Transcript for:
DAY1: Wine Induction Class Overview

hello good evening everyone I hope everybody can hear me and see me and uh I hope hello Eileen hello Joey hi hi nice to meet you hi hi rudiger okay so first of all I'm not Jimmy as you can see um so uh Jimmy tonight couldn't uh be uh the the the the presenter of the induction session uh and um there will be other occasion in which I I will uh uh replace him um so specifically that I know already the 7th and the 14th of April so my name is Elena and I've been working with West London WI school for a long time in um uh freelance capacity um a lot uh face Toof face but uh now I'm moved uh away from uh um London so I'm a bit far from the school so I tend to uh help out more with the online classes uh I'm a w certified Educators and um I teach a lot of courses uh at all level um face to face online um and uh this is what I do most of my time I do a little bit of other things but still wine related uh so before uh uh introducing the course uh I just wanted to uh make sure that um everything is is uh super clear in the use of this platform um so first of all the all the session have been record will be recorded and the recording has already started so if you don't feel comfortable in uh sharing your screen which I hope you do uh you can uh of course switch it off but it's so beautiful to see so many people uh connected today so this also give us an opportunity to interact with each other you know if you have a question feel free to unmute yourself uh this is a this is uh is not a webinar yeah is a class and the more interaction the better uh if you have questions that you want to type you can use the chat which is uh literally underneath uh all the screens so I'll just type something myself there we go and then you can well doesn't really work something wrong does anyone want to try to use the chat which at the moment for me is a little bit temperamental I don't know why very [Music] strange I hope there's nothing wrong with the with my computer because sometimes you know they can be a little bit maybe does not work for anybody does it but I can't see your messages why I can't see anything it's working for me I can see everyone's chats well I cannot which is not the best because of course if I have questions in the chat Bo I can see them oh that's weird never happened to me I mean literally I I used this platform one hour ago and it was everything was perfect that's really annoying well unfortunately I can't see your uh messages so uh if you have questions raise your hand unmute yourself uh because I can't see it I'm really sorry about this I need to investigate maybe something with my connection but shouldn't be um I'll try again I cannot even type that's very weird I'm really sorry about that um so um anyway if you have questions please raise your hands and I will answer to you um very good so do you have any question whatsoever before starting this session no all good fantastic so um you should have receive an email during the weekend a welcome pack with session plan with um all the direction on how to um access the uh The Click meeting every week you receive an invitation um there are a lot of very important information in that EMA made but particularly I would if you never if you haven't had the chance to um to read it I would invite you to do so particularly because um there's already your the date of your exam fix which I think is 27th July so if you decide that you want to uh move that date you have a deadline which is the 1st of July at noon uh and if at some point points further down the line you decide to do that uh probably is better if you defer it before so you don't have to pay anything uh because otherwise you will be automatically um enrolled on the 27th of July very good now um tonight uh is all about uh the introduction of the course uh the induction uh how the course Works uh what to expect in the final exam uh and we start straight away with um calibration of our palette and um tasting wines by using the systematic approach to tasting a level three but also very importantly we want to understand how to gain marks so how marks are allocated during the exam for the tasting part uh you should also have four uh samples of wine and we're going to go through those samples of wine um when we start tasting of course now before doing that um what the uh what what's the deal with the wct level three so first of all um is not uh absolutely um uh mandatory to have done level two but of course that kind of level of knowledge is what is expected yeah um Jimmy and I and by all means all tutor at West London wine school will uh constantly refer to uh what you study at level two but also will repeat a lot of things particularly when it comes to traits of the main gr varieties um but that kind of knowledge should be there already yeah if it's not don't worry because you will get there anyway yeah but if you really feel that you have things that you completely uh forgot or you don't know uh from level two maybe if you have the textbook you can have a look particular at the great variety traits yeah um now uh with this level uh um in addition to the classrooms uh wct suggests 51.5 hours of PRI of studying I took the liberty to put 52 hours because it makes sense uh that's kind of run up um bear in mind that this is a suggestion there are people that might be super prepared in some uh regions uh uh of the world other that perhaps did level two ages ago or didn't even done level two they might need even more yeah um now in addition to that email you should receive previously your uh study Park which consist in a textbook which is this yeah and this is uh really the core of this exam uh of this course the title of the book is understanding wines explaining style and quality so this is also what you will be assess on uh during your exam so the the the the the essence of this course is to learn what makes a wine look smell and tast taste as it does so all factors that are in the vineyard climate topography great varieties of course uh all the work that in the vineard is done by people and how wine is made eventually in the cellar a mature in Oak in the bottle if it does go through uh uh this kind of uh uh maturation uh and this is really what is wct courses are about the aim is really to prove that what is in the glass uh is as it is because of there are objective reasons that make the wine smell look and taste as it does so during the exam particularly in the uh uh Theory um you you will be assessed uh on these and you will need to use your Theory knowledge to explain how these factors affect the wine yeah we're going to talk a little bit of the examine a minute as well so good news is not that thick bad news it needs to studied cover to cover literally yeah uh then you have a study guide which is this A4 yeah so in the study guide you have first of all the first part um which is literally um the um the the introduction and the theory yeah section one um then you have some example of good and less good uh short written answer uh qu short written answer to short written answer questions you have example of multiple choice uh questions as a template um then you have the same for the tasting yeah um with again a good and less successful example then you have all maps of all the regions that you study and from page 20 uh sorry 64 you have space into which recording the tasting notes of the wines that we're going to try together and uh again this is a tast a tast sorry is a study guide is not a textbook but nevertheless it needs to be read cover to cover particularly the section that explain how the exam works and how the marks are allocated we're going to go through these together but uh receiving information from different uh uh sources and in different ways is always very beneficial yeah very good then you have this card the systematic approach to tasting yeah so if you flip it over on the other side you have the Lexicon now how to use this systematic approach to tasting uh if you done level two you might remember you had one that was much smaller lit A5 now it's much bigger and the reason why it's much bigger is because first of all you gain most of the time a five point scale instead of a three-point scale so the systematic approach to tasting is literally a um how to how can we express this is a very strict way that wct applies when it comes to tasting and writing tasting notes which means that everything that is below W T level three systematic approach to tasting wine cannot be changed during the exam so for example let's say that I describ the wine in appearance as a pay lemon that's good if the wine is pale lemon if I use pale yellow wct will not recognize that term so the terminology all the terminology in the systematic approach to tasting cannot be changed if you change it you will lose marks basically on the other side you have the Lexicon so the Lexicon is a little bit less strict nevertheless this is uh a fairly long list of descriptors of Aromas and flavors um that uh The Examiner will use when um they will assess your work your tasting notes why they will do that because these are very common very very common and I would say universally recognized um you can use additional terms no problem at all but bear in mind that these are where the examiner take most of the inspiration yeah to assess your your work um on top of that I might say that using the Lexicon when you start uh tasting wine and writing tasty notes is very is very helpful because it might actually remind you of certain Aromas and and certain flavors that um straight away you might not think of so by reading terms in this lexicon your mind might remember that Aroma remember that flavor so it's a good way to develop and to improve with your testing skills now another bad news during the tasting you cannot take this card with you in the exam so which means that the systematic approach to tasting needs to be absorbed and uh uh uh learned by heart yeah but don't worry at all the tasting shouldn't be a stress at all in the exam because the pass rate is really really high well over 90% yeah then um with a specification uh I would invite you to go uh online but also I think within the that email you might actually have the specification of the course um well you have many things that are very uh good you have the wine Theory exam guidance um so there are extracts on the PDF that uh the school send you uh that comes directly from the official um uh material but for the specification you can go online and digit literally wct level three specification and you will find a PDF and that is basically the scope of the of of the course everything that will be covered in the course and in the exam and the rules and regulation of the exam at the end uh of the day the exam is a close book uh exam so uh uh of course there are rules and regulations uh when it comes to the online resources as students of um uh West London wine School uh you have uh the the the access to the uh wine with jimy platform which is extremely uh wellmade and and really good uh additional tool again in that email that you have you find all the instruction to uh access and also you have a a promotional code for that um very good now let's