In
my life so far I have not had terribly many experiences with wine and would
like to fix that. So far I have had
almost no idea what wines would be good or that I would enjoy. My family is very big into celebratory drinks
and shots of things like Slivovitz and Jägermeister, and my parents drink
things like apricot sours and gin-n-tonics.
Therefore wines have been more of a thanksgiving or dinner party type
drink in my experience. However, I have
discovered that I really do not care for wines that are dry. I really only like very sweet wines. My favorite so far has been Moscatos.
My first glass of wine I actually enjoyed was my freshman year of college at Virginia Tech when my brother visited me, and I had some Moscato when we went to an Olive Garden for dinner. Then, for my 21st birthday my older sister bought me a bottle of Cupcake Moscato, which I really liked. Since then, I have had some wine a few more times, mostly at dinner with my parents. My absolute favorite wine I’ve yet had though was during the past summer when I went to the Williamsburg Colonial Village for a few days with my Mother, Grandmother and Grandfather. One night we went to a colonial restaurant called Christiana Campbell's Tavern and I had a white wine called "Dauphine De Guiraud Sauternes, France" which had honeysuckle, as well as apricot, white pear, and floral tones to it. The wine was very light and crisp, with a very sweet and non-lingering taste.
I have discovered that in addition to not liking dry wine and only liking very sweet wines, I like wines with very little lingering. I also prefer wines that have a lot of fruit or floral tones in it. I particularly enjoy the flavors of pear, peach, strawberries, elderflower, and honeysuckle. Most of the wines I tend to enjoy are therefore white wines, usually Moscatos. As a matter of fact I have yet to discover a red wine that I did actually like.
From
this class I wish to learn about serving wine and how to properly drink and
taste the wine in the hopes that I will enjoy the wine itself more and perhaps
enjoy the flavors more. Additionally, I
really hope to learn more about the differences between the types of wines so
that I will be better able to select wines that I feel I will enjoy. By attending the wine tastings I hope to also
acquire more of a taste for wine so that I can detect more flavors and be able
to get more out of a glass of wine rather than just to say whether its dry or
not. Finally, I want to learn a lot about
pairing wines with foods and cheeses so that when making or having special
dinners I can select wines that will complement the food and vice-verse.
