Have you ever seen those stiff upper-lipped types doing a spot of the old wine tasting malarkey? You know the form – sip, swill, spit. Yuck! Well this information has been written to help you understand the form should you ever find yourself in a situation where you need to know what to do. And don’t go thinking “I’ll never have to do any wine-tasting” because you just don’t know that for sure and the last thing you want is to be caught unaware.

So, on with the tasting…

Study The Wine

Pick up your glass as elegantly as possible. There are two ways this can be done.

a) For chilled wines – hold the glass by the stem and don’t even touch the bowl.

b) For wine served at room temperature – pick up the glass by the bowl and hold it cupped in your palm, the stem between your middle two fingers.

Now that you have the glass comfortably in your hand, hold it at a slight angle against something white. If your hostess is worth her salt, she’ll have covered the table in white linen specifically for this purpose (although it does look nice, too).

Be careful not to tip the glass too far – unless you’re willing to replace an expensive linen tablecloth, that is. You may also need to adjust the distance from your eyes that the glass is held at. Most find that holding it at almost arm’s length is a good starting point although the very short sighted who are also absent minded enough to have left their eye glasses at home may find themselves having to hold the glass almost in front of their noses.

Once you’ve found the correct position, study the colour and clarity of the wine. Now you may well believe that wine’s either red, pink, or white but I’m afraid, if that’s the case, you’re very much mistaken. Wines can be green, yellow, gold, pink, purple, or even black. Evidently, the colour of the wine will indicate the type of grape it was made from – like me, you, and Jack on the street are likely to know that!

Clarity indicates age. Young wines are more see through and cloudiness can mean there’s something wrong. If that’s the case, I’d suggest putting it back on the table and giving your hostess once of those ‘down your nose’ type looks.

The reason why you’re studying the colour and clarity looks has absolutely no bearing on how the wine will taste but a proper connoisseur enjoys the beauty of wine as well as its taste and …

The Bouquet

No, we’re not talking about the bunch of flowers a bride carries with her down the aisle, we’re talking the smell of wine. Sometimes, if the people at the wine tasting are really posh, they might call it ‘The Nose’.

Still holding your glass in the correct manner, lower your hand somewhat whilst bring your glass to a level position and rotate your wrist so that the wine swirls gently within the bowl. You might want to leave these instructions at this point to go to the kitchen and practise this step with a wineglass half filled with water. After all, it’s just as well to know for sure that you aren’t going to spill expensive red wine over your hostess’s spanking new Axminster.

To swill wine properly, very little wrist movement is actually needed. Just very slight circular movements combined with a right-left movement should do the trick.

The idea behind all this swilling is to bring the wine’s aroma out of the wine itself and into the empty part of the bowl thus allowing it to be smelled and savoured. This is why wine glasses are bulbous. The wide bowl has ample room for swilling while the narrow edge ‘captures’ the bouquet. Clever, eh?

Move your glass to your nose as elegantly as you’re able and bring it in slightly beneath the tip. Inhale deeply. Savour for a few moments and then inhale again. It’s a good idea to exhale between those two inhalations or you might find yourself going dizzy. Do it too often and you’ll faint.

You may now move your glass away from your nose.

At this point, it’s appropriate to make some kind of comment. Don’t imagine you’ll fool anybody into believing you’re an expert but at least you can make it sound as if you’ve actually drunk a glass of decent wine before. Why should the other guests need to know that most of your wine costs £3.99 at the Co-Op?

Something like “mmmm, rich and fruity” or “oooh, lovely and light” will probably do the trick. When talking about red wine, ‘rich’ is usually a good word to use – if the wine’s white, go for ‘light’.

The Actual Tasting

You’ve probably been looking forward to this bit but whatever you do, remember that wine tasting is about taking small sips and not guzzle it down like there’s no tomorrow.

This bit’s actually trickier than you’d expect so you might want to do some more practising.

Bring your glass to your lips, open them slightly and take a small sip. Now close you mouth and roll the wine around on your tongue for a few seconds before allowing it to slide slowly down your throat AND AT THE SAME TIME EXHALE!