talk about the exam now the final exam is um divided in two parts you have a tasting and you have the theory now at West London wine School the order is flipped so we generally do the theory first and then we do the tasting uh in between you have a little break so there are really two separate um part however uh you have to se the whole um exam both parts otherwise W will not uh so you will be disqualified for example if you do the theory and then you think you say okay you know what I can't I don't want to taste I have a big cold or whatever and you leave they won't assess the exam uh if you think okay I can do the taste but the theory I don't feel very confident again they will not Mark the papers um however if by any chance and of course this will happen to you uh ever if you fail one of the parts you don't have to receip the whole exam you just need to receip the part that you haven't passed and of course you don't have to do the course uh in its entirety make sense Elena yes um hello it's Claire I just put my camera um there seems to be some questions that people that aren't sure if they're on the full course or a people that are preparing for a the exam in the chat can't see it's so annoying I don't understand why I mean it was working perfectly it's very weird now uh I would invite those people to actually open the the the microphone and talk to me if possible because I can't see the the the chat I'm really sorry I can see the chat but I can't see anything in the chat pod which doesn't help thank you CLA thank you so much not too shy I think it was Karen was it Karen do you have any specific question now I'm aware that in this course there are students that enrolled um on the course and they will have the exam on the 27 of July uh and for the students um this is session one yeah so they will have the wine and everything and there are students that are actually been uh kindly allowed to Reet because they have been uh post they basically uh defer their exam from previous courses uh and of course sometimes it's difficult it's hard when you defer an exam from the year before so they have access to this course but of course they don't have the wine uh they just have the uh uh the access to kind of refresh a little bit the theory and everything uh linked to it uh Karen did I answer a question maybe was that was a doubt again I'm sorry I can't see anything in the chat pod so you you for tonight you can avoid to use it because I can't see it and I'm okay I think she's having trouble with her microphone but that doesn't make sense oh there's two of us that are not well sorted uh let me see I just open the it looks that my chat is not enabled because I enter in the setting and uh there's a pro there's there's a technical problem here because I try to enable the chat for moderation and for Q&A but doesn't simp it doesn't allow me to actually put it on that's a problem and uh I'm not the administrator therefore yeah I'm really sorry Karen um if you have any question on these um issues that are not content related you can always email the school they're super helpful and very very quick in answering questions so from the same email that you receive that email uh welcome email uh you can uh yeah you can um refer to that uh okay so um let's um crack on with the examination rules then so um as I said two different uh section uh but they compose a whole uh exam now with a tasting examination you have 30 minutes and you have to produce the tasting notes by following the systematic approach to tasting of two wines blind which means that you don't know what the wine will be you cannot use this uh but it will be one red and one white which means that rosé wine spark sparkling wines and fortified wines will be not your problem in the tasting yeah they will not appear okay they might be a white wine that is not dry yeah but white and red that's it still and not fortified and and this is why this is the easy bit uh in order to pass that part you have to reach 55% of the uh marks available but com the the marks can be combined between white and red yeah um very soon we will talk about uh the systematic approach to tting we will try tasting wines and I will tell you how to gain those marks well I will tell you how to gain 100% but of course 100% isit is a bit challenging it's possible it's possible um good now the theory exam part that is I must be frank and honest with you that is not easy part that is the difficult part uh and I'm not going to tell you what is the global pass rate because I don't want to upset you on the first day yeah it's very low so um you have you be you will be given um a paper a booklet and in that paper you have 50 multiple choice questions and you have four short with an answer and you can decide to uh complete the the two section As You Wish yeah there's no there's no rule if you are a kind of individual that prefers um you know complete the easy part and just focus on the difficult part after you will do the the 50 multiple choice question and then the four shter answer after if you prefer to get rid of the heavy stuff first and then relax you can do the opposite you have two hours to complete this and it's completely up to you how you do it but you have to remember that you have to manage your time so the first rule of this exam uh to make it happen yeah to make it successful is to be aware two hours to complete all of this stuff is not a lot which means that you might finish your 50 multiple choice question in one hour and if you do so you have only 15 minutes to read answer and reread your answer for the four for each of the four short with an answer questions if you are a bit more comfortable with less time for the multiple choice questions of course you will have a little bit more time for the short with and answer but still you have to keep an eye on on on the time uh because of course you don't want to you know spend 20 minutes on a short with an answer that might be difficult and then running out of time and leave a part blank yeah that is not is not strategic the other thing that makes this exam a bit tougher than the tasting is that even if you answer all the 50 multiple choice questions correctly but in your four uh sorry in your four short with and answer questions you don't reach 55 you don't pass that part that is what makes this a bit difficult as well so of course 50 multiple choice questions are easier because the qu the answer is in front of you you but the force shorted an answer if you don't know the answer you don't know the answer okay so the first thing to uh uh take on board is that the sooner you start reading the textbook the better and the more you read it the better because yes it's not that thick but it's very dense it's very dense of information so this is a really good uh model that you've chosen for wct because you have two hours once a week and you have hopefully some time before the following week to at least uh study and and really uh absorb uh this the subject that has been covered the previous week yeah and also it's good because you might have questions for for the next session and so on now before starting the tasting uh I would also like to add something that makes the theory examination difficult Theory knowledge is not enough so you also need to understand what the examiner is asking you as the question is set so typically and this is something that you will find in the specification wct will uh at this level use specific command verbs to assess different skills if you are asked to identify something generally those are question that have very very very few marks one two and it's literally you are asked to State something for example what is the main black skinger variety grown in burgundy ponir end of story that is where you manage your time because you don't want to spend five minutes in an answer like this that give you one Mark or two is something is a great variety is a climate is uh the name of a mountain is a method yeah so you really want to be brief on that if you don't know it move on maybe let on it will come to you description of course will uh present the verb describe means that that thing that you identify you need to describe as you would find probably in one of the answer of the multiple choice question generally there's a description in the uh four options Things become a bit more complicated and generally you have many marks in what we call explain explain or application questions so those are really the the the question that require that you apply your factual knowledge to explain how those factors affect the style and quality of wine I'll give you an example here you have identification question identify the climate of champagne champagne is a cool continental climate end of story there's no need to add anything else because there will be an allocation of Marks here and you can write whatever you want you will have that maximum number of marks in this case probably one or two yeah if if you are asked to identify and describe the climate of champagne you will still say that the climate of champagne is co Continental however you will need to add what makes a climate cool Continental so you will mention the average temperature you will mention uh the pattern of the Season generally cold winter short hot summer so you you kind of identify this discrepancy of average temperature between winter and Summers and generally a growing season that is quite short because in Autumn temperature T to drops quite quite dramatically quite soon again here as you can see of course I need a little bit more time but literally a couple of minutes yeah if you don't know it there's very there's very little use of wasting time in in try to answered this question if you have a question like this explain how the climate in Champaign impact on the fruit grown and why this makes the wine produced suitable for the production of traditional methal sparkling wines but this is much more complex because yes you will probably state that what is the climate in Champagne which is called Continental uh what this generally means it means that the the growing season are not long because of that drop of tempin AUM uh it means that in this condition because the grape growing season is not long grapes will struggle to ripen so will be more difficult to have sugar will be easier to have high acidity uh and this is ideal for traditional method sparkling wine because a traditional method sparkling wine um means that we start from a base dry wine and then we referment that in a bottle and this alcoholic fermentation this second alcoholic fermentation will increase a little bit the alcohol uh and therefore it's much better to start from a very high acidic but low alol wine yeah so of course you can use your own words there this is this is a a very good answer of course but you can explain this in many different ways yeah providing that is accurate yeah so as you can see this is the way you apply your knowledge on the climatic conditions of champagne area that will reflect the style in the wine make sense so these are the most difficult questions so this is where you have more marks and this is where you have to kind of consider that the examiner will expect bit more details from