Exploring & Tasting Wine: A Wine Course with Digressions

by Berry Bros & Rudd Wine School

There is no more inspiring place to buy, drink or study wine than at Berry Bros & Rudd’s historic building in St James’s, London. And now you can explore the pleasures of wine through the book produced by the firm’s award-winning Wine School. Whether you are starting to explore or building your experience, Exploring & Tasting Wine gives you the tools to recognise, remember and enjoy wine.. Why do I like this wine, not that one? How can I store this knowledge and use it to guide me to other wines I’ll enjoy? What are the reasons this wine works with this food? What about organic wine? Biodynamic wine? Natural wine? Featuring a foreword by the actor and author Emma Thompson, a former Wine School pupil, the book focusses on the classic grape varieties that form the backbone of great wines the world over. For each grape there are innovative practical pages with groundbreaking graphics that best describe vital factors such as aroma, flavour and balance, and wine and food. Background pages take you further and help broaden your understanding of wine and its components; and discussions by the Berry Bros Masters of Wine and other experts explore myriad wine topics. Exploring & Tasting Wine is from people who teach wine every day, and who know the questions wine-lovers, both novices and experienced, want to ask. This is not a book for wine snobs; this book believes that a wine can be summed up in one short ‘Is it good to drink?’ Word 50,000

Genres: Nonfiction

224 pages, Hardcover

Published September 5, 2017

Reviews

[Elif · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic guide for wine-thusiats.
Detailed but not boring, very much to-the-point 👌

[Nick Stengel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This can go next to Windows on the World for an excellent "first wine book" for people. I especially like the graphics explaining, for example, how the taste of Rosso and Brunello differ. As a wine merchant, I have come to really appreciate how difficult it is to explain the complexity of wine to customers in a clear was that isn't simplistic to the point of being incorrect or too much to fast. This book threads the needle.

[Stephen Lung · Rating 4 out of 5]

𝐖𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐢𝐜 𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐥 𝐢𝐬 𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐞 𝐣𝐮𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠. 𝐁𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐚 𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐮𝐫, 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐬𝐚𝐲 𝐢𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐞𝐬 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐪𝐮𝐞 𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐢𝐫 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐲𝐚𝐫𝐝, 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐚𝐤 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐛𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐥𝐞𝐝.

Through my wine club I learned how amazing the grape is. Grapes are the only fruit that produces phenols covering all kinds of smells and tastes so one grape can taste like liquorice while another smells like green apples. I also learned that red wine isn’t really produced with red grapes since all grape juice is clear and its because of the contact with grape skin that it turns red and acquires the tannic flavour. Lastly this book helped me appreciate that everytime you pick up a glass of wine, there is so many different things to look for from: acidity, ripeness, alcohol, tannin, oak and complexity.

Overall, my two personal favourite wines are:

1. Gewurztraminer (a white wine with lychee smell) 2. Nebbiolo (a red wine with rose petal smell)

𝐑𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐤𝐬: my startup for doing a wine club following the contents of this book

𝐒𝐮𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝟖/𝟏𝟎: Book was pretty dry ngl with alot of detailed notes on regions, and everything grape related. But when you combine it with a wine tasting club, it’s phenemonal