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Speak Wine
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Step 2:
Smell the wine
When you smell the wine, it may remind you of certain things. - Aroma is almost a synonym for bouquet. It is sometimes used to describe the grapelike smell of young wine, as opposed to the more complex smell of a mature wine.
- Bouquet describes the fragrance of a wine. Sometimes used to specifically denote a complex "winey" smell, rather than a simple grapelike smell.
- Corky refers to an unpleasant musty odor or taste in wine, often caused by a moldy cork.
- Flinty is used to describe the fragrance or taste of some white wines, especially a White Bordeaux. If you can remember what flint smells like when struck with steel, you'll have an idea of this characteristic.
- Fruity is used to describe a wine that has few tannins. It may smell or taste like any number of fruits, most commonly berries and citrus. A fruity wine is not always a sweet wine.
- Grassy is used for a wine that has a smell or taste reminiscent of fields of grass.
- Heady is used to describe the smell of a wine high in alcohol.
- Herbacious is almost a synonym for grassy. Depending on the other qualities present in the wine, it can be used to denote either an unpleasant "weedy" quality, or a pleasant, flowery one.
- Musty is often used as a synonym for corky, but is more pronounced and unpleasant. Mustiness can arise from a bad cork, excessive moisture, or storage in a moldy wooden cask.
- Nose is a synonym for smell. It's often used to describe how much of a smell the wine has, as in "this wine has a huge nose."
- Sour is used for a that wine has an aroma or taste that indicates partial spoilage, often due to improper storage.
- Spicy is used to describe a variety of aromas, or tastes such as pepper, cloves, or nutmeg, that give the wine a spiced charactor. Zinfandel, Cabernet Franc and Gewurztraminer are considered spicy varieties.
- Stemmy describes a wine with an unpleasant aroma of grape stems. This will sometimes happen when too many stems are left in the fermenting wine.
- Woody: discerning wood in the wine can be very desirable. Sometimes, though, a wine will have an excessive smell or taste of the wooden barrel in which it was stored, and this term will be used to describe it. Barrels made from American oak tend to give more of their flavor to wine than do barrels made from French oak.
- Yeasty indicates a wine that smells of the yeast used in fermentation. Most often found in younger white, and sparkling wines.
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