you okay I I like to do this at the very beginning because I think it can help you a lot in your approach to study having this vision of okay I study all these Theory but how these will reflect in the final line yeah if you do this from the very beginning Bingo your exam is in your pocket yeah and also you learn a lot yeah very good now I have a question yes of course is is this a typical length of question and answer for a short written answer question um well this is a typical length for these template yeah so generally wct prefers quality over quantity so and and you don't have much time because something like this is just is a is a fraction of a short written answer question so you have to go straight to the point yeah of course don't forget to mention the the the the obvious because obvious things often with wct result in a mark and also you have to consider that the examiner cannot take things for granted the examiner cannot take for granted that you know that for example rosé wine is made with black skin gray varieties if you don't write it yeah there there's no otherwise it would be unfair it would be not objective from an examiner point of view yeah it would be a little bit uh kind of uh bigheaded thinking that they can read your mind so State not problem at all yeah sorry could I also cut in briefly absolutely go ahead hello hello um with regards to the short written answer questions um and handwriting in the bluntest sense what happens if you have fairly poor handwriting and an examiner might struggle to read a certain word or what have you written okay so uh the uh the examiners wct are are are used to anything literally so you know I have I have very bad writing uh I never fail an exam for my writing and I'm sure that some examiner might thought H this damn woman is very difficult to understand what she writes um so they used to to it and uh of course if if you write something that is doesn't resemble a you know a phrase that has a sense that's going to be difficult but many of us I mean we are we are not used to write anymore yeah we type so of course this doesn't improve our writing skills uh but it's not a big deal they they will they they are very good okay if you feel that that is is a is is a real problem just practice a bit sure okay sooner or later I would invite you to practice particular you reach the end yeah of course just with regards to that and maybe I'm being a bit too making a mountain out of a mole hill no no no no is there any sort of appeals process do you get the examination back and can you say oh actually I think my answer here was correct and is worth a review maybe they couldn't make sense of what I've written uh W with this are a bit uh uh fussy because um you have to uh basically uh open a case and ask for revision so for example let's say that you you think that your exam was perfect and you fail if you want to have feedback you have to contact them and pay a fee for your exam to be uh revised and to receive a feedback and to probably uh you know open a a um uh yeah a a dispute of over it because when you receive the result you don't have any feedback from them okay no feedback at all with the result okay unfortunately not thank you for that yeah and and in schools providers like us there's nothing we can do Lally is all wct power let's say okay all clear that's great okay so um is there any question on the command verbs on the exam how it works everything Crystal Clear amazing very good now uh there are things that uh uh I'm not going to talk to you tonight and uh particularly tonight we're going to literally uh cover all chapter one which is basically um the systematic approach to tasting how to use it uh in addition to that I will uh explain how marks are allocated for the tasting part uh but we are not going to uh look at chapter two which is wine with food if you done level two is basically the same thing and we are not going to look at storage and service of wine so these parts uh are uh basically only based on private study but if you do have questions next time by all means we will answer Jimmy or I depending on who is there um so with the session two next week we start straight away with vtic culture yeah so climate topography and human factors in the vineyard uh the only uh thing that I will uh um like to recap a little bit is uh just basic rules on uh how to taste wine the conditions that you need and some folds that you will also find in uh in the book so of course we are online there are people that have a better light than others uh so we have different environment but generally speaking of course you need to have a light that is good enough to assess um the appearance of the wine uh if you have a a very dark desk I would recommend to use a piece of paper and assess the color of the wine against that piece of paper uh try to be less disturbed by smell and flavor as much as you can of course if you uh you know if you uh pour on you a bottle of Chanel Number Five probably you will smell Chanel number five and other wine and uh and if you drink gallons of black coffee just before the tasting that will not help yeah uh of course eat something that is really strong uh in terms of uh uh glassware again you might have very different glasses uh what we recommend is what w recommend is the iso uh which is something like this I mean I I broke all of my ISO I just ordered somebody I should receive them tomorrow um something that has a little bit of stem yeah and a kind of a bow shape uh not too big yeah because of course if you have massive a wonderful uh glass wear uh you know they will be very the one will appear and and will uh uh smell very differently yeah now before starting assessing things that are good we need to clarify some of the fults of the wines um now in wct in a wct environment neither in the classes neither in the exam you will assess you will be given faulty wines because if a wine is faulty you cannot really even start the assessment yeah there's nothing like a pronounce Aroma of cork taint or cabbage yeah those things are not drinkable and not uh uh accessible uh so this is more for your theory knowledge so the most um recurring problem with uh uh wine in terms of fults is corain which is caused by a um chemical compound refer as uh TR chlorinol or TCA to be um uh more simple so this is a compound that that uh um so we we generally talk about cork Tain because most of the time these chemical compounds that make a wine smell of dump cardboard sometimes even wet dog uh will uh uh most of the time affect the Cork and the cork will then impart this uh bad smells to the wine and the wine is not fixable yeah one one the wine is corked there's nothing you can do uh and you have to you know waste it or change the bottle so this is the most recurring uh cork um then you have a problems that could be caused by different uh uh elements for example oxidation which is the uh unwanted uh exposure to oxygen or o Dental exposure to oxygen um is something that uh most of the time is a link to for example a a a closure that failed yeah typical a cork that dries out and the air gets in and wine get oxidized now a wine that is oxidize is a wine that is not supposed to but it will appear and smell and taste like an a deliberate oxidative style of wine like for example a cherry so if you have a Sherry that oxidation is deliberate so the wine maker decided to that the oxidation um actually improve the character of the wine but in that case you have a wine without of alcohol yeah if a wine is not supposed to be like that that is a fault yeah so generally you have a brownish color and um uh a reminiscence of nuttiness of caramel uh something that in theory could be nice but if from your wine you expect um you know Peach and vanilla and uh honey uh that that's not good for that wine it's faulty again there's nothing you can do uh it's not fixable yeah then you have the opposite reduction is literally the opposite of oxidation and is um most of the time um linked with wines that have been made in an extremely protective way so wines that have been made with the aim of protecting as much as possible the fruit characters of The Grapes so sometimes this goes out of end and the wine might actually gain Aromas of um [Music] um extinguish match um sulfur sometimes or um again cabbagey rotten eggs kind of a situation similar but not identical to sulfur problems sulfur problems are related to uh an excessive or not well-managed use of sulfur dioxide so as you can see all of these folds all of them coraine oxidation reduction sulfur the first things that they do they will mute the fruit so anytime you have a wine that doesn't show that bright that uh uh fresh fruit that you expect it might mean that that's something that is covering these element yeah and sometimes is a f volatility is linked to um uh volatile uh acetic uh acid and is sometimes certain wines might have a little bit of volatility which is fine but when you have a lot and again the kind of vinegary character cover the the fresh fruit that is a fault yeah uh last very popular in the past Bret um so Breet is the abbreviation of bretony Breton misis is a East but is East that doesn't have any function so it doesn't actually ferment sugar uh is a East that can infect the Vats the equipment and the repercussion on wine can be a bit kind of a animal likee character um horse sweat uh sometimes plaster yeah um there there's a school of thought for which a little bit of breath is okay because it gives you a bit of complexity this is what your book will say uh if you want to know my humble opinion is that a fault is a fault particularly when it comes from an infection and it can be very dangerous because when you have an infection of something that will make your wine almost takes something that is not clean and so you are not in control anymore and we enter a zone that is very dangerous yeah uh luckily all a lot of these uh uh faults are less and less less visible in wines particularly when it comes to uh you know things that are linked to hene standards which are very very high now yeah more than in the past now we've done with this nasty things are we ready to say something delicious hopefully I pause for a minute just in case there are some questions remember I cannot read the the chat sorry so feel free to to jump in at any time any moment yeah oh Karen I can see your microphone is uh active now hello can you hear me no she can't okay are you happy to start with the sample number one Elena I just enrolled on Saturday so I don't have any samples yeah oh well but the the sorry to hear that but uh you will receive the recording of the session so you can go through uh with your own and by all means if you have questions don't hesitate to uh email and uh Mandy will will revert it to us to the educator great Okay so our first wine uh be good to do this blind but of course you have the name of the wines um it doesn't matter the first wine is a mus okay so you might know what a wine is you might not let's pretend we don't know anything about the wine let's just try to assess what is in the class so what I'm going to do now I'm going to go through the first wine very slowly to uh clarify how marks are allocated at but also to