I've been saying for the last week that I would do a blog post on the wine tasting that my wife and I hosted last weekend, and being the man of my word that I am, here it is.
The grand plan for this tasting was to take people with varying degrees of wine experience, have them each bring a bottle of red wine, and drink a lot of wine. I really wanted to expose some of my friends who were not as experienced with wine to some different varietals, in the hopes that this would help them identify some different types of wine that they liked. Overall, I think it was a success.
Amazingly enough, we somehow ended up without a single duplicate varietal. The wines that we tasted were -
- 2008 Lindeman's Pinot Noir
- 2004 Ventisquero Reserva Merlot
- 2006 Terrazas de los Andes Malbec
- 2007 Coppola Drectors Cut River Creek Zinfandel
- 2007 Dalas Cotes-du-Rhone
- 2008 Mandola Dolcetto
- 2006 Red Diamond Cabernet Sauvignon
- 2007 Oak Grove Petite Sirah
It's really fun to do a tasting like this, because you really get a feel for how everyone's palate is different. There wasn't really a single wine that was uniformly enjoyed by everyone. There were certainly some that more or less people enjoyed, but it was clear that everyone has their own tastes.
I would say that the overall winners at our tasting were the Pinot Noir, the Zinfandel, the Dolcetto, and the Cotes-du-Rhone. I really enjoyed throwing this tasting party, and I plan on doing more in the upcoming months. There were a lot of people who I would have liked to have had join in the tasting, but we just didn't have room for everyone in our apartment. I may have to find somewhere willing to host the event in the future.
I have some ideas about the format for future tastings, but I would love to get some feedback on fun things to try in the future. What are some stories that you have about tastings that you have participated in? Any thoughts on good places to have a tasting?
we can always host a party
I have never hosted a wine tasting party before but would love to hear about how your formatted yours. How did you select the wines? Did you have all your participants maintain a scoring card? Thanks!
We didn’t do anything too fancy with this particular tasting. A lot of the people who were going to be coming were pretty new to wine, so I thought that I would just have everyone bring a bottle of red wine. I tried to stay in communication with everyone so that we could get a good variety. It worked out really well. We did have everyone keep a simple scoring card. The main point was to get everyone to try as many different things as possible and see what they liked.
I am starting to work on planning my next tasting party, and I think that we will probably pick a variety and try some different wines that feature that variety. Should be fun.
That is a great idea to have all your guests bring a bottle of wine. I never thought of that! It really involves them all in the process, which I think is especially important if someone is new to wine. Less intimidating and it engages more with the individual’s comfort zone, at least for part of the tasting.
I think that having everyone bring a bottle did really help get the guests more engaged in the event. We also asked everyone to share something that they had learned about the wine, whether it be info on the varietal, the region where the wine was produced, the vintage, the producer, or the wine itself. It was really fun to hear what everybody had to say about the wine that they brought.