Choose a Quality Wine

Video Transcript

"How to choose a quality wine? This is probably the mind field of an era in terms of wine. Because there are so many good producers as well as a lot of mediocre producers. And in terms of choosing quality wines, the areas you expect to get quality wines from. In France, virtually all of France. But I'll pick two, Bordeaux and Burgundy. They are the ones who are known world wide. But you can equally get wonderful ones from the Loire region, from the Rhene region. Champagne, Champagne is an easy one. Because you got wines like Krug, Kristal, Dom Perignon. The obvious names that produce top quality Champagnes. But when it comes to red wine and white wine, it's very much an insiders game. You will need to know your wines and there's no way around it. Other than doing your homework. Looking what the wine magazines are saying. What the wine commentators are saying. You clearly won't have the opportunity to taste the broad range of wines, they do. But they do, year in year out. They taste different wines, they taste same wines from the same producers. To see what the quality of the producers are. And they score them out of twenty, out of a hundred. So there are a lot of top class wine writers. Who will give you an idea of what the quality wines are out there, on the market. Also in the age of the Internet, if you've got a name for a wine. You can type that wine in, on to the Internet. And usually, if it's a good quality wine. Someone has written about it. And you can find out, what their faults are. Another way is, once you've got past that phase. It's just by the bottle. Try it yourself and see what you think in terms of it's quality. And so use the guidance of the books that are available in the market. The magazines that are available in the market. From the wine experts and they will give you a good guide as to who are the quality producers. Once you know about the quality producers, look at Vintage reports. Because even the Chateau Le Toires and Mutant of this world can produce, have a bad year. And if you're spending 200 pounds on a bottle. Which is roughly the cost of one of these wines when they're released in an average year. You might find out, you're spending too much money for that wine. And because it's not a great year, it's not distinguishable from, for example fifth growth from Bordeaux. So do look, do your homework. Do read up around the subject and then go to as many wine tastings, as possible. And talk to people. Then you'll get a general knowledge of whose producing the best wines. That's how I'd really choose a quality wine. Also use your wine merchant. They often know what are good wines on the market. And often you can get great bargains for real quality of wines. Rather than just for the name. That's how you choose good quality wines."