How do you select the wine for wine tasting party? By following some simple guidelines, you will be able to present a great selection of wine.
In the article Host an Italian Wine Tasting I examined some essential ideas when planning a wine tasting party in your home. Aside from how many people and whom to invite, the most important question is, "What wine will we drink?"
Which wines you serve depends on how much you hope to learn from the tasting. You can pick a single variety of wine, such as Chianti, and serve different labels of that variety. This allows you to compare the different styles within the style, and discover which you like best.
You can decide to focus on one of Italy's wine regions, such as the Piedmont. When you serve wine from only one region, you can compare to see what they may have in common with each other. Instead of focusing on one region, you can pull back and compare wines of Northern Italy, Central Italy, or Southern Italy.
Another option is to serve wines all made from the same grape, such as Pinot Grigio.
For an informal tasting, you can ask your guests to bring a bottle of Italian wine. You may want to keep track of who is bringing what wine so you can have as wide a selection as possible. You don't want all Verdicchios from the same vintner. You can opt for well known varieties, such as Soave, Valpolicella, Chianti, etc. You may choose to focus on lesser known wines, such as Gattinara, Inferno, or Torgiano.
Some purists insist that you should not serve both white and red wines at a tasting. This is an option as well. Only white wines will be tasted so that you may learn something about the unique character of Italian white wine.
The choices are varied and broad, depending upon your tastes and curiosity.
