August 15, 2012

Wine For Normal People Radio: Ep 055 -- Improving and Understanding Your Palate

This week we talk about some tactics for improving and understanding your tasting skills and palate. I've been doing a ton of classes lately and have realized that so many people are spooked by describing wine and think they have poor senses of taste. Nah! We tackle four tips that can help you improve or at least understand your palate!


1. Build your "taste pantry" -- including a story about me licking a golf club
2. The importance of state of mind when tasting wine (and why not to taste with jerks)
3. Figuring out how to define what standard BS wine terms mean to you
4. M.C. Ice and I do a little battle over nature v. nurture on the palate...you'll be surprised at who takes what side.

And the Grape of the Week: Norton, an American original!

As a bonus, here is the picture we mentioned at the end of the podcast.

If you like the podcast, please review it on iTunes, drop a comment below, or join the awesome conversation on Facebook (Wine For Normal People page) and Twitter @normalwine! 

And if you've got a question you want us to answer, post it on any of those places and we'll include it on the show! 

Thanks for listening! We can't wait to hear from you!


Podcast music: "Café connection" by morgantj / CC BY 3.0, ©2009 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) Map: Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, 2.5 Generic, 2.0 Generic and 1.0 Generic license
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5 comments:

  1. Douglas TrapassoAugust 20, 2012 at 10:30 AM

    Dear Elizabeth:

    Another excellent show, as always! This week’s show inspired me to invest in some spices and start adding them to salads, soup etc.

    Even the “corporate” grocery stores in my city have boosted their spice collection in recent years. I want to start familiarizing myself with a few of them and then trying to connect them to whatever wine I am tasting. Which spices do you find most commonly connected to wines? Are there any wines you have had that instantly take you to a specific spice? I am really looking forward to exploring this!

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  2. Wine For Normal PeopleOctober 23, 2012 at 12:22 PM

    Sorry it's taken me so long to reply to your comment!

    Spices fall into two categories -- baking and savory. The most common ones I find:

    Baking: cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, clove.

    Savory: thyme, oregano, basil, tarragon, black pepper, sage.

    There are also notes of smoke and sometimes even minerals or rocks can smell spicy (I'm thinking about slate in Riesling). That said, the ones above are probably the most common.

    Does that help? Let me know and I can brainstorm some more if you want!

    Thanks for the comment!
    Elizabeth

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  3. Douglas TrapassoOctober 23, 2012 at 12:28 PM

    Thank you, Elizabeth! This was very helpful. It doesn’t seem like you lack for topics for future shows, but I would love for you to discuss the “spicier” aspect of wine and how to incorporate that into your pairings.

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  4. AnonymousJanuary 10, 2013 at 7:49 AM

    This was a great podcast! I think I finally understand the nuances in tasting wine and to trust my instinct in what I taste.

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  5. Wine For Normal PeopleJanuary 24, 2013 at 4:30 PM

    I'm sorry I didn't reply back to your comment sooner and thank you for the wonderful comment on this podcast. It's so important to trust yourself. Sometimes it's just a matter of learning the lingo and kind of getting the permission to say what you think! It sounds like the podcast gave you a push in the right direction.

    Just remember, no one has the same DNA or the same taste experience. Critics tell you what they taste and experience but that doesn't mean it's right. They provide some guidelines like whether or not the wine is well made, which is important to know, and some idea about what you may also experience, but they can't tell you what you like!

    Take care and thanks for listening!

    Elizabeth

    ReplyDelete