Tasting 1

Tasting 1 - Milestone Cabernet Sauvignon

Name: Milestone Cabernet Sauvignon

Variety: Cabernet Sauvignon
Region: Geyserville, California
Country: USA
Year: 2013
Price: $8.79

Quick Facts

Wine style: Rich and velvety smooth, our Milestone Cabernet
Sauvignon’s luscious, jammy notes of blackberry and dark fruit
are followed by subtle hints of vanilla and spice.

Appellation: California
Alcohol: 13%
pH: 3.8
TA: 6.1g/L
RS: 11.5g/L

Winery review

A beautiful wine, not thin but balanced with oak notes and a full jammy mouthy taste. Not overpowering, so this will go well with cheese, meat, fruit or chocolate. Smooth with a wonderful finish. A great value. 3.5/5

My review

The wine had a nice taste to it, nothing too strong, but still flavors to give it something to be remembered by. I tried it before eating and while eating. This was the first time I tried the “Bird calling” technique and have to say that the rear pallet taste was quite different than without aerating the wine using the technique. I read the description to have an idea of what to look for but couldn’t really tell where the vanilla or the oak was coming from. Trying the meat with the wine was a great paring, maybe the dark fruits and berries were adding to the experience too!

Week 1

Wine has always been that shirt in the back of the closet that always seems to be a great shirt, but never turns out to be all that great by the end of the day. You try it a couple times each year, but it just never turns out to work all that well. I don't try wine all that often, I do enjoy smelling different wines when those around my are having it with a meal, but the aspect of tasting it has never sat that well with me.

My experience with wine is slim, I've visited vineyards, have siblings that work at them, friends that are extremely knowledgeable, but my lack of knowledge in wine prevents me from fully understanding all of it's complexities and depth. I look forward to learning more about it and what the complete wine experience is about. My typical experiences are around dinner time when I'm offered a small glass, one that I usually turn down.

I can't wait to slosh and make bird sounds when I try my first wine during this course though. I never knew that there were so many different techniques to tasting wine. The front, left, right, and back of my pallet will all finally have a chance to properly taste wine the way it was made to be tasted. Now, if I could only figure out where I left my wine spit bucket....

Moving forward I hope to learn how to properly identify the various aspect and characteristics that wine hold. I currently don't quite understand what makes a full body wine a full body wine, or what a flinty wine tastes like. I had my first lesson on wines when visiting Thomas Jefferson's wine cellar and the history of his classification system on wines, now I'll be able to understand what the tour guides were really speaking about and how impactful Mr. Jefferson's analysis was.