We had the best time wine tasting at the Humble Grape so of course we just had to share it with you! It is of course national wine day on the 18th February and we think this is the perfect place to celebrate!
There are 5 Humble Grapes in London and we decided to visit the one in Islington. We totally forgot how much was loved Islington High Street and will definitely be returning soon; so many restaurants & bars and such a buzz on a Saturday too!
The Humble Grape often do wine tastings from vegan wine, meet the winemaker and also food and wine parings. We attended the food and wine paring and cannot recommend it enough! It costs £10 to attend but you get a £10 gift card to spend in store, which we think is wicked!!
Our teacher was called Carlos and he was also the GM of the Islington branch. He had so much knowledge of wine and was also so passionate, he was great to listen to! We have been to wine tasting before elsewhere and found the session quite boring (sorry!), but this was quite the opposite. Carlos was so interesting and we loved listening to what he had to say.
We sampled 4 wines in total over an hour, 2 whites, 1 red and 1 sweet wine. We were given a leaflet which we could write our answers on and make notes too. The placemat had sections ready for the wine and also the name of the wine too!!
One of the wines we sampled was a Gewürztraminer, which tends to be a sweet and slightly aromatic white wine. Gewürztraminer wine, which is the second most planted grape variety in Alsace, France, tends to be a delicate wine, with complex fruity aromas. Quite a contrast to Sauvignon Blanc, which tends to have a more ‘citrus’ flavor profile!
The first part of the session was to sample all the wines one after the other. We started with the first one, looked at it and shared what we thought it looked like e.g. clear, pale lemon coloured etc. Next we smelt it and shared what we thought it smelt like e.g. floral, woody, lychee, rose water etc.
Next was time to taste it. Carlos taught us how to taste wine properly; taking a sip, swilling around the mouth, breathing/sucking in air and then swallowing. We really did think that by doing the step of breathing in air made the flavours come alive!! Then we moved onto the next wine following the same process again!
Next it was time for the food pairing part! We are going to be honest and we thought it was going to be eating food/a meal with the wines, and we were so wrong and so glad we were! The pairing session was not what we expected but in fact it exceeded out expectations because it was so interesting!! The session was to show us that wine doesn’t change the flavour of food, but food changes the flavour of wine.
First we drank the first white wine (Sauvignon) and then we took a slice of lemon, sucked it and sipped the wine again. Wow, as the wine was so acidic the lemon totally reduced the acidity of the wine.
Then we moved to the other white, took a sip and then had some bread with harissa and took another sip of the wine. This time the spiciness of the bread made the wine in our opinion taste nicer. The wine also reduced the spiciness.
For the sweet wine we paired it with a custard cream and again this made the sweet wine taste perfect – the custard cream went so well! For sweet wines you should never pair them with anything sweeter than the wine itself, so you have to choose wisely!
We have learnt so much about wine tasting from this session. So now, you need to book your place and see for yourself, you will have the best time – we promise and don’t forget you will also get a £10 voucher to spend it store!
