No Wine Before it's Time

The inaugural meeting of Parvulus Vinum(Young Wine in Latin) is coming up tomorrow night. It's a club for young adults that my buddy Anthony and I thought up about a month ago and tomorrow night we're expecting about 15 people to show up and learn how to experience the phenomenon of wine. The meeting will cover the basics; regions, varietals, how to smell, taste, swirl, etc.

I picked up the bottles we're going to taste yesterday, some generic two buck chucks from Trader Joes and the other five bottles from San Diego Wine Company which is close to my apartment. We're aiming for the most common type our peers will see and taste, here's the list for tomorrow:

• Drylands 2005 Sauvignon Blanc - New Zealand - 91pts
  
• Alamos 2005 Chardonnay - Agentina - 89pts
• Gravity Hills 2002 Syrah - California - 88pts
• Smoking Loon 2004 Merlot - California - 84pts
• Echelon 2005 Pinot Noir - California - 88pts

The Wine Aroma Wheel is a handout and will help dramatically for people who have never truly tasted wine before and are at a loss of what they're attempting to taste.

Yesterday when I was looking for reviews of the wine I purchased (some of them were in the store but others were not) I came across two amateur wine rating sites, Corkd and Winelog.net.

Both sites are relatively new and don't have a huge amount of reviews, but as word spreads I have a feeling it will be an excellent independent wine resource site. I've signed up with Corkd and you can see my online wine journal listing on the right of this page. A few friends have also signed up and we're now "drinking buddies", which means we'll be able to recommended wines to each other, see what their cellars hold, and other common things. At our meeting we'll encourage members to join either site to keep track of their tastings and what other members of the club are doing.

Salut!