Who to invite and what you'll need
Ottawa sommelier, Carol Anderson, gives us her top tricks and tips for throwing the wine tasting party to beat all.
Number of guests
Eight to 10 is ideal. And you can have neophytes at the same table as experienced tasters, as long as the latter promise not to dominate the conversation with musings of malolactic fermentation or whether Chile can hold out against an infestation of phylloxera.
Setting expectations
- Ask your guests to arrive on time so that everyone can taste together.
- On this occasion you want your guests to focus on the wine, so ask them to have a light meal beforehand.
- Request that guests make it a perfume-free evening.
What you’ll need
- A big, spacious table with a plain white table cover, to highlight the true colour of the wine.
- Bottle drip stops for guaranteed drip-free pouring (available at most wine supply stores). At about $1 each, your white table cover will thank you when the red wine appears.
- Tulip-shaped, stemmed, plain uncut glassware. Wine-tasting glasses can be rented from party rental outfits for about $6 a dozen. You’ll need three glasses per person, for tasting in comparative groups, or flights, of wine.
- A basket of crackers, or unbuttered baguette slices, to neutralize the palate between tastings.
- A personal spittoon for each guest! Plastic, opaque patio tumblers are perfect. Or you can ask guests to bring their own.
- Water for sipping, and rinsing glasses between tastings.
- One or two opaque containers on the table for discarding waste water and wine from personal spittoons. The mixture becomes an interesting colour, so opaque is preferable!
- Wine evaluation sheets for each guest. At the top of each sheet, write out the basic details from the labels — name of the wine, grape varieties (if given), vintage (year), producer, country and region of origin, and price. For evaluation headings, use: appearance, aromas, taste and possible food matches, and score out of 10. If time doesn’t permit, just give each guest paper and a pencil for note-taking.
- Some bars of milk and dark chocolate for tasting with the dessert wine.
- Wines!
