Since this is a wine blog we’re obviously going to talk about wine, and in order to do that, we need to discuss how to approach and taste wine. As I’m going to be sharing plenty of wines, let me explain the way I will describe each bottle. As there is a lot to cover, I will post two articles which explain the basics: the first will discuss the appearance of the wine, the second will detail the smell of the wine and will go over the flavor.
First off let me explain a few things and then we’ll talk about the three different steps to breaking down a wine. You will often hear a wine described as have certain flavors like apple, blackberry etc. This does not mean that the wine makers mixed in the juices of other fruits or flavored the wine. Instead these are the flavors that we are reminded of when we smell and taste wine. The majority of taste does not take place in the mouth, but rather, in the nose. Need proof? When was the last time you could really taste anything when you had a head cold? Smell is also the sense most closely associated with memory. It is because of these factors that we are reminded of other flavors when we smell and taste a wine.
Now that I’ve established where most of the flavor happens, let’s go through the way I plan on explaining wines. For this I need an assistant and I’ve chosen a bottle of Dynamite Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon. 
The first step to understanding the wine is to look at the front label. A lot can be gained from the front of the bottle, including the name, the location it comes from, the year it was made, the alcohol content and quite often (but not always) the kind of wine in the bottle. In this case we learn that I am drinking a 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon from Red Hills in the Lake County region, with a stated alcohol content of 13.9%. Lake County is the area just north of Napa Valley in California. Many bottles often have information or a story on the back label that will often tell you something about the wine or winery.
After you’ve looked over the label, the next step is to open the bottle and pour an ounce or so into your glass. Be sure to use a wine glass and not a straight sided water glass or cup. The glass you use can significantly affect the wine but that is a discussion best saved for another time. Now, tilt the glass to about 45 degrees (be careful not to spill the wine out) over the whitest object you can, be it a napkin, a table cloth or a piece of paper, and look at the rim of the wine. The appearance of the wine immediately tells you a few things about what you’re about to drink. Mainly, the color gives you a hint about the age of the wine. By looking at the rim, or edge, of the wine as you stretch it out in your glass you will be able to see the true color better. For white wines, younger wines look lighter in color whereas older wines will take on a more deep yellow-amber color. Really old whites will turn brownish. For red wines, the lighter, more bright purple colored wines are younger, while older wines start to change into a rusty red, brick-like color. If you have a young wine, i.e. a wine that’s only a few years old, that is displaying colors that typically belong to old wines, there is a good chance that the wine is oxidized and will taste vinegary.
The appearance of the wine can also give you a hint about how big the “body” of the wine will be. This hint can be found in the opacity of the wine. First stretch the wine out again, like you did when checking the color. Hold a sheet of paper with a bit of writing or markings on it under the glass. Without making the wine too thin, try to look through it at the paper below. Can you read the words below it? Can you even see the any letters? Generally the darker, more opaque the wine, the heaver it’s body should be.
At this point you may find yourself asking about the “legs” of the wine. These “legs,” also called “tears” or “curtains,” refer to the small droplets that form on the sides of the glass when you spin the wine around. There is some debate over what causes these but it is generally seen as sign of alcohol and other factors, like glycerol. It does not, as the common myth would have you believe, denote quality, but can often give you a hint as to the body of the wine.
In the case of the Dynamite Cabernet Sauvignon, the appearance told me a lot. The color of the wine was a deep ruby. It was opaque and I could not see though it. The color itself was enough to tell me that the wine was still young and the opacity only served to support that claim. Lastly, if you’re wondering, the legs were slow moving and formed inconsistently around the glass.