clarify how to assess the wine correctly yeah now in your study guide you can start writing the tasting notes when it comes page 64 now when it comes to the tasting notes so this is really good because these replicate uh pretty much the look of your uh uh tasting sheet that you're going to be uh given during the exam but your tasting sheet during the exam is even better than this because you will have here another column with the allocation of the marks so the examiner will remind you that you have two marks for appearance uh seven Mark for the nose sorry yes seven marks for the nose nine marks for pallet for a white and 10 for red uh one mark for assessment of uh uh quality one mark for level of Readiness for drinking I'm literally reading this now yeah plus your uh paper will remind you that for AR romance you can have maximum five marks on the nose for Aromas descriptors and for flavor descriptors three these are really really helpful information because you you can see if you if you for example let's say that very simple example appearance will grant you two marks yeah one for intensity and one for color if you write only color for example let's say that you write the wine is lemon and then you look at it and think how can I get two marks I just said lemon yeah so you might oh I forgot intensity yeah this is really really simple example but you can apply this approach with all the section now how to write your tasting notes very simply you don't need to write an essay here you don't need to be to write tasting notes that you might find in a magazine be clear and go to the point appearance pale lemon will do literally nose you just need to clarify what you are assessing for example intensity is light Aromas of lemon Apple etc etc development useful that's it you don't have to be prosaic you just need to go straight to the point but be clear because if you write for example a list of medium plus and you don't say what is referring to or M plus that is dangerous just be kind of a stupid proof so anybody can understand what you you're saying but you don't need to be you don't have to spend time and and and in words yeah because marks are allocated only on terms of the systematic approach tasting literally okay so far so good can I ask a question so youthful youthful would be something that doesn't have like malolactic or tertiary something no we we'll get there oh well we're just at the beginning that is just how to how to write the tasting notes because some student ask me they are not quite sure how to to write them okay so I would invite you to now write as we go your tasting notes in in your tasting sheet okay now how can I interrupt sorry of course um you said sorry I'm sorry that my chat part doesn't work but I don't know how to fix it um you said that the aroma characteristics are worth five points is that right yes um I'm assuming not every wine is going to have five Aromas that you're meant to pick out we'll get there okay we will get there absolutely we just started with the appearance and when we comes to Aromas we will clarify that point and if by all means you have additional questions we will see but probably I have I have I'm confident that probably I will answer your question yeah just a second no problem so with appearance you have two marks now as you can see if you look at your tasting uh approach here you will see that there's a Clarity on appearance there's a condition on the no don't worry about those because Clarity and condition on the nose generally are there to assess that the wine doesn't have fault but we know already that you're not going to have wines with fault so there are no marks for clarity there are no Mark for conditions don't worry about it yeah we are very marks Focus here yeah so intensity and color how do I assess the intensity of a white wine there's nothing more annoying intensity refers to the ability to see through and there are no white wines that you can't see through right so how do we do that well first of all uh statistics most white wines are pale lemon yeah they might have slightly different nuance once I'm sure that number two will appear slightly different but they will probably be both P lemon lemon is the term that W uses for white wine literally yeah if in that lemon you see some greenness when you particularly when you tilt the wine to forwards very rare very very rare that will be your lemong green if by tilting the wine over you see an orange and the wine looks almost like a piece of gold that is your gold Amber and brown are colors that uh well the lemon is gradually disappearing yeah Amber think about the Amber as a gam yeah so you have more orange and a bit of brown and with brown literally you don't have any any any lemon any gold any umber is brown for the sake of your exam you don't have to worry about these wines you really focus on lemong green to Gold but lemong green not much so as you can see much easier we kind of restrict the chances here why because Amber and brown are typical of fortified wines not of white wines make sense yeah or like I don't know 100 year old so turn that we we don't have access to good now still the intensity so this will be lemon are we happy with lemon good yeah now the intensity uh again most wines that are lemon are pay lemon but nevertheless if you really want to understand the intensity in a white wine you tilt the wine over again and you look at that oval surface that the liquid now has so you will see you will notice that the upper part of the wine what we call the rim is colorless right it became colorless water like whereas the color is more concentrated at the bottom what we call the core yeah towards the stem make sense now if you look at the ratio between the rim and the core of the glass uh if the rim is much bigger that is pale if they are equal that is medium if the color stretches all the way through and the colorless R is really tiny that is deep yeah and if you understand this you will also probably understand why most wines are pay lemon yeah because there's not much color there some gold wines might be deep yeah and by all means there are exception medium lemon but pale lemon is very popular yeah so if you do this you will have gain one Mark here and one mark for color so two marks in the bag now in the nose there are seven marks available one for intensity one for development and up to five for Aromas descriptors now how do we assess intensity I'm sure that if you've done level two you might have been you might be familiar with you know try to move the glass close to your nose and far from your nose and try to kind of stop when you can smell something uh here I would like to add something else that will probably hopefully make your life a bit easier particularly with wine like this yeah you can move the wine as much as you want it will smell of wine it's going to be very difficult in this wine to capture very specific Aromas descriptors yeah and the fruit which I do believe you might agree what we find here we find lemon grapefruit apple pear but what I'm doing here is more a theory exercise because none of these fruits is really PR size so when it comes to assessing intensity yes look at how powerful are these Aromas but focus on the specific Aromas if I often say this to my students and um it sounds silly but if you think about it and next time that you have a wine in front of you if you think about it it will probably help if you smell a wine and what you can think is wine probably the intensity of those Aromas will be fairly light if you smell a wonderful wine and you think about beautiful things like fruit and you know spices and leather and this and that and you almost forget that is wine that is where you are in the pronounced so is also the the the how easy is to name those descriptors at the beginning probably will be not that easy because you need to practice a bit you need to absorb the Lexicon but the more you practice the more you will probably this this this concept will resonate with you yeah so do you agree that what we smelling this wine is more wine rather than these beautiful things it's very generic yeah yeah certainly yeah so something very important clusters so citrus fruit green fruit um you know Oak the name of the cluster will not get any Mark you need to be specific and mention the specific fruit the specific flow the specific spice the specific uh whatever is in the cluster okay now a wine like this is light yeah which means that there's not much going on here but also that those Aromas are very generic so the intensity is light but also here I want to write something very important which probably will answer Oliver question here I want to write simple there we go you're right Oliver a wine that doesn't have much going on like this will be challenging to gain five marks and that is where you have to use Simple you have to because if you don't use Simple in a wi that is simple your marks will be capped at four so even if you write and by all means this you know please do so you can you can head here I don't know Wet Stone yeah uh yeah you can write some don't know graphs you can write as much as you want but if you don't write simple you will not get the fifth mark does it make sense did I answer your question Oliver thank you sorry I said yes sorry oh good no it's fine for for a second uh it wasn't working perfect so I'm in a mission here because most students forget about the power of simple but also forget that a lot of wines are simple yeah not many not not all of them and by all means you you know you might have a simple wine in your exam you might not but the wines out there most of the times are not shat are not shat are or mus quantity wise yeah so simple is very important if you've done this pause for a second and go straight to your palette please do me a favor write simple here as well because in the flavors you have three marks available and if you don't write simple you be Mar be C at two and you don't want that good very good now we go back to our assessment and to answer Eileen question I hope I pronounce your name correctly is e no it's elen elen sorry sorry sorry sorry um so to answer your question a wine that is useful is a wine that doesn't show tertiary characteristics so secondary are irrelevant let's say that you have a chip and cheerful wine with a bit of chips yeah Oak flavor from chips is still useful yeah yeah is is the lack of tertiary characteristics that makes this wine youthful so just to uh clarify this and this is another reason why becoming familiar with the Lexicon is also very helpful because the Lexicon divide the Aromas in primary secondary and tertiary and if you know where you where you are with your Aromas you will have a better understanding of a useful wine or developing wine so a wine that is useful is a wine that shows only primary characteristics that come from grapes yeah uh great variety grape ripeness and alcoholic fermentation wines that are developing will have at least one or two tertiary characteristics which are at the bottom here and they refer to the Aging of the wine yeah whereas some one might have secondary which refer to post alcoholic fermentation procedure use of Oak Malak conversion you will do this in