The trouble with exhaling whilst swallowing is that some of the liquid might come shooting through your nostrils. Not a pretty sight and, again, think of the Axminster!

If you fancy, you can always take a second sip at this point but never a third. No matter how good that one particular wine is, it’s time to move on to the next.

Other Stuff Worth Knowing

Apart from bottles and glasses, the table will probably hold plates of cheese or, occasionally, sherbet. They’re not there to snack on; they’re used between wines to clean out the taste of the last wine you tasted. Just a little at a time is all that’s needed. Do like a mouse and nibble!

Wear something comfortable and preferably something that doesn’t carry a designer label. After all, if you spill red wine down the front of your best frock, you’re not going to be happy, are you?

That’s it. You’re now clued up enough to pop along to your very first wine tasting party without making a complete idiot of yourself.

Enjoy!

 One of the most popular imported wine styles in America is Pinot grigio. Nearly all of the Pinot grigio consumed in the US comes from Italy, but as we shall see this is likely to change soon. Pinot grigio is very popular with consumers, but it receives mixed reviews from wine judges and wine critics.
One reason may be that wines made from Pinot grigio do not have a consistent and distinctive varietal character. Consumers are just attracted to the crisp which goes well with a wide variety of foods.

Another problem is that there are two names for the variety in common use. The names Pinot Grigio and Pinot Gris mean Grey Pinot in Italian and French respectively. ‘Pinot’ refers to the characteristic pine one shaped bunch of this group of varieties.

In Australia, winemakers, marketers and wine writers haven’t really sorted out which name to call the variety. Some have dodged the issue and refer to “Pinot G.” This variety closely is related to the much better Pinot Noir variety and is believed to be a mutation of Pinot Noir. In fact in the vineyard Pinot grigio is difficult to distinguish from its putative ancestor until the berries ripen when those of the grigio will have much less pigment. There is another variety, Pinot blanc which has little or no pigment in the berries.

There is considerable clonal variation within the variety. Jancis Robinson says that the variety hardly knows if it is a dark or a light grape. It has several synonyms including Burot and Malvoise in France and Rulander and Tokayer in Germany. In Europe the variety is widely planted. Given the inherent variation and geographic dispersion it is hardly surprising that a wide range of wine styles are produced from it. In Alsace under the name of Tokay d’Alsace, it produces a rich, almost oily wine. In Northern Italy the Pinot Grigio’s are light and even spritzig. Under the name of Rulander in Germany it produces wines somewhat similar to white burgundies.

The variety has attracted serious interest in Australia only over the past few years. It is now producing some remarkable wines in regions such as the Mornington Peninsula, Geelong and the Adelaide Hills. Casella wines in the Riverina wine region are very interested in this variety. They believe they can make first class wines even in warmer wine regions, and are devoting some resources to developing a wine suitable for export to the US. Remember Casella is the company who developed the yellowtail range of wines which exploded onto the US market a couple of years ago.

There is a great deal of experimentation with the variety and it may take several more years before the optimal combination of terroir and winemaking technique emerges. In the meantime some great wines are already available for those who are looking for new experience. The style varies from light bodied and fairly straight forward to rich and complex wines that are almost overwhelming in their voluptuousness. This is one occasion when reading some tasting notes about a particular wine before buying is worthwhile.

Tasting flight is a term used by wine tasters to describe a selection of wines, usually between three and eight glasses, but sometimes as many as fifty, presented for the purpose of sampling and comparison.

Glasses used in tasting flights are usually smaller than normal wine glasses, and they are often presented on top of a sheet of paper which identifies each wine and gives some information about each grape or vineyard. This format allows tasters to compare and contrast different wines.

An extended tasting will typically consist of several flights, each with a theme. For example, several wines from the same region and vintage would comprise a flight, or several wines from the same variety but different regions. It is typically the responsibility of the tasting organizer to select flights that offer maximum illumination of similarities and differences, while at the same time making sure the progression of flights is appropriate.

