{"id":13761,"date":"2019-01-30T08:30:56","date_gmt":"2019-01-30T07:30:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.arttrav.com\/?p=13761"},"modified":"2019-01-30T08:59:57","modified_gmt":"2019-01-30T07:59:57","slug":"learn-about-wine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.arttrav.com\/expat-life\/learn-about-wine\/","title":{"rendered":"What I’m Doing This Year to Learn About Wine"},"content":{"rendered":"

I only recently started drinking wine. Until age 40 I actually didn’t drink at all<\/a>, so I’ve got a lot of catching up to do. Far from becoming a lush, what I really want to do is learn about wine in all its fascinating variations<\/strong> (or varietals!) and hone my palate into a greater ability to recognize the finest of flavours. This year my main resolution<\/strong> is to be more dedicated to learning about wine in various, more structured ways than I’ve used so far. Talking about this goal with friends, I find I’m not alone in my quest, so I’m sharing my plan here on the blog in case you, too, want to try these methods and learn about wine along with me.<\/p>\n

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No drinkable wine was wasted in the making of this photograph<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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My journey into the world of wine began only recently, spurred actually by my job in a communications company that had started working with a winery. Having learned quite a bit about how wine is made there, it became necessary, in my mind, to actually taste the wine! Sounds odd to you, perhaps, but I had been previously convinced that I had some kind of allergy or reason not to drink which, thankfully, I overcame (here’s the longer version of that story<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Living in Italy, wine is an everyday matter.<\/strong> Historically, it has always been present on the peninsula’s dinner table, from the Etruscans who often seasoned it with herbs, such as basil, thyme and rosemary and stored it in large terracotta amphorae through the Middle Ages, where monks kept up the practise of winemaking and drank it out of mugs since the water was hardly safe. In the modern age, it’s been the making of a number of small towns and raised the level of agriculture and eventually tourism in areas of Italy that managed to better their economic positions thanks to wine. As an (art) historian and person interested in the past, all of this contributes to why I want to learn more about this almost magical substance.<\/p>\n

The other thing that makes me want to learn about wine is that it’s infinitely complex<\/strong> at the best of times, and poses a particularly huge challenge to me. Complex both in terms of scents and tastes, of which there is a seemingly miraculously huge range for something that is just fermented grapes, and complex in terms of the number of varietals and denominations across so many countries. In some ways I feel overwhelmed by this: I recently saw the movie Somm<\/em> – have you seen it? about guys studying for the Master of Wine – and it actually made me anxious to think how much I need to learn just to get a basic grasp on the stuff. I have a really terrible memory, or rather an almost entirely visual memory, so I sound like a total idiot when I don’t know any of the words for grape types or the brands of the wines I’ve tasted.<\/p>\n

So here’s a plan<\/strong>, in the hopes that I can stick to it, and perhaps you can add to it as well!<\/p>\n

1\/ Take a class<\/h2>\n

Learning about wine with other people, guided by an expert and\u00a0 other people choose the wine. This is the ideal format in my opinion! The question is, what wine class or sommelier class is right for you?<\/p>\n

2 years ago I took 2 levels of a easygoing local wine school’s so-called “sommelier class”. Run by an association in Florence, the quality and level wasn’t particularly high, but it was inexpensive and it forced me to spend a night each week studying wine. In the first level we learned about how to taste wine and how it is made, while in the second level we took a superficial look at most of the wine producing zones in Italy (grouping together regions, we addressed at least the major ones). The format is pretty similar to the more serious courses offered by national wine schools AIS and FISAR, but without a recognizable certificate. If you can find an amateur wine course in your area, I recommend this to help you get started if you’re a rank beginner.<\/p>\n

If you’re looking for something more serious, either because you are working in the field or because you want the accreditation, you might look into the WSET training system. It’s international and taught in English all around the world by third-party schools who offer standard exams. This year I’m planning on studying and taking the level 2 “award” as they call it. I’m interested in this choice because it introduces students to the most important grapes and producing areas around the world, not just in Tuscany or Italy, where I have a whole lot more access to information.<\/p>\n