session three um leas aging yeah yeah sorry to to interrupt you I don't be sorry I like being interrupted I question I I didn't catch the sense you wrote six Aromas from lemon to grass um that are more than five and how could it what what is the the sense for for the word simple in this case if you wrote three I I could understand it but U you wrote you wrote six very good question very good question because it gives me an opportunity also to explain better the concept of Simplicity for wct so for wct one is simple when uh you cannot M move much through different clusters so for example here you have mainly Citrus and green fruit with a little bit of grass a bit of Wet Stone but it's still simple so a wine that is complex is a wine that uh shows very clearly a lot of different Aromas in a lot of different clusters they might be even all uh um just primary I give you an example a premium quality sovon Blan from Malboro New Zealand a premium one yeah not not the CH Che from the off license so you have generally in those wines you don't have secondary characteristics you don't have tertiary but you have floral very specific ELD the flower you have citrus fruit but you can name it you can smell it so these are more generic yeah uh you can name lemon lime grapefruit very clearly you have her bous character typical green bell pepper asparagus grass but you can smell the grass um you have tropical fruits passion fruit you might have wet stone so you go from floral citrus fruit tropical fruit herbaceous character uh Wet Stone but everything is very precise now the reason why is better to write a bit more than less is because you want to gain those five marks and if you write only five descriptors for a simple wine and by any chance one of those is wrong you C yourself yeah so a little bit of grass of Wet Stone here it doesn't mean that a miracle happen and all of a sudden the one is not simple anymore it just way to make sure you're not going to lose marks make sense okay so if you assert things that maybe you only get the vaguest hint of as long as the marking scheme accepts it as an answer you get that point you won't risking losing a point no there are no negative marks uh and of course if you if you have a hint of something by all means write it because at this level it's much more difficult to to to to actually have that hint so if you have it write it the the the I tell you what generally uh generally candidates that don't pass the exam which are not many don't pass the exam because either they're very stingy with the the scriptors if you write three descriptons there's no way on Earth that you can get five marks if you write five you'll be fine if you're really accurate because in a one like this if your five primary characteristics are melon banana and peach you're out yeah so that's why as as Educators we have to you know encourage to write a bit more so it's getting the clusters right in a broad sense well yeah in a way of course but let's face it how many white wines don't smell and taste of lemon yes okay yeah and another very good approach is to think about similar Aromas lemon grapefruit apple pear yeah Peach apricot because let's face it there's also an element of subjectivity that is is you know it's fairly uh uh important in we are all different you know for for Aurora lemon may be a grapefruit for me is a lemon yeah Rasberry strawberry potato potatoes yeah is you know that that's that element to consider so be generous don't be silly so if you write 20 different Aromas from 10 different clusters and then you write that the one is simple The Examiner I think either you try to be smart or you don't understand what simple means yeah so as you can see a simple wine six seven Aromas it's not problem and they are all very much linked to just ripe fruits yeah good now if a wine is show primary secondary and tertiary what the examiner will do is to allocate one mark one valid Mark for primary one for secondary and one for tertiary the other two randomly to anything that is correct which means that if in a wine that has secondary and tertiary you don't recognize secondary and tertiary you lose two marks in a wine that has primary and tertiary if you don't recognize a tertiary you lose a mark If a wine if in a wine that has primary and and secondary you don't recognize the secondary you lose a mark yeah and Elena is there a way to stand back once you've written your kind of nose part of your tasting and then say okay if the intensity is medium and I've got useful is that correct if because would would color indicate maturation which indicates nonuseful which means you should have a tertiary you is there a way to kind of align your an yeah there are but not many okay but I will I will tell you first the more you study the theory the more that will become um easier to understand um color color is important but if you don't smell and taste the wine uh intensity I would say that you can say that most of the time a one that is light useful and short is a wine for early consumption mhm yeah but if you have a pronounced wine that doesn't mean that the wine is going to be developing and uh you know complex okay because you might have a pronounced note of very specific Aroma or two which means that wine might not be complex uh and the wine could still be made for early consumption yeah that that wonderful sovon Blan that we mentioned earlier you got probably be pronounce and long and very good out standing but the aim is to consume that wine when the fruit is fresh yeah okay yeah um there are other things that can be actually very helpful for example a wine that shows uh a red wine that shows tertiary characteristics how many wine that are designed to age in the bottle will not be actually mature you know not many and certainly you know wct use uh wines that are very mainstream not like quy Boutique strange Andora things so uh if you don't smell secondary if you don't smell Oak you can think it must have some OK G so you try to make an effort there yeah uh sorry sorry I don't want to interrupt you no no please a young wine which is youthful could this wine have uh tertiary Aromas no no okay no I mean we we decide that this one is useful because we don't smell any tertiary if you look at the tertiary Aromas in the Lexicon you have honey you have dried fruit uh you have nuttiness there's nothing in this wine it's just fresh just ripe fruit yeah mhm to comp um to finish my uh little uh uh uh tip on uh things that can actually be a sign of something else a white wine that is heavily OED well it might not be that easy to find tertiary but remember that a white wine that is maturing barrels is mature in that Barrel so the aim is also to trigger some tertiary yeah probably this is what you were asking yeah yeah good so it's time now to try the wine bear in mind that here if you've done this you will have one Mark here yeah five marks here in Aroma descriptors and one here for development yeah which make in total so two marks for appearance let's write it here and maybe with another color because green on green doesn't work there we go and seven Marks here for nose Okay so as try the wine we need to assess if there's res sugar residual sugar in the wine we need to assess the level of acidity the tanning only for red so don't worry about this for a white yeah uh and the body yeah so all of these element we refer as the structure of the wine these things don't have flavor yeah then uh the flavor intensity which is generally mirrors the FL the aroma's intensity uh and the flavor characteristics here you can you should literally copy and paste your Aromas that you detected on the nose and if you find something additional write it here and write it on the nose amend your nose yeah because I can assure you the challenge here is gaining marks for the scriptors most students struggle with this uh for a number of Reason first because they sometimes they don't quite understand that you have an allocation of marks and if you don't write enough the scriptors you don't get get those marks but there's there's also a challenge in terms of assessing uh what the W is showing yeah so copy and past tast and of course if you need to add any add something add something the Finish is how long those flavors will linger finish and flavor intensity are very much connected to each other because they depend on the concentration of the flavors and if flavors are light we don't expect to last long in our mouth yeah so if you have flavor intensity that is light not on the nose on the palette because sometimes wine can be disappointing you can they can promise a lot on the nose and they don't deliver if that is the case it means that there's lack of concentration of flavors but if you have a light flavor intensity expect you are on the short medium minus side if you have pronounced intensity which means that you taste very clearly the flavors you probably are on the medium plus uh long yeah now sweetness assess the sugar acidity once you spill your wine out your um spit Your one out try to open your mouth a little bit like this and see how much saliva how quickly that saliva pies up and how cons persistent is and the higher of course the higher the acidity alcohol the warmth feeling some people might find um very helpful to swallow a little bit of wine and feel the warmth in your throat uh bear in mind that this is the only scale that is three point so medium minus and medium Plus for alcohol would not get a mark and these refer to the to the ABV stated on the label if it's below 11% will be low if it's between 11 and 13.9% ABV will be medium if is above 14% ABV is high alcohol can be a challenge for some of us for me it is but you can practice Yeah you focused on alcohol only and for a few days and you look at the label and you try to calibrate your sensation with the label uh the ABV on the label are we ready for this let's try is it dry course it's dry yeah so no resed sugar whatsoever with this wine is very easy with some wines might be not that easy yeah if you have very ripe fruit character your brain might be confused yeah so if you have that kind of situation in in the exam or by all means when you're assessing wine you can do this it doesn't look pretty it doesn't look elegant but it works every time you do this has been proved that um almost 80% of our taste uh of the flavors that we taste depends on the olfactory system so by touching the wine with your tongue you don't get many flavors yeah you don't get much flavor because the one the nose is not involved too much but the tongue can detect if there's residual sugar because the tongue mainly taste tastes sweetness acidity bitterness Umami and uh salt yeah so uh the one is dry I salivate a lot so for me this the acidity of this one is high yeah alcal is medium is 12% yeah I have the uh alcohol level here in front of me and now the body how can we assess the body well the body is the weight of the wine in your mouth there are things in the structure that will affect directly for example if a wine has a lot of residual sugar the one will be heavier if a wine has a lot of alcohol that will impact positively the body a wine like this that has no sugar medium alcohol on on the lower side because it's 