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 Tasting is the examination that allows to evaluate the organoleptic characteristics of wine for just half of the sense organs, and especially the sight, smell and taste, and touch come into play only marginally. The tasting is divided into three phases: the visual examination of the olfactory and gustatory analysis.
These three tests must be carried out in their proper order and can not be separated from each other.
VISUAL EXAMINATION
With this examination, consider the color and clarity of the wine, and sometimes effervescence. It's necessary to bring the cup to eye level and hold it by the stem or base, and then observe contrast a white tablecloth, it does not interfere with the color of wine.
The color of the wine depends primarily on the vine or vines that compose it, but it also has to do with the winemaking techniques adopted and with aging. The most common colors are:
- white paper, that is a very yellow discharge;
- greenish, typical of young wines and the presence of chlorophyll.
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 THE SNIFF TEST
This examination is judged the smell of wine and its persistence. At the same time, he looks for defects in the wine. The smell of wine fall into three categories:
- primary odors, derived directly from the grape variety;
- secondary odors, develop during fermentation and have fresh fruit and floral tones, and these odors typically characterize a young wine;
- tertiary odors, it smells that result from the aging of wine, and can be spicy or balsamic or mention dried fruit, jams and wood.
To properly judge the smell of a wine you need to smell it several times for short periods, to avoid problems of addiction. First, you must consider the quality of the perfume, that is its charm, and then evaluate the intensity and persistence. The quality of the perfume is more important, however, the court, while the intensity and persistence are still subject to its pleasantness. We can therefore say that a good wine must have excellent aromas of great intensity and persistence.
With regard to the defects, the most common are:
- smell of cork, occurs when the molds are formed in the cork;
- smell of scum, the result of winemaking practices to be incorrect and is manifested by an unpleasant odor of rotten eggs which is determined by the acid sulfide;
- odor of oxidized, in a first stage occurs with hints of cooked fruit or fruit in alcohol, while a second takes those of marsala, and is indicative of a wine aged for too long;
- smell of vinegar, it is derived from fermentation of vinegar that usually occur in the event of rustic wines.
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THE TASTE TEST
The taste test is undoubtedly the highlight of the evaluation of a wine. With the analysis of taste we can assess the intensity, persistence, the structure of flavor, softness and harmony of the wine in question.
For a correct taste in the mouth is necessary to introduce a small sip of wine and slide it along the sides of the tongue to the base. To facilitate the operation should raise his head slightly. Then you go forward, passing it the wine in the middle of the tongue to the tip. Finally, you hit the tongue on the palate so that it will release all the substances in wine. The four basic tastes that everyone is able to perceive are:
- the salty, it is perceived in the central part of the language;
- the acid, it is perceived on the sides of the tongue and causes copious salivation;
- the bitter, it is perceived primarily on the bottom of the tongue and has a greater persistence than the sweet;
- the sweet, it is perceived on the tip of the tongue.
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1. The salty, brackish or rather, is a very rare wine that can still be seen in some white wines produced near the sea. |
2. The acidity is rather a very important parameter, and is one of the components of the body or structure of the wine. |
3. The bitterness is characteristic of some white wines produced with aromatic grapes, while for red wines is indicative of oxidation of tannins, which are a component of grapes, and especially those with red berries. |
4. The sweetness comes from grapes with high sugar concentration, and then, or is characteristic of wines that are stabilized by special techniques to be just desserts. |
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The body of wine is the result of the set of acidity, tannins, sugars, salt and alcohol. We can speak of a full-bodied wine when all these components are abundant and communicate a feeling of fullness.
The softness is instead the ratio between the components that give just soft (such as sugar, ethyl alcohol and glycerine) and hardness (acids, tannins, carbon dioxide). The index of softness of course change depending on the type of wine. A dry white wine it necessarily brings a more accentuated than the acid component in a red wine aged.
Harmony finally derives from the equilibrium of all components of wine, including those of softness and hardness. A wine can have such a good indicator of softness for the presence of sugar, but has a low alcohol content and can therefore be unsound.
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