2\/ Sign up for a wine club<\/h2>\n

There are lots of kinds of wine clubs, and from what I understand, most major cities have offerings. My dad belongs to two of them in Toronto where they organize monthly tastings and occasional outings. Wine clubs may be more or less serious, require entry fees, and offer different kinds of services. Tommaso and I are particularly attracted to the London private wine club 67 Pall Mall<\/strong>, where members can store their wine in a vault and socialize in an extremely swanky situation.<\/p>\n

But failing that, wine clubs can also come to your door. I’m really excited about being in a mail-order wine club called Nosy Wine Club<\/strong><\/a>. This wine club resolves the question of how to access wines from outside your immediate region – in Europe, there is a tendency towards drinking local wines (in those countries who produce it) and supermarkets carry a very limited stock of vintages from other places. Available for delivery in Europe<\/strong>, this Porto-based startup works with guest sommeliers like Sarah Heller MW (the world’s youngest Master of Wine) who choose three wines each month which you receive by mail. Heller’s choices were three wines from Piedmont that were NOT made primarily from Nebbiolo grapes. The January box, on the other hand, includes wines from Spain and Chile. Inside the box is a booklet with an interview of the month’s sommelier and information about the three wines, with pairing suggestions. The 3-bottle box costs \u20ac60 including shipping and you can choose to receive it every 2 or 3 months if you don’t drink that much.<\/p>\n

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Click this and\/or enter ARTTRAVNOSY15 at checkout to get 15% off<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

3\/ Study everything you taste<\/h2>\n

Every wine you taste is an opportunity to practise! Since I’m so new to wine, I need to constantly reinforce my understanding of the scents and flavours associated with principle grapes so I want to look up information about what I’m drinking. I usually start with Delectable<\/strong><\/a>, an app that recognizes labels and will show you ratings as well as the cost of what you’re drinking, and I can save it to my account so I remember it better. From there, I go to the producer’s website<\/strong> and find out where they are located and how large or small they are.<\/p>\n

\"Tasting
EASY Tasting experiments and research<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For example, we opened up a bottle of red wine from Piedmont that came from Nosy wine club: Le Piane’s Maggiorina. I was surprised to receive something in the “Vino Rosso” category – not even a DOC denomination, which I’d expect as a mark of quality. I would have never chosen this bottle myself, but I soon figured out why their sommelier did. It’s a blend of 15 (!) grape types, of which 40% is Nebbiolo, as you’d expect in Piedmont, but then there’s 20% made of some 13 different grapes of which three white grapes. A wine that is atypical for its region, very drinkable, and clearly outside of any regulation, made by a small producer who makes only 50k bottles per year. How fun is that?<\/p>\n

Read some books<\/h2>\n

I admit, it’s a chore to read non-fiction books. My reading time – before bed and on weekends – is when my brain needs a rest, and it’s been a long time since I’ve actually studied anything. That said, I’m going to make an effort to get through some books on wine – it’s the only way to complete my learning.<\/p>\n

\"Filippo
Filippo and his book |Ph. www.ilforchettiere.it<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I just finished a book in Italian by my friend Filippo Bartolotta, who wrote “Di Che Vino Sei<\/a>” that presents his theory that people fall into different personality types that match with types of wine. (Reading this is, in itself, almost a miracle: I rarely finish books in Italian. I may be very fluent but I’m also lazy.) There is a quiz to figure out which type you are, and sections that predict what you’ll like, almost horoscope style. I am a cross between three personality types, not sure if that betrays my being a Gemini?, so the suggestions aren’t spot on for me. But the first half of the book is an interesting presentation of the history of wine, especially in the modern age, Filippo style – with a strong bit of character and a really fun vocabulary.<\/p>\n

On my wishlist:<\/em><\/p>\n