Blind Tasting Wine Recommendations

[skilly1]

I'm going do a blind wine tasting evening - 6 bottles of wine (3 red, 3 white) wrapped in kitchen foil. Teams then have to guess from the taste/smell and looking at the bottle shape:


Country of origin
Type of Grape
Also rate the wine (1-10)
Price
Any suggestions for some wine to buy? It has to be available from a supermarket/ high street booze shop (preferably the same one !)
I need one cheap, One medium (£8 plus) and one expensive(relatively - £20 max). Thinking of putting a British wine in there somewhere.

Any good suggestions, maybe a curved ball option?

[condor]

Make it very obvious varietal choices, otherwise the chances are your tasting party will fall flat.

suggest
white
New Zealand, Sauv Blanc
Australia, Chardonnay
Loire, France. Chenin Blanc ( ie Vouvray)

Red
Chile, Cab Sauv
Australia, Shiraz
Rioja, Spain. Tempranillo

Edited by condor on Monday 22 March 17:31

[Mobile Chicane]

Try Denbies 'Whitedown' as a sparkler. £15.99 from Waitrose.

They'll never guess it's English, and it knocks spots off any champagne for the price.

[escargot]

Try a New Zealand Chardonnay (such as the cloudy bay) then compare this with a French Chardonnay (such as a premier/grand cru Chablis). Both often superb but very different.

[Simpo Two]

condor said:

Tempranillo

I'll have a glass of 'Cuprinol Shed and Fence Preserver' please...

[Wadeski]

Pouilly-fume, a Loire white with a very distinctive "flinty-minerally" taste. Also my favourite wine
Young Sauvingon Blanc, for the distinctive acidic smell.
Merlot vs Cab Sav (most pronunced in New World wines) to tell the difference between soft and tannic. Then throw in both a New World and a Burgundian Pinot Noir to show the difference in style.

[4mo]

We did this with some neighbours a while back, as well as price, grape etc we provided a jumbled list of the descriptive words on the bottles and points were awarded for matching the correct words to the bottles.
We had 10 different bottles to go at so everyone had at least 10 glasses no spitting out allowed, waste of good and some crap wine. Weight watchers wine was universally hated by everyone, the cheap (47p a bottle from france)cooking wine was enjoyed by many. May have had something to do with it being provided later in the evening.

[skilly1]

Thanks for all of the replies, good idea to pick quite obvious differences to make it easier. Also like the idea of have description to guess.

[cinque]

Whites:

NZ Sauv. Blanc Pay around £7-8 for a Oyster Bay/Wairau Cove etc) (gooseberry/grassy)

Aussie Chardonnay Pay around £6 for a Jacobs creek (melons/lemons)

French Chablis Prem. Cru, £15 for a Brocard (dry minerally/flinty/complex)

You could also throw in a Viognier for £6-7 which will give you peach and apricot to confuse things nicely!

Reds:

Aussie Shiraz, £8 for a good Peter Lehman (Rich plums/juicy/touch of spice/hints of chocolate)

Chilean Pinot Noir, £7-8 for a Cono Sur (Ripe cherry/raspberry/ultra smooth)

Spanish Rioja, £10-12 for a good Reserva (lots of Vanilla from the oak/lots of leather and spice)

Throw in a Musar as the wildcard (about £16-17). Lebanese made and something of a cult wine, really gives the blind taster something to think about!


This should give you enough variety and structure to compare and contrast and you can up or lower your budget in each area accordingly.

I've purposely listed wines that are easily available in large supermarkets for ease of purchase.


Happy tasting.

[condor]

Rather than putting the bottles in kitchen foil which might tear easily , another way would be putting them in dark (non see-through carrier) bags and tying with a cable tie around the neck.
I've done quite a few of these wine tasting evenings which is why I've suggested making it easy, you don't want them all not getting any right! You want your participants to enjoy a good, fun evening and give them some confidence that they can guess the wines. You'll need a tiebreak question as well ie write your own 'back label' wine description for the last wine tasted....just in case

[escargot]

On a slight aside, I recently did the free majestic introductory wine tasting course thing. It was absolutely superb - if you get the chance and have a majestic local, I'd recommend sticking your name down for it.

Also, spitting isn't obligatory