Tasting Wine 101

From the Shuswap Wine Journal - by Jake Ootes, 2014

Taste is relatively straightforward. When a person with wine knowledge talks on til your eyes glass over, take control of the conversation! Tell him that his tongue has more than 4000 taste buds and there are a scattering of other taste buds along the sides and roof his mouth, and each taste bud possesses 50-100 interceptor cells. When he becomes taciturn, tell him that despite all this mouth architecture his mouth picks out only four defined taste sensations.

Yes, in truth the human mouth can only detect four distinct flavors -  sweet, sour, bitter and salty. But there is no salt in wine so we are down to three. Bitterness in wine is usually created by high alcohol and high tannin. Sweetness occurs only in wines that have some residual sugar left over after fermentation. Sour or tartness indicates the acidity of the wine.

Sweetness is best detected on the tip of the tongue. Bitterness is tasted on the back of the tongue and acidity is found on the sides of the tongue, the cheek area and back of throat. Tannin is the sensation of dryness but remember tannin is not a taste it is a tactile sensation.