- NC, please help me upload some pictures of that night - :)We went for wine tasting that night at Taman Desa, turns out pretty interesting! Let me share our experience with you guys..
The most important thing to have while tasting wine, is
good company. I don't think I need to explain why..
Do you know that wines have to be served in certain temperatures? Room temperature that is. Not Malaysia room temperature of course. The room temperature as where the
old world is, Europe, where wines were first produced, at 7 - 18°C. The basic temperature principals, the coller the wine is, the less it will smell and vice versa. The lower temperature will also emphasize acidity and tannins. Tannins makes your toungue "
kelat"; like when u eat an unripe mango near the skin. There are 3 simple steps to taste wine Simplistically,
Optimal Wine Serving Temperatures :
White Wines: 7-10 °C
Red Wines: 10-18 °C
Rosé Wines: 7-13 °C
Sparkling Wines: 6-11 °C
Fortified Wines: 13-20 °C
YOU CAN IMAGINE HOW COLD IT WAS THAT NIGHT!
There are 3 simple steps to taste wine; Sight,Smell and Taste.
Sight
Tilt the glass about 45°, holding the stem of the glass. Put it against a white background, usually your napkin. Look at the depth of color, the base, and the hue, the light ring on the top.
White wines gets deeper in color while aging. But the dessert wines are darker in color even when they're young. Red wines on the contrary, are dark in color when young and loses color when they age.
Swirl the glass a little, you will see that there's tears trickling down the glass. This, also known as Legs, indicates the level of sugar and alcohol in the wine. The higher the content, the slower the tears drop.
SmellPut your nose into the glass. Nosing is the most important step of all as you will be able to smell he grape variety, age, whether it's fruity or earthy and the depth and intensity of the wine. Swirl it some more for more aroma to come out from the glass. We tasted a white wine that night. Smell so nice of passion fruit. It smelled so familiar to me initially, but I wasn't able to tell what it was. And passion fruit was my favourite!
TasteWhen tasting, take a small sip and gargle (not vigorously!) for the wine to cover your whole tongue so that you're able to taste it fully. Mix in some air, oh well quite hard to describe, ask us to show you! A long taste meaning that the taste stays in your mouth longer and vice versa, a shorter taste for those that taste don't remain. A dry wine is wine with much tannin contents and the opposite is a sweet wine. Sometimes wine can combine many other tastes, smooth/ buttery when eggs are used to clear the wine. Sometimes other fruits are mixed together to get the fragrance as well. A Full bodied wine has a very rich taste while a toned down taste will be described as light bodied.
There was 3 glasses of white wines to taste, from light to dark, young to aged. The lighter one was a dessert wine, has more legs 'cause it was sweeter and smelled very nice. The second has a fainter smell and the last least. The dessert wine earns its name, I like it from the first sip! The older wines tasted with more tannins and my preference is against dryer wines.
Comparatively, when given the reds to taste, I didn't like any! From this class, I've learnt how to appreciate white wine more than red wine, when traditionally we have always drank reds on any occasions.
Come, come, let's gather one day to appreciate wines! We can cook and drink..so that we don't get drunk like the previous time at NC's hse!
