Navigating a wine tasting

In the retail wine biz, September kicks off distributor tastings/shows with hopes of big buy ins for the inevitable holidays ahead. Sounds glamorous and fun right? Tasting 100's of different wines. Talking to some big wig winemakers. Drinking $200, $300 Cabs. Yeah right sign me up, who doesn't want to go? Here's the side maybe you don't see...

Maybe you want to try the new Far Niente or Caymus or Silver Oak? Well so do your 1000 closest friends and their family. Be prepared to wait in line. How do you get through a tasting of this size and caliber without going postal and without getting completely bombed outta your gourd?

First things first, you need a game plan! Your years of playing Stratego are now going to pay off! Understand your opponents. Depending on the size of the venue, expect 100's of wine drinkers of all different levels and experiences jockeying for position to try all the new and latest wines. They'll also be zeroing in on everything over the $100 price point just to say that they drank those bottles. They'll never buy those bottles but hey it's free, so why not right?

You need to come up with an idea of what you think you would like to try. Maybe it's a different country or a different style of wine. All summer you drank Pinot Grigio, but what other Italian whites are out there? This is the opportunity to find those gems! And they're will be tons of vineyard reps and winemakers to answer your questions.

Remember these three words; Sip, Spit/Swallow, move on.

Those five S's of wine tasting we talked about earlier are going to come into play now.

Ask quick questions as there will be many people behind you waiting to do the same. Be courteous to your fellow tasters and the person at the table serving you. Inevitably you will end up behind the "know it all" who insists on telling the rep or winemaker everything that he/she knows about their vineyard and how the grapes were grown. Seriously! You think that impresses anyone especially the guy/woman that spent 20 hours a day tending the vineyard, picking the grapes by hand, creating the wine while you were sitting in your lazy boy? We got a lot of ground to cover here.

If you can get a brochure of what and who will be at the tasting event that will give you an extra 15-20 minute head start, so ask whoever you can to get that booklet and look it over days ahead if time. You can't possibly taste every single bottle in the room so having an idea of what you really want to accomplish is half the bottle.

Plan your course of attack. Go through all the white wines first. Make sure to spit. Again, be courteous. I've had total tools spit on the ground and on my foot. Not cool. This is CT! You are a far cry from Europe.

Now that all the whites are done go find the food! Put together a nice plate and sit down to take everything in. Have a glass of sparkling water. Give your palate a rest and a cleanse. A nice cold beer would even work good at this point. Restroom trip, freshen up and on to the reds!

Pace yourself now since Reds will be bigger wines to take in. Spitting at this juncture in time would be a great idea. It's all fun and games until someone passes out!

By now you should be exhausted and your palate shot. 

Find the nearest restaurant and sit down order a tall glass of water and relax. Look over your notes and try to remember what all those check marks, stars, etc mean. Get some real food in your body, mission complete! 

Martin Scott Fall Tasting @ Lincoln Center in NYC