How to Describe Wine - Part 2 of 2
This week’s content is all about the FUN and creative side of describing wine. Last week, in How to Describe Wine: Part 1 of 2, we focused on the foundation of our descriptions: a wine’s structure. Now it’s time to bring your own unique perspective and expression to the composition of your descriptions. We’re introducing specific flavor profiles related to fruit, flowers, herbs, spices, oak, minerals, and the other nuances we’re learning to detect as we gain experience tasting wine.
As usual, you can expect me to break a few rules when it comes to the content I’m presenting to you. I believe in embracing the limitless details of the world around us and applying the things that resonate with the way we talk about wine. There are millions of colors, textures, and sensory experiences out there to discover and no two people perceive any of it in the exact same way.
When it comes to fruit, for example, there are so many to explore. Beyond the individual fruits themselves, there are countless conditions each can be found in. In the image above, we see a wine that may be described as having flavors of strawberry. At this level, the question becomes, “what kind of strawberry?” This common fruit can appear in countless ways or conditions. We have fresh strawberries, of course. But what about dried ones? What about a strawberry popsicle or sorbet? Strawberry jam? Strawberry candy? That’s only the beginning but it’s so important! Most of us have a familiar sense of what this fruit tastes like. It’s when we dive into the specific nature and condition of the fruit that the picture we paint about the wine we are tasting transforms and we can transport our audience to new levels of understanding.
As for our adjectives, this can be a lot of fun too! Some adjectives describe the condition of the fruit or other flavors, as in, dried strawberries. In other cases, the adjective gives a description of the structure or style of the wine. For example, words like “bold” or “velvety” or “elegant”. These words give personality to our wines!
I invite you to dive deep into the colors, aromas, and flavors of the world around us. By intentionally committing these details to memory, you can apply them to your wine descriptions and give someone who has never had the wine a real sense of what it looks, smells, and tastes like. It’s a lot of fun and can quickly turn into a lifelong practice and pleasure.
I sincerely hope you’ll consider sharing your journey with me and the rest of The Wine Ship community by posting your thoughts, descriptions, questions, and comments in the section below this post! Let’s learn together!
Cheers, Montana Rae