Vertical and horizontal wine tastings are wine tasting events that are arranged to highlight differences between similar wines.

In a vertical tasting, different vintages of the same wine type from the same winery are tasted. This emphasizes differences between various vintages.
In a horizontal tasting, the wines are all from the same vintage but are from different wineries. Keeping wine variety or type and wine region the same helps emphasize differences in winery styles.

To ensure impartial judgment of a wine, it should be served blind — that is, without the taster having seen the label or bottle shape. Blind tasting may also involve serving the wine from a black wine glass to mask the color of the wine. A taster’s judgment can be prejudiced by knowing details of a wine, such as geographic origin, price, reputation, color, or other considerations.

Scientific research has long demonstrated the power of suggestion in perception as well as the strong effects of expectancies. For example, people expect more expensive wine to have more desirable characteristics than less expensive wine. When given wine that they are falsely told is expensive they virtually always report it as tasting better than the very same wine when they are told that it is inexpensive. French researcher Frédéric Brochet “submitted a mid-range Bordeaux in two different bottles, one labeled as a cheap table wine, the other bearing a grand cru etiquette” and obtained predictable results. Tasters described the supposed grand cru as “woody, complex, and round” and the supposed cheap wine as “short, light, and faulty.” Blind tastings have repeatedly demonstrated that price is not highly correlated with the evaluations made by most people who taste wine.[citation needed]

Similarly, people have expectations about wines because of their geographic origin, producer, vintage, color, and many other factors. For example, when Brochet served a white wine he received all the usual descriptions: “fresh, dry, honeyed, lively.” Later he served the same wine dyed red and received the usual red terms: “intense, spicy, supple, deep.”

The world of wine has numerous myths and exaggerations that are only now being disproven scientifically, yet they influence perceptions and expectancies. Not even professional tasters are immune to the strong effects of expectancies. Therefore, the need for blind tasting continues.

In 1991, Inniskillin’s 1989 Icewine won the Prix d’Honneur at the prestigious VinExpo, in Bordeaux, France. At the St. Catharines Wine Tasting of 2005, a blind tasting of four named growth Bordeaux and twelve Ontario Cabernet and Cabernet blends was held at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario. The fifty Canadian judges were wine writers for Canadian publications, wine educators and students at Brock University, Ontario vintners, and included three certified wine judges. The tasting ranked five Canadian wines above four wines from Bordeaux. The third-ranking entry (an Ontario wine) cost $14.95 whereas the 12th-ranking entry (a Bordeaux wine) cost $85.00. It is important to note that the price for the Bordeaux wine was artificially inflated due to import taxes and tariffs, and was widely available in the US and Europe for closer to $35 US.

Despite the awards, not all Canadian wine is VQA. “International blends” use a high proportion of foreign bulk wine to produce a product which is labelled as “Cellared in Canada”, “Product of Canada”, or “Vinted in Canada”. Some of the wine industry’s organizations, and respected wine writers in Canada and abroad, are quite concerned about the blending practices of some producers.

Bar stools are as important as the best wine in your bar. It is said that if you don’t get a good stool to sit on, you won’t enjoy the drink. By a good seat it means that not only it should be comfortable it should be attractive too besides having other minor and major specifications. Nowadays, there are lots and lots of options available, may be the number match to that of the number of the brands of beer available in the whole world. But the irony is that not many match all the required specifications. The options available in the material that we can use are metal, wood, bamboo, iron, etc. The styles available are retro, swivel, whether it has back or not, different metal colors, different designer fabrics, whether it is meant for indoors or outdoors and so on and so forth. We as the owner of our bar, we are the best judge of our bar and hence we are the only one who can decide, which is the best for ourselves. At times we want to make our own bar stools to cater our need. Here are some tips to make one yourself.

First of all you have to decide between the material and that in turn will also decide about the portability. Obviously the wood ones offer easy portability. Similarly if you think that children would be using that too often then bamboo ones would be better. You might also want to consider wood ones in that case. If you are an art lover and want to have some carvings and designs, then we would recommend you wood ones. If your house is of ethnic style then it is the wrought iron that will suit your need the most.

