Wine Wheel

How to Score

APPEARANCE   3 - Excellent                - Brilliant with outstanding characteristic color.   2 - Good                      - Clear with characteristic color.   1 - Poor                        - Slight haze and/or slight off color.   0 - Objectionable       - Cloudy and/or off color.   AROMA AND BOUQUET   6 - Extraordinary       - Unmistakable characteristic aroma of grape-variety or wine-                                             type.  Outstanding and complex bouquet.  Exceptional balance                                             of aroma and bouquet.   5 - Excellent                - Characteristic aroma. Complex bouquet.  Well balanced.   4 - Good                      - Characteristic aroma.  Distinguishable bouquet.   3 - Acceptable            - Slight aroma and bouquet.  Pleasant.   2 - Deficient                - No perceptible aroma or bouquet or with slight off odors.   1 - Poor                        - Off odors.   0 - Objectionable       - Objectionable or offensive odors.   TASTE AND TEXTURE   6 - Extraordinary       - Unmistakable characteristic flavor of grape-variety or wine-                                             type.  Extraordinary balance.  Smooth, full-bodied and                                             overwhelming.   5 - Excellent                - All of the above but a little less.  Excellent but not                                             overwhelming.   4 - Good                      - Characteristic grape-variety or wine-type flavor.  Good                                             balance.  Smooth.  May have minor imperfections.   3 - Acceptable            - Undistinguished wine but pleasant. May have minor off flavors.                                            May be slightly out of balance, and/or somewhat thin or rough.   2 - Deficient                - Undistinguished wine with more pronounced faults than above.   1 - Poor                        - Disagreeable flavors, poorly balanced, and/or unpleasant                                             texture.   0 - Objectionable       - Objectionable or offensive flavors and/or texture.   AFTERTASTE   3 - Excellent                - Lingering outstanding aftertaste.   2 - Good                      - Pleasant aftertaste.   1 - Poor                        - Little or no distinguishable aftertaste.   0 - Objectionable       - Unpleasant aftertaste. OVERALL IMPRESSION                                       TOTAL SCORES         2 - Excellent                                                                18  -  20         Extraordinary   1 - Good                                                                      15  -  17 Excellent   0 - Poor                                                                        12  -  14         Good                                                                                                        9  -  11 Commercially Acceptable                                                                                           6  -    8 Deficient                                                                                           0  -    5  Poor and Objectionable

The American Wine Society is a national non-profit consumer organization which is dedicated to educating its members and the general public about wine appreciation, production and use.  The society is an independent organization with no commercial affiliation.  The society has chapters throughout the United States and Canada.  Membership is open to anyone interested in wine - amateur, enthusiast or professional.  For further information contact:         AMERICAN WINE SOCIETY                                                                   113 South Perry Street                                                               Lawrenceville, GA  30045 PHONE  678-377-7005                                                    info@americanwinesociety.org

AWS Tasting Score Chart

		Wine Evaluation Chart                  Name: _________________________          Date: _________________________                  Place:  _________________________          Theme: _______________________ See Reverse Side for Scoring Guidelines							A         W              S
	Wine		Price	Appearance 3 Max	Aroma / Bouquet 6 Max	Taste / Texture 6 Max	Aftertaste 3 Max	Overall Impression 2 Max		Total Score 20 Max
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

The Basics

To begin this study of wine, let's first establish some basics. Wine is an alcoholic drink made from fermented grapes. Archaeological evidence suggests that wine production first took place as early as 7000 BCE in Georgia with the grape vine being domesticated around the advent of the Bronze Age. The history of wine is linked to humanity through avenues of agriculture, cuisine, and culture as is evidenced by its uses and popularity today. Like our ancestors, we have many uses for wine ranging from the cheap Shiraz you may enjoy with a cheeseburger to the sophisticated Cabernet Souvingnon you may use to "wine and dine" a potential business partner. These uses are determined widely based on the food science of wine pairing, which we will discuss at a later point, but also on the quality of the wine itself. This distinction creates the need for us as consumers, and for wineries as producers, to establish a standard of accepted quality. What exactly is this standard?

Like many components of the wine industry, and like wine itself, the answer to this conundrum is multifaceted  and somewhat subjective. However, for the sake of laying a foundation, three main tells for wine quality are raw material quality, processing, and obviously, taste.

Raw material quality refers most commonly to the actual grapes used to make the wine. This is derived from the cultural practices employed in the vineyard such as planting time, soil chemistry, and irrigation as well as from the actual cultivar of the grapes. Grape cultivar is a driving force for many of these practices with different varieties requiring different cultural input. Different cultivars also determine the type of wine produced with Cabernet grapes producing Cabernet, Chardonnay producing Chardonnay and so on and so forth. Many of these strains are extremely old cultivars which originate from areas also named for the grape. Translation: You could literally be drinking a Bordeaux made from Bordeaux grapes grown in Bordeaux. Try saying that five times fast.

The way these grapes are processed also impacts the quality of a wine. One important component is the actual receptacle which the wine will ferment and mature in. These can range from stainless steel vats to hundred year old oak barrels and everything in between. In addition to the different profiles which arise from the containment of the wine, chemical levels must also be constantly evaluated and adjusted in order to produce a palatable wine.

Despite the importance of the above components, ultimately wine will sell and be evaluated based on taste. In a professional wine tasting sphere (sommelier) wines are evaluated based on established profiles for different wine types using a taste chart. One common chart for scoring is the AWS (American Wine Society) which ranks various aspects of the wine based on appearance, aroma, taste, aftertaste, and overall appearance for a score of up to twenty points. There is also a figure known as a wine wheel which can be used to help the taster identify diverse scents and flavors. Both of these figures are pictured with this entry While these professional opinions help shape the marketing of the wine, taste is incredibly important and subjective. Many times an expert may dislike a wine, but it may be a top seller on the market. Really there is no wrong or right taste, but a profile which sells.

The production of wine is a worldwide industry which is inextricably linked to our culture and has been since its advent. Viticulture drives the culinary and agricultural fields while entangling itself in our day to day lives and social culture. for this reason, the exploration of the quality, materials, and procedures used to create wine and wine products is heavily influenced by science and art. If nothing else is derived from this project take away these three main quality points, however if you are looking dazzle your friends and family at upcoming events at which wine is served, I will be unpacking these points in gory detail until we are all intimately acquainted with the romance and mystery of wine production.

Welcome to the Journey

Howdy!

My name is Heather MacDonald and I am a senior Horticulture major at Texas A&M University. For the last year I have been studying Enology (Scientific term for wine making) with Dr. Greg Cobb. Of course, I loved it, I mean who wouldn't love being involved with the production of wine? But this new passion led me to embark on my senior research project in enology which brings us to this blog. From now until April  I will be interfacing with several Texas wineries to learn not only how they compare in various wine making processes, but also how all the components of a winery, from Field to Harvest to Production to Marketing, fit together and what, if it exists is the key to success in the wine industry. Follow along to see the interviews, photographs, charts, graphs, and miscellaneous information gathered as I strive to unravel the secrets of wine success and separate fact from fiction, and truth from myth.