In any given wine class at The Chopping Block, we spend a heck of a lot of time assessing the “nose,” or the smell of the wine, before we actually get to taste it. Sometimes I see students chomping at the bit to get on with it—after all, it’s called wine tasting, not wine smelling.
So why is giving wine a thorough sniff before tasting so important? Because the sense of smell accounts for up to 85% of that which we perceive as the sense of taste. Yup, we perceive on our palate only salty, sour, bitter, sweet, and a nebulous thing called umami—everything else comes from our olfactory center. This is the very reason your sense of “taste” flies right out the window when you have a stuffy nose.
It’s said that human beings can recognize 10,000 different odors. People who are trained to recognize odors (wine tasters, perfume experts) aren’t necessarily blessed with superior organoleptic set-ups, they’re just better at retrieving the names of smells from memory. To most, this is easier said than done.
A while back I was introduced to a very cool (though very expensive) kit called “Le Nez du Vin,” which presents the essences of the 54 aromas most likely found in wine in tiny vials. Wine lovers can smell for themselves what the trade magazines are referring to when speaking of aromas (and therefore, flavors) ofnquince, cut hay, cedar, yeast, truffle, and clove. What a revelation!
Since I happen to have my mits on one of these Le Nez du Vin kits, I thought why not make a class out of it? Why not help Chopping Block wine students dissect the nose of wine, with a vial of blackcurrant leaf in one hand, and a Cabernet from Napa teaming with it in the other?
Our first edition of “The Nose of Wine” class will be held Friday, September 3 at our Lincoln Square location, from 7-8:30. Come one, come all, but leave the Chanel No. 5 or Aramis at home, please. Click here to sign up.