12% only but very high level of acidity will appear a bit thinner right so in this case we would say that the wine is light but of course we rely on the theory so the fact that the acidity is very high and there's no sugar and the alcohol is medium but also think about it does this wine is this wine more similar to water or to mango juice water probably yeah so the wine is light in uh intensity if you think like me that there's no a miracle in your mouth of flavors and the one is still simple generic with these citrus fruits with this uh green apple uh and not much perhaps I will add a note of bread maybe but it's it's not really by all means if you taste bread add it to the nose but it's still simple um and I literally gonna do this copy and paste here yeah uh and for me the flavors are are pretty in and out so still light in terms of flavor characteristics because there's no definition here yeah uh and uh do you agree that is pretty short yeah good now you have one mark for all these assessment so one Mark here yeah one mark for sweetness one mark for acidity one mark for alcohol one mark for body one mark for flavor intensity how many for flavors three only yeah yeah and one for finish fidgeting around with this too many things in there we go just want to make it clear so which means that for a white wine in the palette you gain one two three four five six seven eight nine marks available yeah nine marks and of course for uh red you have 10 because you have a mark for tanning as well which you don't have here okay so what do we have here we have 9 + 9 18 yeah the last two marks are allocated for the quality level and the level Readiness for drinking uh potential for aging so in total for a white wine you have 20 marks for a red you have 21 how do we assess quality balance uh quality level with the Blick Yeah by considering how the wine scores against balance length intensity and complexity length intensity complex are in front of you you just need to look at the length which is short intensity which is light and complexity which is simple which is the opposite of complex so the wine does not score against this parameter not at all so I'm sorry but this is zero yeah on all these elements unfortunately yeah now we don't assess the balance in our tasting notes but the balance is something that we have to assess at this point yeah and by all means generally if a wine is balanced it just give you a pleasant feeling if one is unbalanced as is not something that happens very often but generally you have something that is extremely dominant in the wine yeah for example a wine like this where acidity I would say is the main feature of the wine if a wine was unbalanced you will feel almost like a not a pleasant feeling from this acidity whereas because one is drinkable and is overall Pleasant it means that that acidity has enough fruit which is not much in this wine but is enough to balance that acidity so we can say that the balance here is okay yeah and the four the wine is acceptable so can I ask the way you've scored them out would we not just write things like short simple you you're basically saying that we you put nothing in those areas nothing nothing as you can see there are no Marks here you don't have to motivate anything okay the the tasting exam is a statement okay you don't have to give reasons there another re there another reason why the pass rate is so high because you might get everything wrong but for some reason you know uh uh marks are allocated in a way that's you pass yeah uh so I deliberately uh don't I don't consider faulty deliberately because I don't have faulty wi ever but also poor poor is something that is really really hard to find in the in the market a poor wine is a one that is not even balanced badly yeah has issues Okay so the use of the Blick the easiest way to use this Blick is to look at your tasting notes and particularly for length intensity and complexity if a wine is medium in everything if a wine is sorry score uh in the lower level of this category the one is acceptable if it's medum in everything is generally good if it's very good it's because it's medium Plus in everything so it's almost there but it's not yet so a one that is outstanding is a one that is balance long with long finish with pronounce intensity and with a lot of different Aromas and flavors from different clusters that are easy to identify yeah so you could have a complex wine that has prominence of the individual flavors but you might not class it is outstanding because something in the Blick might not be just exactly right is that the case yeah it might be generally speaking wines that are not outstanding are wines that lack a bit in the Finish or lack a bit in the uh complexity yeah okay um last but not the least you don't need to write the one is complex because complex doesn't give you any Mark yeah no I was just saying the example that you used earlier about the premium svon Blanc y the one thing that it might not have is length because it's kind of crisp and fruity and yeah but that's length depends on the concentration yeah of the flavors so you you might have actually outstanding San Blan from New Zealand okay Malo you might have very good it depends on the concentration of the flavors of that wine okay but outstanding and complex wines do not always go hand in hand because it's that determines that that's that was my key question complexity is a very good is a very good element for a wine yeah so and if a wine is complex is because uh you know you can detect very well all different flavors which means there there concentration or the wine has enough concentration enough balance enough structure to have developed yeah a little bit of fruit and a hint of vanilla doesn't make a wine complex as we mentioned earlier yeah so complexity is a really good element yeah okay uh some wines might become complex part down the line but no they don't they are not yet so literally is it's very important to look at what how you assess the length intensity because if length and intensity are medium plus generally the one is not is not enough to be outstanding yeah okay got it um a wine doesn't need to be super complex to be outstanding just to answer your question but if he's lacking of course yeah um now another good news forget about too young and forget about twoo old yet this is not going to happen to you very difficult to find this one in the market too young means that is from from a tank probably too old it means that someone in the shop forgot you know didn't apply a very good stock rotation um so here we debate between can drink now but has potential for aging or not suitable drink now not suitable for aging it's very important to write drink now so you don't have to be so pedantic and write exactly what is here but drink now suitable for aging drink now not suitable for aging only if you write the whole thing you can get a mark now generally speaking a useful wine most of the time is a wine that needs to be consumed in that status uh by all means there are youthful wines that can develop but statistically most of the time a wine that is like this is a one that doesn't go anywhere yeah it's just fresh fruit doesn't have enough concentration probably if you wait too long that little fruit will disappear so in this case is drink now not suitable for aging if a wine is developing this is easy if a wine is developing and we will see some Wes that are developing is developing so it means that it's going somewhere with we don't know if it's going to age for one year or 20 we don't have to say we can just say drink now but has potential because he developing now is the implication the distinction between not suitable for aging or not suitable for further aging that a wine that would be not suitable for any aging would only have primary and maybe some secondary characteristics whereas a one that was not suitable for further aging would have all three characteristics or categories of characteristics uh is that an important distinction to make when writing you can write you can you can write either right not suitable for aging or further aging absolutely okay uh or simply suitable for it I mean it's really even if you write e can age you will get a mark But if you forget to write drink now you lose you don't have that Mark okay yeah thank you now the last but not the least if you have a wine that is fully developed it's not that common but it can happen a fully developed wine is a wine that shows mainly tertiary and the tertiary are dominant that's very little primary or none for example that fruit is all dry yeah in that case it's fully developed a fully developed wine will not further aging because because aging of other aging means improving a one that is fully developed is it can be outstanding and it can be it can hold for a long time and stay outstanding for 10 years but it will not improve it will not become more complex yeah you have to think about what is the next stage the next stage of a fully developed wine that will be even farther very far in the future is downhill yeah so this is more like really Common Sense fully developed cannot developed father because it's fully developed okay I'm not sure will'll be able to find fully developed wines because it's not it's not an easy thing are we happy with the with all these marks and how they are allocated very good now my last bit of information when the with the next swine would be a bit more yeah quick use of these five point scale now first of all you cannot use ranges you have to make a decision because otherwise you can get a mark you can't say oh the intensity is light to medium minus you can't because the examiner will not know how to give you a mark okay so you have to make a decision examiner can sometimes in very difficult wines uh allocate a mark to different individuals that assess slightly differently the wine yeah but you can't another very important information every point of the scale is not a point is a range so you have pronounced wines that can be here close to medium Plus or pronouns that's I call Uber pronouns there are so pronouns that that pronounce is not even enough and everything in between so don't wait for the most pronounced one in your life to assess it as pronoun don't wait for the most acidic wine in your life to use the extreme don't wait for the best wine of your life to assess it as outstanding yeah as we taste wine we will see that we probably assess wines with the same assessment but they're slightly different which makes sense they are in a Range yeah then the last but not the least don't abuse of medium minus and medium plus because most students tend to use a lot of of the stretches of the medium because they are they are afraid of using the extreme now how to consider the medium minus and medium plus medium minus and medium plus are basically more accurate uh medium so medium plus is a medium that is towards pronounce medium minus is a medium that is towards light and you can say the same for every part of the scale uh or low for example if it's acidity or or oh tan sorry so um if you are in a situation where you're not sure if you want to use the extreme or if you want to use a medium Plus or medium minus pretend