat, look at what is written on the label, and simply match those 2 together!
“Love is like wine, drink it as you rhyme.”
― Santosh Kalwar
