Santa Margherita

You’re probably already sitting down. So, if you have a bottle of wine in the house, open it. For now, it doesn’t matter what kind it is. Pour yourself a glass and get ready, if you feel like it, for a  brief introduction to a tasting course that will guide you into the magical world of wine.

Even people in very ancient history considered wine to be magical: the inebriation provided by wine was in fact thought of as a means of getting closer to the gods. We do not want you to get drunk but, on the contrary, to help you discover wine from the right perspective, getting rid of its clichéd images as the heavy drinker's inseparable companion or, on the other hand, as an elitist product just for a few snobs. We would like to pass on to you our love for this product, which is a gift from the earth and which has an extremely long history, and show you that a glass of wine represents the work of men and their struggle with, and sometimes against, nature.
We shall explain how, where and when wine is produced. We shall teach you to recognize a wine's characteristics from its color and aroma, even before you have tasted it. We shall suggest how, when and with what to drink it. In short, we wish to give you a background which, while not overwhelming, should certainly be enough to help you understand a great deal and to know exactly what you are drinking.
By the way, what does a bottle of wine contain? Mainly water (78-85%) and sweet-tasting substances (including alcohols and sugars), but there are smaller quantities of thousands of other substances that give the wine its distinctive character and these can be identified by means of what is known as organoleptic examination of the wine. This is maybe a rather grand-sounding expression for a procedure that you will get used to performing every time you taste a glass of wine: one that you have probably seen done many times, maybe to your amusement, by people who were very carefully assessing the color of the wine and its clarity, and trying to find ways to describe more or less recognizable aromas. It is not a game - or rather, it can become one - but it has a serious basis. The color of the wine can tell us about its age and the stage it has reached in its development, just as the bouquet or aromas which it gives off can tell us about its condition, the grape variety and the way the wine was made. The reference to well-known smells is just a way to recall suggestions that are common to all of us, but which actually correspond to well-defined chemical substances; it makes more impact to say that this wine smells of tobacco rather than give the name of the chemical which is responsible for the tobacco aroma.
This short course, then, will teach you to judge a wine’s color, bouquet and taste - along with many other things - but you can learn the first rule straight away: if the color is clear and attractive, the wine smells clean and pleasant and the taste is appealing, then what you are drinking is already a good wine.