How to drink wine with confidence
You don’t have to be a sommelier to be confident about what you like to drink.
When I started my program at Le Cordon Bleu, I was handed a behemoth of a binder full of reading materials for term one. One of the materials focused on how to properly taste wine, which included a section on spitting. (Yes, we spit out our wine in class. We’re not getting drunk at 11 a.m.) The section was short, and my peers and I still joke about this single sentence: Spit with confidence.
Spitting is uncomfortable and weird, especially when you’re doing it in a public, even professional environment. There’s nothing more embarrassing than spitting and dealing with a line of drool or splatters of red wine on your white shirt, and somehow still trying to look cool in front of all of the other industry experts at a tasting. To spit successfully, you have to spit confidently. It’s the only way to pull off a clean spit.
You could say the same thing about drinking wine…or pretty much anything else in life, for that matter. Drink wine with confidence. Write with confidence. Parent with confidence. Cook with confidence. When you infuse confidence into your body, it’s easier to handle complicated or stressful situations.
This was the mantra I took with me into my exams in December. I studied like a mad woman the weeks before, blind tasting wine twice a week and running through my flashcards every time I had a free moment to do so. I was confident I knew my stuff, and despite the fact that I knew very little about what the exam would be like and how it would go, I walked into that room with confidence. And I passed. (Hallelujah!)
It’s also the mantra I want you to take into the new year when it comes to ordering — and drinking — a bottle of wine.
You don’t have to know everything to be confident about wine.
Wine isn’t only meant for the industry elite or the “wine snobs” of the world. It’s meant for everyone. Yet unlike cooking or parenting or even writing, there aren’t a ton of easy ways to learn about wine. So how does one drink wine with confidence if they have no idea what the f**k they are doing?
The answer is simple. Drink wine and discover what you like. In the same way you order food at a restaurant or read books or watch television shows, you choose the style of cuisine and genres based on what you’ve enjoyed in the past.
Wine can easily be consumed in the same way. You don’t have to know a lot about wine to enjoy it. You just need to take note of your tastes, and to explore more of that.
Three ways to taste and approach wine a little more confidently this year.
Take note of what you like, and keep ordering it.
My husband always thought he hated red wine. He would sip on the red wine I ordered and say “that tastes like a red wine” with a twist of his mouth, and would move back to the cocktail he ordered. That was until he discovered Beaujolais. A red wine from Beaujolais is soft in tannins and jammier in flavor, and is more his cup of tea than a tannic Bordeaux blend or a dusty Chianti. Now that he knows this, when he sees a Beaujolais on a menu, he orders it confidently.
Whether you have a wine that is already a go-to or you’re ready to hunt for something you like, take note of what you enjoy as you taste wines this year and order that with confidence. If you love Sauvignon Blanc from Marlborough, then you’ll likely also love Sancerre or Pouilly-Fumé from the Loire Valley. (Yes, that’s Sauvignon Blanc!)
Don’t second guess your tastes.
When my classmates and I are tasting a wine, we’re always coming up with different aromas. One classmate smells strawberry shortcake. Another smells caramel. Someone smells cedar and blackberry jam. They are all relatively different, yet they’re coming from the same bottle of wine. And our instructor never tells us we are wrong.
When it comes to wine, there is no correct smell or taste. Our individual perceptions of smell are based on how our brain comprehends the aromatic compounds that are released after that grape was exposed to yeast and ferments. There are over 700 different aromatic compounds that you can detect from wine, and while some are more obvious than others, what you experience is what you experience. Even if someone is trying to tell you a wine is lovely, if it smells like mushrooms and you don’t like it, you don’t like it. Plain and simple.
Buy yourself the nice stuff. Don’t let price dictate your decision.
Before entering this program, when I would order a bottle of wine from a menu or grab something at the store, I almost always chose something based on how cheap it was. I would go with the usual second from the top trick. I’m not ordering the cheapest bottle of wine (because that would just make me look cheap), but I’m ordering the next one on the list. That way I don’t look totally cheap…even though I have no idea what I just ordered.
Don’t settle for cheap. Remember, a bottle of wine is typically 5 glasses. If you’re at a restaurant and you order a bottle of wine that is $50, that’s $10 a glass. That is significantly cheaper than the running price for a cocktail; it’s not uncommon to find a cocktail listed at $19 these days.
Bottles are even cheaper at the store. While it is tempting to snag that $8 bottle, if you splurge on a $25 one, that’s only $5 a glass…and you’ll likely be sipping on something really nice.
Now that you know the type of wine that you like, buy what you like instead of buying something because it’s the cheapest. You deserve to drink something high quality; those wines don’t have to be saved for the wine elite. And if the menu doesn’t have what you like listed, let the sommelier know your usual go-to’s, and they can direct you to a bottle that will fit your tasting profile. After all, that’s exactly what we’re taught to do!
Wine of the week
This week’s wine is a Serè 2022 from Celler Vendrell Rived. It is a Grenache and Carignan red blend, from Montsant in Catalonia, Spain.
My tasting notes
Appearance: Bright, moderate intensity, high viscosity, violet color, still youthful.
Nose: No evidence of new oak, high intensity, with notes of tart cherry, plum, toast, cream, and a hint of chili. More developing on the nose.
Palate: Dry with high acidity, light to medium body, high in alcohol, moderate tannins, with a long finish.
Final conclusion
Spicy and tangy with notes of red plum, cherries, and a hint of chili. Creamy and toasty on the finish. Light and easy to drink.