WI

NE

Journey

Filling the glass

Lets get started ! First pour yourself some red wine.
When filling it up, try to aim for the widest part of your glass. This will maximize the surface in contact with the air, and will help to bring out the perfume and aromas.


Click on the glass to fill it up and drag to adjust. You can also switch between red and white wine by clicking on the colored button in the text.


When you're satisfied with the quantity, you can scroll right to the next step.

Handling the glass

Now pick up your glass !

Make sure to hold it by the stem. Grab it by the foot, and you won't be stable enough. Grab it by the bowl, and your hand might warm up the wine.


Hover over the different parts of the glass and click to pick it up.

Understanding the label

The label on the bottle can give away a lot of useful information. It can be seen as the passport for the wine! Dependending on the country of origin, design and contained information can change.

Once you're done, scroll down to discover more about the wine itself.


Hover over the different parts of the label.

Vision

What color can a wine be ? Easy, we all know that : red, white and rosé. Well... Yes but not exactly. If it is true that everyone has been classifying wine into these three main categories for years, a wine color's is far more important and complex than those threes simple categories. The range of colors of wine is infinite. There exists hundreds of names and adjectives for describing the color of wine. It is a really complex science. However, without getting that much into details, we can still get a good understanding of the main characteristics of the different colors and the effect they have on the taste of the wine. Because yes, before even tasting a wine, we can guess a lot about its taste only looking at it. But obviously it takes a lifetime of learning before being able to do that. First we need to quickly understand how to describe a color.

We characterize a color with three main properties:

Hue
,
Value
and
Saturation
(hover to get details)

Now that we know how to characterize color, we will learn in the next section interesting facts about the link between the color of a wine (red or white) and its tasting characteristics. Obviously, wine is not an exact science but in most of the cases, these are true. In the last slide, you'll be able to discover notable tints and their associated characteristics.
And rosé ? I can only tell you one thing : Rosé is not made from mixing red and white wines ! Rosé wines are stained pink by macerating the skins of red grapes over an average period of 4 hours to 4 days.

Color and red wines

There is a quite strong connection between the color of red wine and its tasting profile.

  • Generally, red wines lose color as they age. Their tint tends to turn to garnet/brown colors.
  • Red wines that are more opaque generally contain higher levels of tannin(Nebbiolo is an exception to this rule).
  • Red wines with higher sulfite additions have reduced color intensity.
  • The hue in red wine is partially affected by the pH level of the wine :
    • Wines with a strong red hue have a lower pH (high acidity).
    • Wines with a strong violet hue have average pH ranging between 3.4 and 3.6.
    • Wines with a blueish tint are usually over 3.6 pH (lower acidity).

Color and white wines

On the white wine side, it is a bit less straightforward. However, with experience, we can still guess a lot of interesting things.

  • Star bright wines tend to be light bodied, young, have high acidity and are filtered.
  • In contrast, a wine that a dim yellow color has a lot more pigment in it and could be a much richer older wine. These wines could be dim because of age or because of sweetness.
  • White wines tend to darken as they age turning to deeper gold or yellow colors eventually turning brown.
  • The saturation of color in a white wine can indicate the richness of the wine. A very pale chardonnay is unoaked and zesty. A saturated golden chardonnay will most likely be oaked and buttery in style. Additionally, sweeter wines then have more pigment into them resulting in higher saturation. A sweet Sauterne is bright yellow.
  • Wines that have green hues to them are more savory, with grassy green flavors like bell pepper, white pepper, green bean and limes whereas wines that have more golden-copper yellow hues tend to have more fruity notes to them such as apricot, peach, orange and pineapple.

Color profile

  1. Tint name :

  2. Typical grape variety :

  3. Typical wine age :

  4. Typical wine sweetness :

  5. Variations of this color :

    1. Shades of this color :

      Please select a color in the left panel.

      Smell

      The odor of each wine is unique and recognizing every different scent can be a challenge. To make it easier, we classified the most common scent in different categories:

      Primary aromas are scents that our nose detect that are specific to the grape variety (or varieties) used to make the wine. The primary aromas can vary depending on the climate and the soil.

