National Wine Tasting Day Date in the current year: November 2, 2024

According to Wikipedia, wine tasting is “the sensory examination and evaluation of wine”. Sounds a bit clinical, but it is what it is. Wine tasting can be professional or recreational. Professional wine tasters assess the quality of wines, whereas recreational wine tasting is meant to teach wine lovers how to better enjoy their favorite drink.

The practice of wine tasting is probably as old as winemaking. For example, Plato listed the main wine flavors and classified wine aromas in the 4th century BC. However, a more formalized methodology of wine tasting didn’t begin to emerge until the 14th century. The first use of the term “tasting” in relation to wine is dated 1519, and a more or less modern approach to wine tasting developed by the 18th century.

There are four recognized stages of wine tasting that allow to establish the main properties of a wine and assess its overall quality: appearance, “in glass” (aroma), “in mouth” (sensations), and “finish” (aftertaste). In other words, after being poured into a glass, a wine is first evaluated by sight, then by sniff, and only then by taste. The first step, appearance, is often split in two, color and swirl. In this case, the basic steps in tasting wine are described as the “five S”: see, swirl, sniff, sip, and savor.

Professional wine tasters, sommeliers, and other wine professionals often taste wines without knowing what they are drinking. The blind approach to wine tasting is meant to ensure impartiality because knowing the geographic origin, reputation, price, vintage, color, or other details of a wine can result in bias.

Many people think that wine tasting is for connoisseurs only, but recreational wine tasting has been growing increasingly popular over the past decades. It is an important part of wine tourism, a relatively new but rapidly developing industry. Most winery tours include a wine tasting in order to encourage tourists to buy the wines made by the winery. Recreational tasting usually involves the same steps as professional tasting, but focuses on a more personal appreciation of wines.

National Wine Tasting Day (NWTD) was created in 2015 by Jace Shoemaker-Galloway, a wine lover and freelance writer and editor who has written thousands of holiday articles over the past decade. In addition to writing about the existing holidays, she has created quite a few holidays of her own, earning the nickname “the Queen of Holidays”.

National Wine Tasting Day is meant to encourage people to try new wines and expand their horizons. Wine tastings are fun and educational, as well as a great way to support your local restaurant, wine store, winery, or vineyard. They give you an opportunity to sample various wines and learn more about wines and the wine industry for a reasonable price.