Once you’ve learned the basics behind what influences the flavors and characteristics of wine — you did read my first blog post, right? — it’s time to practice. Yes, that’s right, practice drinking wine. It’s like homework for grownups, but with all the learning and none of the angst! 🙂

I’m sure you’ve probably seen friends or colleagues, or people on TV and in the movies, pour a glass of wine, carefully swirl it around, smell of it, sip it, and then launch into a stream of lofty adjectives and colorful descriptions. “I taste hints of orange blossoms, honey and freshly mown grass.” Or, “I’m getting leather and tobacco and old books.” Or maybe, “Wow, primary, carbonic, pure fruit and unintegrated wood that makes it like combo of Kool-Aid and wet hot tub…”*

Wait, huh?

Before I really got into wine, I found all of that to be so pretentious and ridiculous. Is the swirling really necessary, or does it just make you look fancy? And how can anyone really taste all of those particular things in a wine?

Well, hang with me here for a minute, because I’m here to tell you that I was wrong. Sure, a lot of wine drinkers can be a bit snobby and pretentious, but more and more regular people are discovering the joys of good wine, and that’s served to open up the experience to all of us. I mean, that’s the reason behind A Girl and her Somm — to encourage anyone to dive in to wine drinking and not let perceptions of snobbery turn you off.

So let’s break down the steps of tasting a wine, after it’s been poured. And let me tell you my opinion on why these things really do work.

Step 1: Pour and look

Step 2: Swirl and smell

Step 3: Taste 

Step One: Pour and Look

Enjoying a wine really begins the moment you pour it into your glass. Take a step back and look at it. What do you see? Is it bubbly at all? Clear or is it cloudy? How would you describe the color?

Believe it or not, in blind tests, sommeliers are trained to begin identifying a wine by what they see. They can tell a lot about a wine before ever taking a sniff or a sip. Even though you may not be there yet, you should still notice the beauty of the liquid in your glass. Whether a gorgeous garnet red or a delicate straw wheat, it’s worth appreciating the quality.

Step Two: Swirl and Smell

Gently swirling the wine in your glass accomplishes more than just making you look “fancy.” Swirling wakes up all the beautiful scents contained in the juice by getting the liquid and air moving, so you fill the glass with the aromas unique to that bottle. In fact, that’s one of the purposes of wine glass shapes (and other cocktail glass shapes) — to concentrate smells, called the “nose,” and direct them to your nose.

Sometimes you’ll be surprised that if you clear your mind of expectations, you just may find that something really does stand out. Like lemons; or tar; or ocean air; or wet earth. A wine’s smell may remind you of a place, or of another food. You may pick up something that your tasting partner does not. Despite what wine snobs may say, there really is no right or wrong answer.

Repeat steps one and two as much as you like; then move on to step three! Tasting.

* The funny Instagram account @freshcutgardenhose, by Maryse Chevriere, entertains with clever illustrations of the often-ridiculous or over-the-top wine descriptions she finds around social media and beyond. The Kool-Aid and hot tub quote came from @doctornoah, via @delectable. See the original post here.