      Secondary aromas are scents due to chemical changes effected on the wine by the process of fermentation. The natural flavors present in the grapes interact with yeasts and bacteria that run the fermentation to create further aromas.

      Tertiary aromas are smells we associate with wine aging. Wine molecules interact with each other and with oxygen, creating new flavors.

      Fault and Other are unwanted ordors that can be present due to some winemaking practice or poor storage condition.

      To capture most aromas, we advice you to take short breaths through your nose and breathe out through your mouth. We will dive into the different scents in two steps.

      First your first nose consists of one sniff. With this sniff, you should try to identify one family of odor.

      Then, swirl the wine to release the different aromas and for the different families, try to identify the exact scents of the wine.

      Scroll right to apply this procedure.

      Test your nose

      Click on the bubble corresponding to a smell you can identify to see the more refined aromas that should be in you wine.


      On the right, you will find the most common groups of aromas that can be found in a wine. Try to identify at least one smell for each of the categories :

      • primary aromas
      • secondary aromas
      • tertiary aromas
      • fault & others

      All Aromas Primary Aromas Secondary Aromas Tertiary Aromas Fault & Others

      Taste

      Training your taste buds to recognize subtle tastes in wine takes years of experience. For now, let's focus on 5 simple traits that anyone can feel. Take a good sip from your glass and make sure to swish it around in your mouth before swallowing, to get the full effect.

      Sweetness in wine is primarily from grape sugars that are leftover after fermentation, and is less perceivable in wines with higher acidity. Tannin, found mostly in red wine, gives a drying sensation to your tongue. High tannin wines will grip the insides of your lips to your teeth. It can also give a bitter taste to the wine. Acidity is the level of sourness in wine, it makes your mouth water. Low acid wines generally taste round or even flabby and high acid wines taste lighter in body and very tart. The level of alcohol is felt in your throat as a warming sensation. All these traits come together to give you a sense of the wine's overall body. It is essentially a measure of how bold it tastes in your mouth.

      Match the taste

      Tweek the 5 components of the graph in order to fit best the taste of your wine.


      On the right, you will find the profiles of 3 grape varieties that are the most similar to your description. Have a look at the variety displayed on the wine's label. Did you manage to describe the taste correctly?
      Scroll right if you don't see the correct variety or want to explore more taste profiles.

      Discover

      If you didn't manage to identify the grape variety, don't worry ! As mentioned, it takes a lot of practice. Furthermore, to make things even more complex, many winemakers choose to combine different grape varieties (as opposed to using just one) to achieve a very specific taste. However, getting familiar with the taste profiles of well know grape varieties is already a great starting point, so you can explore them here by using the search bar.

      Pairing wine with food

      Imagine you have this one bottle that you got from a relative a couple years ago that you've been eagerly waiting to open, so you design your dish by selecting ingredients to match the wine. Or you are meeting your partner who just cooked a delicious meal and you want to bring the perfect wine to go with the dish. In both cases, we are talking about the complex art of pairing wine with food. The basics however, are pretty simple to learn, so that you never again will have to spend an eternity staring at the dozens of wine bottles in the wine section of your local supermarket, not having a clue about which one to choose.

      Pairings can complement two tastes, balancing them out. A typical example is combining high fat foods such as melted cheese with a highly acid wine. On the other hand, pairings can reinforce a taste, if the wine and food share a common trait, such as smokiness or creaminess.

      So always ask yourself what the strongest savors of the dish are, and try to create either a complementary or reinforcing pairing. Of course, a dish can be itself composed of multiple strong savors, in which case the wine can create multiple pairings (both complementary and reinforcing). This type of pairing is more interesting but also harder to do, so focusing on the primary savor is enough for most cases.

      Even though there isn't a magic formula, here are a couple of simple guidelines that can help you:

      • the wine should be more acidic than the food
      • the wine should be sweeter than the food
      • the wine should have the same flavor intensity as the food
      • red wines pair best with bold flavored meats (e.g. red meat)
      • white wines pair best with lighter meats (e.g. fish or chicken)
      • bitter wines are best balanced with fat

      Explore

      Select either a wine type or food type by clicking on it. Additional information will be displayed.