Then we think the height is the most important that you should consider. Although people have their own standards but it all depends on the height of the counter. Remember that calculating wrong seat heights is one of the most important reasons why people are unsatisfied with their stools. You should leave anywhere between 9 to 13 inches from the top of the seat to the counter.

The next is the style and color. If you want to choose from the innumerable designs or you want to give stress on comfort or you want something to write on the back then the swivel is the best for you. You can carve anything from the name of the basketball team you support to your wife’s name. The color-coding will depend on the amount of light available in the bar and the color of your walls although black can suit every background.

Now let us talk about blend. The best among the blend is the wood and the metal. In this category some people make a metal frame with a wooden seat. In some others, the metal seat on the metal frame is carved and painted in such a way that it gives an impression of wooden seat, which means a durability of, wooden with a visual picture of wood.

The Australian wine industry is experiencing a tough time as oversupply of product is creating downward pressure on prices. Large producers have had their well publicised problems, leading to merger and takeover activity. Small and medium producers are feeling the pinch. Canadian wineries stand to experience the same.

Over the past twelve months I have discussed internet marketing with quite a number of smaller winery operators here in Canada. The overwhelming experience seems to be “We have a web site but it doesn’t generate any sales.”

This experience mirrors that of other small business where the overwhelming majority fail to get significant benefit from their Internet presence. During the research I conducted as background to developing my own website I have visited several hundred wine related sites. It is not hard to see why they are not succeeding in generating sales.

Despite this gloomy record I feel that the Internet has lots to offer small to medium wineries in their marketing efforts. Some people are making sales through the internet: the challenge for the others is to get their sites going.

Small and medium wineries have several advantages that they can exploit to enhance their sales. Many are growing alternative varieties, and thus have a natural point of difference to build their marketing around.

Tourism is a booming industry and wine is an integral part of the tourist experience in most regions. An intelligent and integrated approach can exploit powerful marketing synergies.
For several reasons the Australian wine industry stands to reap great benefits from the internet, at least for those who are able to use it effectively.

My optimism is based on several emerging trends:
1. There is obviously a much greater volume of wine being produced, both by the big wineries and the plethora of small and medium producers, new and old. The success the export trade has thus far kept problems of oversupply to a minimum, but the environment for marketing Canadian and Australian wines is certainly becoming much more competitive.
2. There is increased diversity in the wine produced in Australia and Canada. New varieties have been introduced into emerging regions, the Rhone varieties into the Nagambie Lakes region and the Italian varieties into the King Valley, to name just the more prominent.
3. A growing number of consumers are looking for something new. There is a limit to how many marginally different chardonnays or shirazes they can drink and still remain interested.
4. Wine consumers are faced with more choice which is driving a thirst for knowledge about new wine experiences.
5. The Internet is primarily an information distributing medium, and consumers seek information about wine more than most other products
6. E-commerce is growing as more consumers are becoming comfortable with the internet. Warning! There is much more to e-commerce than having a website with attractive graphics. Too many businesses are overspending and underacheiving on the internet.
7. There is still a wide gap between those are producing something new and those who want to find something new.

Like any transforming technology the effects of the internet will take many years to unfold. There are hundreds of lessons still to be learnt. But with persistence, some Australian wineries will gain great benefits from marketing their wine on the web.

While most of Canada is too cold for grape growing, Canadian wine is produced in Southern Ontario and southern British Columbia. The two largest wine producing regions are the Niagara Peninsula in Ontario and the Okanagan in British Columbia. Other wine producing areas include the shores of Lake Erie and Prince Edward County in Ontario, and the Similkameen valley, southern Fraser River valley, southern Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands in British Columbia. There are small scale productions of grapes and wine in southern Quebec and Nova Scotia. The Canadian wine industry also vinifies imported grapes and juice.

Icewine, which can be produced reliably in most Canadian wine regions, is the most recognized product on an international basis. Canada produced 75.9 million litres of wine in 2002 (0.3% of world production).