you don't have the medium minus and medium plus pretend you have a finish that you can only assess as short medium and long if in a situation like that you're happy with long there's no reason why you have to go back to medium plus if in a situation like this you're happy with medium by all means use medium if in a situation like this you think oh if only I had a medium plus which I'm sure it happened at level two that is where you have to use medium plus yeah very good now I'm going to clear up all these uh uh you have the recording so no problem at all but I'm going to clear up these so we can uh assess the other wies um we're going to finish later tonight you know that I'm sorry but there are I really appreciate there are questions because there are very uh burning very important doubt that you want to resolve and I like to answer all your questions so if someone needs to jump out again uh uh the session will be recorded so don't worry too much but uh you I will probably need 10 15 minutes of your time tonight okay let's try to to move on a little bit more quickly with the next ones it's very important that everything so far is crystal clear because we we want to start with the right foot right okay let's move to number two which is rioa Blanco so this is a a wine that is um traditionally made with a lot of Oak yeah so let's see so as you can see completely different wine but still if you tilt the wine over the wine is is pay lemon very good two marks in our bag hopefully yeah then very different kind of wine now well for a number of Reason first the fruit is much riper do you agree of course you can write lemon here no problem lemon grapefruit not a problem Apple not a problem pear not a problem but in reality probably the examiner here might want to see something else like what you can unmute yourself you can stay unmute all the time I don't mind if you have a cat a child or a dog barking in the background what do you think [Music] Peach AIC yes sorry Oliver say again and aprot I was yeah agreeing yeah absolutely and again we we can't kind of use that approach of using things that could be similar yeah nectaring yeah why not would you say some melon as well well I was about to write that you believe it oh absolutely there's an element here is not is not like a banana but there's an element of ripeness that's knock on the door of tropical fruit I think absolutely then what on the thir on the secondary now just to give you an idea this is a one that has been fermented in barrels and has been aged in small barel for 14 year 14 months uh and also the Le has been steered quite a lot so you might be able to recognize a bit of vanilla here yeah bit of toast a bit of smoke bit of Cedar which is the Posh word for Oak at the end of the day uh maybe a bit of that kind of pastry biscuits yeah so that kind of Bakery product here are much more evident um you can say bread yeah but like that lovely crust golden bread not not not not dough yeah something really uh again toast um we already wrote toast for the oak but it could also be an element of Le aging now if you think without thinking anything specific is very difficult but if you look at your Lexicon and you go to your uh ter Aromas and you think about almonds you think about maip you think about dried fruit anything that might inspire you a little bit on these things yeah yeah I think I think you can say almond here I think you can say um of dried Apple maybe yeah a bit of mipan yeah raisins what do you think so a couple of things here we detected some complexity it was not very difficult to detect these Aromas yeah um and uh of course we have primary secondary and tertiary so the one is developing and in terms of intensity what do you think certainly much more intense than the previous a medium plus medium Plus in a three-point scale would you use medium Plus or would you use pronouns I would use medium plus so you would use medium yeah I would use medium sorry yes you convince me very good so medium plus let's see let's try [Music] very good now of course this one is dry but it's not that easy to assess dryness here as it was before but it's dry there's no residual sugar acidity you salivate a lot yes but perhaps medium plus yeah there's no need to assess Tan in here the wine is 13.5% uh ABV therefore is medium in alol but certainly the weight of the wine is is higher here yeah is a is a bigger body wine so I would say again medium plus good now uh for me the flavor intensity is pronounced is not medium plus and the reason why for me is pronounced is also because it's long those flavor linger uh and uh the structure of the wine is uh is dominated by the flavors yeah super balanced and these flavors of very ripe fruit but also of Oak influence and that nuttiness really linger a lot so this can happen that uh uh a wine can go a notch up a notch down in the intensity uh I will repeat absolutely everything so for some people my actually sometimes the um the the the the flavors of Oak are easier to um assess than the intensity sorry then the the nose so yes uh repeat everything here what happened soor I just wanted to make a bit more Center yeah uh and the Finish is long yeah so in this case you have a whne that yes maybe on the nose is not pronounced as well as on the pette but the palette is much more important so the wine scores when it comes to intensity length it's fairly complex very well balanced the wine is outstanding there's nothing that the wine is missing here and it's clearly a wine that is designed to develop in the bottle so is drink now but has potential for aging do you have any question on this one are you all happy happy custom um when the wine has a potential for aging do you have to say can drink now or can you just saying so I think so so basically on level of regs for drinking you always say drink now whe whether it's aging or not yes absolutely absolutely but you have to say I mean it sounds silly but you have to say it because um the uh The Examiner might think well has potential for aging but do you think it's too young if you don't write it I know it sounds silly but this these are the rules so you have to in both cases you start with drink now and then you write if the wine can age or not simply as this okay yeah better being safe than sorry very good um so if you're happy with this we can start with the red happy okay yeah by all means if you have questions jump in at any moment no problem at all I'm sorry Tony did you have a question no no I'm good yeah good right so with the red wine um we do exactly the same of course when it comes to flavor the color be different of course uh but much easier to assess in a red wine um particularly the intensity because there are red wines through which you can't see and in that case will be deep yeah um the flavors and the Aromas of course we were looking more at red and black fruit uh and when it comes to tertiary secondary characteristics really is only Oak for red wine yeah there's no malow or these aging that we are we need to be concern of um tertiary of course we're looking more at dry black and red fruits and also you know all the Savory characteristic leather um Earth and meat and things like that but the main difference is the tanning structure yeah tanin from SK comes from skin mainly and this is why we assess it on the red one and not in the white because the whites the majority of times are made only with the juice without the Skin So color much easier first because if you look at your glass from the top like this uh if you see nothing almost like only the Reflection of yourself the wine is deep if you can see only the bottom of the but not the stem that is medium if you can see through perfectly all the stem the wine will be pale so much easier yeah so in this case I would say medium yeah of course it depends on different lights that we have different uh glassware but I think medium here is reasonable uh and the color also I believe is a little bit easier for red wine so a red wine is Ruby if by tilting the glass over you can see in that Rim a tinge of blue that is purple if you can see a Ting of orange that is garet again don't worry about Tony and brown which means that your Ruby is gradually disappearing um and and uh the the orange and the brown become dominant but those are color mainly of Port yeah so a red wine with a long deliberate oxidation good so this is medium and the color here I mean this is knocking on the door of purple now for some students assessing color can be extremely frustrating because of course there are wines that are kind of in the verge of purple to Ruby or Ruby to Garnet but don't stress too much it's just a mark and it's there are many marks around that are much more important than this yeah so I would say medium purple probably not the most purple wine in the world but what can we do we have to make a decision okay good now this is a what is it a b b vage yeah so again with the same um yeah now did you notice how number two was so much more than just the smell of wine this we are back of yeah this SM of wi yeah and so much less of that kind of specific range of Aromas and flavors yeah so in this case it's a bit more intense than our mcade but I wouldn't go more than medium minus here so in fness here the Cherry is a cherry yeah then of course if we start if we start arguing oh is more cherry or more Plum then it might be a little bit uh not sure but but there's an element of red stone fruit right red cherry red plum yeah uh bit tart in terms of red fruit red curant cranberry again I start now using my theory knowledge rather than my you know uh uh uh my my uh genuine uh assessment of these fruits yeah then perhaps uh a bit of fruit that is a little bit confected like I don't know maybe bubble gum yeah you see bubble gum is not in your Lexicon here but in a one like this bubblegum will probably give you a mark yeah uh kir which is here yep now with apple wct are not very fasty red green yellow you don't have to specify with cherry and Plum they are really specific so you have to specify the color that are in two different clusters yeah um very good now in a wine like this if you are not really sure right simple no secondary no tertiary very limited cluster here is mainly red fruit with a little bit of confection yeah um I would really encourage to write simple here because the wine is is simple isn't it y again go into the uh flavors copy and paste everything and this is why important to copy and paste because if you copy and paste you won't forget simple if you don't and you go for a tangent you have two risks one that you start writing things that are not in the wine two is that you forget things that actually will grant you a mark yeah let's say in a in a wi with ter characteristics you for you forget to write thary flavors those Mark are gone simple is gone so in this case again you have a one that is useful because there's no tertiary right no secondary no tertiary do you agree sorry this bubble gum um irritates me because it's not written down here in this uh I know but this is how can you use it uh because you can use additional terms providing that are quite common yeah okay so even if he not in the lexic by all means if if you don't write bubble