How to develop a more educated palate?

[BernardSmith]

What is the best way to develop a more educated palate? I read all the time about the flavors that those with acknowledged knowledge of wine discern in wines (and beers) and while I am aware of the complexity of flavors that are in wines and beers and meads I am unable to identify them in any meaningful way. Are there (inexpensive) proven ways of developing an educated palate that would enable me to identify the flavors and aromas in wines that are aligned with what others would also identify?

 

[wineforfun]

Drink more.

Seriously though, while I believe to a certain degree some people can taste certain things in wine/mead/beer better than others, I also believe a lot of it is phooey and "wannabeism"(ok, I just made up that word). Some feel the need to gain status or sound intellectual, in their eyes anyway, by it.

I remember bringing up something along these lines when I first joined the board. I asked what exactly granite, earthy, seagrass, etc. tasted like? I mean who has had a sip of granite before? Some of these descriptions on the labels of wine are borderline hilarious.
I also never understood the blackberry, plum, cherry tastes that are described. We are drinking grapes, not blackberries or plums.

For me an my uneducated palate, when I drink a wine it always comes down to how oaky it is, how full or thin it is and how acidic it is.

Just my .02.

Sorry to get a little off topic Bernard.

 

[NorCal]

I have a similar interest. What has helped me is drinking wine with fellow wine makers. Listening to them describe the wine, while I drink along side them helped me understand what they were tasting/ smelling. I had a chance to bring my new vintage to a very accomplished winemaker ( friend of a friend). He went through the wine as he was judging it and literally spent 20 minutes on my cab franc. One thing he said, before starting is that it should have an essence of coffee to the nose. I was thinking "what"? Sure enough, you could actually smell coffee.

 

[JohnT]

I would recommend that you invest into a wine tasting kit. These things go a long way in teaching you the specific aromas and flavors present in most wines.

There are currently several available on Amazon...

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias=aps&field-keywords=Wine+tasting+kit+

 

[wineforfun]

One thing he said, before starting is that it should have an essence of coffee to the nose. I was thinking "what"? Sure enough, you could actually smell coffee.

Do you think you would have smelled coffee had he not planted that thought initially?

 

[BernardSmith]

I do think that some suggested flavors and aromas are ridiculous and worse - worthless. But some flavors and aromas are clearly present and finding only hints of such flavors when you might want them to be pronounced or finding such flavors too obvious when they should be more subtle is I think something I want to be able to talk meaningfully about , meaningfully aim for (in my own wine making) and accurately perceive when I am tasting. To give an obvious but somewhat tangential example. I recently made a saison beer and I can definitely taste the difference between this beer and the yeast I used and a beer using exactly the same barley but with a different yeast. It strikes me that the difference is in the amount of pepper flavors... Now there is no pepper in the saison beer, but that does not mean that there is not a distinct peppery flavor. To provide a different example, I recently made a mead to an Ethiopian recipe. It is a t'ej and it used gesho stems. The thing is that this batch tastes very different from a similarly made batch I made about 6 months ago using a different variety of honey (this time white sage , last time clover). But I don't have the ability to nail - verbally - the differences in flavors. And that inability means that I cannot tweak the process or the ingredients to highlight or diminish flavors. Sure, I can toss in something or change a yeast or a temperature but if I do not know what - precisely - the outcome I am looking for, I don't have the ability to better control any outcome my work produces. In short I really do think that the ability to achieve very specific outcomes is dependent on the wine maker's ability to identify and recognize flavors and aromas as much it is dependent on his or her knowledge and familiarity with processes

But that said, I will check out JohnT's suggestion of wine tasting kits.... although , I think what I am looking for is something that helps me identify say , cherry or raspberry or clove or oak, or butter when I don't know what is in a solution. Seagrass, be damned. Can I find the blackcurrent and cherry notes in a wine with no false positives and no false negatives?

 

[ibglowin]

Look for a local wine appreciation class taught at either continuing education or a local wine store. I know Total Wine puts them on all the time.

 

[terrymck]

I think what I am looking for is something that helps me identify say , cherry or raspberry or clove or oak, or butter when I don't know what is in a solution. Seagrass, be damned. Can I find the blackcurrent and cherry notes in a wine with no false positives and no false negatives?

One needs to actually taste those items like cherry or granite or dirt to know how to describe the sensation. When tastes like raspberry or pepper or any other flavor is present it means that the chemicals that produce the original taste is present in the wine; not that it actually has cherries in it.

It must take a great deal of experience to be able to taste all the flavors in a complex wine. It would seem better to start with commercial wine to develop the skill.

 

[BernardSmith]

It must take a great deal of experience to be able to taste all the flavors in a complex wine. It would seem better to start with commercial wine to develop the skill.

Yes... but how do you develop the skill? If I eat a cherry I know the flavor. If I drink something blueberry flavored (and I know that it is blueberry flavored) I know the flavor. If I drink something blind I can not consistently identify the flavor as cherry or banana or raspberry except through luck. I know this because a couple of years ago I attended a master class at a Welsh distillery. They gave us all about a dozen samples of flavors to identify blind and I was able to get perhaps three or four right. The ones I got wrong were doubly wrong because not only did I then fail to identify the flavor of the sample but if I identified the WRONG flavor in the sample it struck me that I could not know what the flavor I guessed tastes like! ) ..

Those wine tasting kits are either too broad (tannin vs oak; acid vs sweet, fruity vs vegetative) or are designed for drinking games (I think) ...

