Several weeks ago, my neighbors hosted a small wine tasting party, which was a huge success. They invited a few families that live on our street and also included our children, which made it easier for all of us to attend. While the children played, we adults sipped good wine and decided which one we lived best. Then, we all shared a simple dinner and caught up on everyone’s latest news. Finally, refreshed from the rare night out, my husband and I said our goodbyes and were home in plenty of time to bathe the children and get them to bed.
If you are looking for a good excuse to have people over, you might hold your own wine tasting party. It seemed relatively easy to plan and was so much fun for everyone who attended. The first step to planning a wine tasting is deciding on a date and then coming up with your guest list. I recommend keeping it limited to no more than 8 or 10 friends. Select simple but sophisticated cards or invitations that you can print yourself, and ask every person, or each couple, to bring a bottle of wine of your choice. For the wine tasting we attended, the host requested we select a Merlot. She also planned some simple appetizers, such as crackers, cheese, vegetables and humus to munch on before the meal, and she put out some chips for the children.
To keep the wine tasting organized, each bottle of wine was placed in a paper bag so we couldn’t see the brand. Then each bag was assigned a letter (A, B, C., etc.) A small sample of each wine was poured in little plastic cups so we could try it. Further, the host had printed out scoring cards from her computer, so we can give each wine we tried a number, from 1 to 4 (4 being the best). Once we had tried each wine and scored it, the scorecards were collected and tallied and the wine with the highest score won. Ironically in this case, the winning wine was the most inexpensive bottle there, but also the tastiest!
For this wine tasting party, the host had the foresight to also ask people to bring a second bottle of the Merlot they selected, so after the tasting was over, guests could have a full glass with the meal. For dinner, she served a few lasagnas, which were easy to make and serve and weren’t too much effort to clean up from, especially with all of us pitching in to help. We all had such a good time at this wine tasting party that my neighbors and I have decided to take turns every month or two to hold similar event, to help to keep the fun, and the wine, flowing!
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