gum here and you write red cherry red plum red curant kir and simple you have your five marks no problem at all yeah um of course we are very keen on how gain marks but we also try to learn how to taste find different things in the wines improve our tasting skills and bubble gum is very typical of these kind of wines because of the way they are made made so even the examiner wct will recognize you will notice uh I will attempt the pronunciation of your name but please please correct me R girl yes yes it's right oh wow that's that's that was L rud rudig you see you're very kind it was not right thank you very much so you see that in the Lexicon there's not simple there's not simple in the lexicon but if you don't write simple in a simple wine okay it would be marked down however in your study guide page 29 I believe and if I remember correctly I will be very scared yes indeed 29 you will see and this is why it's important to read the study guide as well it will explain the concept of simple as I did okay it's not in the Lexicon but nevertheless is required if a wine is simple uh very good so let's try the wine and in addition to everything we need to assess remember that we have to assess the tanning now the tanning will make your M mouth feel dry yeah uh and a very good way to assess the tanning is a to pass the wine between your gums and your upper lip and the more your gums will fill shrinking almost the higher the level of tanning however keep an eye on the body as well because some tanins might appear a bit higher than what they are because they might not be right they might be a bit harsh plus the acidity in a wine can confuse you a little bit let's try this okay dry right dry acidity I salivate a lot myself so the acidity is high good body what do you think is the body of the wine before assessing the tning alcohol is medium I tell you is um 13 Point uh no I don't know what is it's medium though I did I think it's around 13 what do you think is the body of the wine Oliver I'm gonna say light yes you're right it's one of those situations where I I'm almost inclined to medium minus but I did what you said no I wouldn't say medium I would say light it's light because if you think about another you know other red wines that are lighter than these you might struggle yeah now with a light body wine tanins cannot be high cannot be medium plus cannot be medium gen the light sorry low if you say lights turning lights you lose a mark so although this tanning might appear a bit AR stringent a bit unripe the level is low and what might be confusing in this wine is the level of acidity and the fact that there's no enough concentration of flavors to for the flavor to to be actually uh uh uh appreciated and for the Finish to be more than short to medium Plus or medium minus yeah so when you assess the tanning when you struggle think about the body because these two are very related a wine that is full bodied red probably the level of tning would be medium plus to high yeah um so the flavor intensity for me this wine went down a notch in the flavor compared to the nose so for me is light and uh for me is short again that acidity that tanning that alcohol uh Prevail a little bit this doesn't mean that the one is not balanced the one is fairly balanced but it doesn't score in length intensity and complexity so the one is acceptable so is youthful concentration Is Not Great the wine is drink now not suitable for aging do you agree y or do you have any questions about it oh good only with regards to flavor intensity why we would say it's is it light the word because do you agree that the wine is short yes I tell yes so if the wine is short that means that flavors are not concentrated enough for you to actually assess them for a long time and this will also have an impact on the uh intensity Now by all means you know um some examiner might accept medium minus here but no more than that okay for me the wine on the nose is a bit more promising so for me the Aromas are a bit more defined than the flavors on the palette this is why I said sure uh sorry I said medium uh sorry I said light medium minus might be accepted by from by some examin it if I had to uh iess exams and in a wi like this I would I would want to to see light don't you think the wine is a bit disappointing from the nose to the palette yes definitely yes that's your answer literally okay yeah okay very good right so last red wine is a rioa very good producer is is just a a bottle for wine Society but the producer here is a really good one Mara ala is a resera uh 14% of alcohol if you want to uh take a note of it nice bottling because it did the that uh you can see the gas that goes out so okay so in this case again our color so in this case I can't see anything and the wine is Ruby yeah there's not much purple there there's not much orange so deep Ruby that there are a lot of wines that are Ruby uh as well in the in the in the red Universe good and again probably and you this wine you you probably straight away think about I know Rose and lovely red and black fruit and vanilla and coconut and leather and mushroom and these wonderful things and you almost forget that smells of wine yeah isn't that amazing so the wine is pronounced and I will show I will also demonstrate why it's pronounced so you just let me know if you disagree with the Aromas that I'll find in this wine and by all means if you want to add something jumping at any time I really like that so red and black cherry I would say red and black Plum I will say strawberry uh Blackberry maybe I do this raisins then I'm going to move into oh uh actually a bit of uh Rose violet yep then I'm going to move into uh Oak there's a lot of or in the wine and I would say vanilla coconut Cedar smoke Charwood toast yeah cloves so far so good then in terms of tertiary mushroom very good term that means everything and nothing nothing is in your Lexicon Savory yeah kind of a safe term um leather meat Earth tobacco dried BlackBerry what do you think it's just my imagination or you can actually smell some of these things happy so the wine is absolutely developing very good let's try so for example in a wine like this if rather than assessing all these fruit you would assess more like only dry fruits and all the tertiary it will be fully developed but in this one there's so much fresh fruit and of course you in the in the pallet you can assess it even better right do you agree that wine is dry yeah thumb up if you agree that wine is dry good do you agree that the acidity is high there's a lot of fruit here very ripe so take your time forget about the fruit go back to the wine spit it out open your mouth you will see you salivate a lot but there's so much concentration of fruit in this wine that of course is very well balanced so much more difficult to sometimes assess acidity tanning and um alcohol now alcohol is high here is 14% so just about High um what do you think about the body of this wine medium plus perhaps right so I would assess the Turning as medium plus and the body as medium plus y this is not disappointing is it yeah you like it lovely so no disappointment for us flavors are all there very precise um very evident very pronounced and they last forever yeah it there the flavors are so concentrated that is is almost hard to actually assess the high acidity and the tanning and the ALCO so is long yeah oh is lovely so we repeat all our um flavor here yeah here we go and of course this wine is outstanding and is absolutely designed for aging so drink now soup for aging now in my humble opinion this wine if we follow the Blake is a much better wine compared to the white rioa that we assess as outstanding but as you can see how they can live together in the outstanding range make sense I lied to you I actually stole 23 minutes of your time sorry yeah some people left which is fair enough some people are mute which is fair enough it's very late so first of all I apologize for finish so late but I really wanted to clarify all the points this very crucial beginning uh and um thank you so much for everybody that stay until the end uh I'm still available if you have questions ask a question Elena what makes this why in your opinion why is this better than the white rioka in terms of it being outstanding what makes it more outstanding to you because uh when we uh when we assess the Aromas and flavor was this for me is more complex secondary when when I assess the intensity and the length which again I'm talking about the Blick as you can see is I'm not talking about my preferences it was much easier for me to say is pronounce is long there's no debate whatsoever yeah it's is very extreme as a wine it's not a wine that you think oh if I had a three SK what would I do here um so in that sense you know you you can say okay in this outstanding this rioa red is here the rioa blanco probably was a bit more towards very good yeah yeah makes sense makes sense thank you really nice isn't it it's lovely very good well at the end of the day this is one of the most iconic produc producer of rioa and the grapes come from one of the best part of rioa um can't wait till mine comes sorry I can't wait till my samples come yes absolutely uh so this wine Society is a great great great value because they have of course a lot of really good supplies and they sometime they label as a wine Society ranges so but having said that in rioka gener there great value compared to other part of Europe let's say okay do you have any question any doubt on how to assess wine how to write tasting notes how to get as Mark as many as Mark as possible is all clear I just want to check we've gone over everything for the tasting that we're going to be on there's nothing else they would expect uh no we just need to practice yeah of course but bear in mind that uh your tasting skills will improve dramatically as you learn the theory because there's no tasting skill can be developed without Theory knowledge even the knowledge of the you know the the terminology that is theor knowy if we decide that all of a sudden the intensity uh is not full intensity anymore but it's called Julie we will say pronounce Julie of Aromas so it's all a theory and of course when we going to study the typical expression of rling from ranga or um semon from anal we would expect those things in the wine and that will help our calibration as well so is is is end end in End Theory knowledge tasting practice I and so on but don't underestimate the reading of the study guide yeah I I keep saying this because as a student I always skipped in all my career at w I always completely overlooked deliberately the chapter on tasting so the first chapter of the textbook and study guide never give a monkeys about it it's not a good move it's not a good strategy okay so again apologies thank you very much for uh stay with me until 9:30 almost um sorry for the chat I will try to fix this um for our next I will also tell Jimmy to to double check that everything works but he might be an administrator so he might have less problems with these technical issues uh but I will make sure that for next time is working properly guys thank you very much it's been a pleasure and I'll seven of April bye bye bye