 

[DoctorCAD]

A. Get older, studies have shown age changes a persons palette.

B. Quit using sugar as a crutch. Drier is always better.

 

[BernardSmith]

I plan on getting (even) older - Sadly, a spring chicken, I am no longer. :<And
Generally speaking, I ferment most of my wines dry and don't back sweeten although occasionally I do think that the fruit flavors (I work with fruits other than grapes and honey and flowers) are enhanced at about 1.008

 

[richmke]

I would recommend that you invest into a wine tasting kit. These things go a long way in teaching you the specific aromas and flavors present in most wines.

There are currently several available on Amazon...

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias=aps&field-keywords=Wine+tasting+kit+

I didn't see Dirty Socks in the list
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OZ56O2Y/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I heard part of learning to taste wine is to develop a vocabulary. Once you start putting words to what you taste, you can start to discern it more. Kind of like the Coffee comment. Once you think about coffee, you can taste it. If you are not thinking coffee, the subtle taste can be missed entirely.

 

[ceeaton]

B-Smith, I feel your pain.

I have what the state store employee described as a "baby amarone" in my glass. I know I've tasted what I'm tasting now from the semi-dried grapes in another wine, it's a very distinctive flavor.

Yet the label describes the taste as this:

Palate: rich, powerful cherry and berry flavours, good length and soft tannins.

I know the predominate flavor I'm tasting has good length, from the initial taste through the aftertaste/finish. But I don't necessarily equate it with what they are describing on the label. I know it is from the semi-dried grapes (ripasso) and the method they used to create the wine. But how do I describe that to someone who has never tasted it? I'm at a loss and feel your pain.

Thank you for starting this post.

 

[REDRUM]

Drink widely, drink often...
that's my plan anyways.

But seriously for me it's just gradual familiarity - you start to recognize the characteristics that different varietals have & start to taste flavour similarities between different wines .. then it's just a matter of finding the right vocab for it.
Familiar flavours like cherry, chocolate, passionfruit, coffee etc can be easy to pick, others not so much. Some of the language is super-wanky but with other stuff - 'flinty', 'earthy', 'forest floor', 'leathery' - even if you've never tasted these things directly you can associate them with certain smells and then tastes.

 

[Boatboy24]

I know the predominate flavor I'm tasting has good length, from the initial taste through the aftertaste/finish. But I don't necessarily equate it with what they are describing on the label. I know it is from the semi-dried grapes (ripasso) and the method they used to create the wine. But how do I describe that to someone who has never tasted it? I'm at a loss and feel your pain.

Thank you for starting this post.

Start by thinking about raisins. After all, that's what dried grapes are.

 

[Runningwolf]

What is the best way to develop a more educated palate? I read all the time about the flavors that those with acknowledged knowledge of wine discern in wines (and beers) and while I am aware of the complexity of flavors that are in wines and beers and meads I am unable to identify them in any meaningful way. Are there (inexpensive) proven ways of developing an educated palate that would enable me to identify the flavors and aromas in wines that are aligned with what others would also identify?

One of the Sensory classes I took brought in all the fruit flavored jelly beans from Jelly Belly. WE would have to blindly taste each one and describe it and what we thought it was. I thought it was a pretty good exercise just to get reaquainted with some different flavors.

 

[wine]

my self ,,to me I do not care if joe down the street likes or dislikes my wine ,, I only care if me and the wife like the flavor ,,, if the kids like it fine if not fine ,, my wine is made for the two of us ,, cause 300 can taste it and to each one it will taste different ,, so I make ours to our taste

 

[BernardSmith]

my self ,,to me I do not care if joe down the street likes or dislikes my wine ,, I only care if me and the wife like the flavor ,,, if the kids like it fine if not fine ,, my wine is made for the two of us ,, cause 300 can taste it and to each one it will taste different ,, so I make ours to our taste

Right, Absolutely no argument from me, wine, but I am asking a very different question, not one that deals with "subjectivity" and likes or dislikes, but objectivity - what flavors and aromas are in this or that wine. Not a question about whether a wine is good or bad or delicious or awful but about how I can better identify what flavors and aromas are in the wine that I made or that I just tasted. Whether I or anyone likes those flavors is not relevant to my question or to an answer. What is relevant (to me) is in better grasping what objective flavors I have just experienced when I taste a wine or mead or beer. And that is relevant AND important because if I want to replicate those flavors again - or indeed avoid them - knowing what flavors am I trying to replicate (or avoid) I have a far better idea of what I am trying to achieve and can (I hope) better accentuate or attenuate them.

 

[wine]

OK now I get what your after , sorry guess I should have said it another way ,,, to start out I never had that type of Palate ,, I never went that deep when tasting , (when I could taste) and now that I think about it I should have never posted in this thread ,, nothing against you ,,as I have to go by the wifes taste as a hand full of dirt and candy has the same taste for me (i taste nothing at all ) and smell nothing , been like this for over 15 years so I think different about taste and smell's
sorry

 

[vernsgal]

Tea is always good for practicing to get the aromas and tastes.(have you ever read some of the descriptions these teas have? lol) Buy yourself some different herbal teas, without looking at the box, make one up. Smell it and write down what scents you perceive, then taste and write down all the different tastes you can pick up.When you're done ,read the box and see what the description says and how many scents/tastes you were able to pick up on.This might help you learn to do it better with wines.
I really like Dan's suggestion though because personally I'd rather sit with a bowl of jelly beans than sip tea