Nearly two years ago I wrote the following blog post about palate fatigue. It’s one of the Top 10 posts on this site so I thought maybe I should review my advice and see if I still agree with it!
Fortunately, I do.
During the past week, I tasted a lot of wine: about 2 dozen wines at Bridlewood with winemaker David Hopkins, 15-20 wines at three Ventura County wineries on Friday, a couple of bottles on Saturday at home for blog posts, on Sunday another 20 or more wines at 4 Ventura County Wineries, two more wines on Monday, then on Tuesday about 50 wines at an industry event in Los Angeles. That’s a lot of wine, but I didn’t have any problems with palate fatigue (no hangovers, either).
And I’m preparing for Dark & Delicious where I will taste as many as 50 different Petit Sirahs! Insert image of red wine tongue here!
So in addition to the ideas about palate fatigue in the post below, I’ve learned this about attending tastings:
1) Drink lots of liquids before (and after) the tasting; don’t drink water during. I like protein shakes before.
2) If you taste a lot of wine often, you don’t get palate fatigue like you do as a beginner.
3) Dump. Spit. Dump. Spit. Dump. Spit. You’re not going to offend anyone!
4) When in doubt, don’t drive. When your palate is fatigued, maybe this is a sign for you to stop tasting. There was a woman at the tasting Tuesday who insisted she could drive home. While I prayed the valet didn’t give her her keys, we went for sushi and let the traffic die down. I didn’t want to be on any road she was on.
5) Wear dark clothes!
Keep reading for more tips on what to do about palate fatigue.
via Wine Predator