Study Abroad Week 4: Wine Tasting!

My favourite wine-tasting locale: the typical French cafe or brasserie.  Because why not?

 

CEA held an Introduction to Cheese and Wine Tasting session on Tuesday. About half the program as there, because due to the size of the program they broke it up into two sessions of about 15 people each.  It was interesting.  We got a little booklet explaining the principles of wine tasting, the regions of France and their respective wines, wine-making and bottling practices in France, and a little bit of information on how to distinguish the origin of a wine by the shape of its bottle.  Our region of France is apparently known for its rosés, and even with the few wines I've tasted thus far into the semester, I can understand why.  Rosés just have so much more distinction than I can detect in either red or white.  True, reds have far more character and whites are more subtle and elegant (disclaimer: not a wine taster.  Take my opinion on wines with many grains of salt), but the varieties and subtleties of rosés amazes me.  We also had a little introduction to the cheeses of France, and how to pair and balance them with wines. 

In cheeses, we had:

1. Fromage de chèvre (goat cheese); served spread on bread
2. Chausée des Moines
3. Brie
4. Cousteron
5. Compté
6. Emmental
7. Roquefort; served spread on bread
8. Saint-Félicien; served spread on bread

 So today I had a randomly selected rosé and the three B's: baguette, brie, and basil

In wines, we had a very "basic" red and rosé, and Monbazillac, a white dessert wine.  I fell in LOVE with the Monbazillac, to the point I know that is one bottle I am bringing back to the States in May. 

In the instructions for tasting wine:

• Sniff the wine, whole nose in the glass, and swirl it around the glass
• Look at the "legs" of the wine- the wine that remains on the glass after you stop swirling
• Sniff the wine and sip, swirling it in your mouth and chewing it
• Spit or swallow

The red wine I found incredibly spicy after tasting it by chewing, though simply fragrant and woody when I tasted it normally just before.  The rosé deepened its fruity flavour when I chewed it, and the Monbazillac had a very delicate taste after chewing, in contrast to its vry sweet taste before that.  With the other wines I've had this week, I've noticed that reds tend to be quite spicy.  I'm no sommalier, but I do find that these little wine tasting tips have added interest to tasting wine for me, beyond "I liked it" or "This is good but that was bad."  And I have 3 months in wine country left to develop this with local but fine and rather cheap fare!

One other thing that astounded me was how different the cheeses tasted before and after tasting the different wines. I never have liked Roquefort, but it tasted decent and even delicious after the rosé and the red, and the emmental, which I loved, tasted AWFUL after I sipped some red. Brie, my favourite cheese ever, tasted lackluster and even meh after the red wine, but okay after the rose, and delicious as ever after the Monbazillac.  The other cheeses tasted great throughout, although how they tasted to me changed throughout.  I wasn't the only one, either, and the wine tasting pamphlet did have a brief mention on how different wines affect the palate. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and very good introduction to getting familiar with why I liked this wine and didn't like this one, or what it was in this wine that made it taste different from that one.  It was great!

Au revoir!