THE WINE LIST
The Wine List is the first wine box company focused on learning about the wine not just drinking it. The Wine List is a way to discover wine, and develop your skills at the same time.
Every month, you will learn one Wine Principle, a bedrock of how wine is made, broken into bitesize chunks. This will apply to all wines. Month by month, you'll be able to drink better at every price point. So that you can make each bottle count. You will be looking at wine learning in a load of different ways and discover new grapes, regions and winemakers – with a few core principles underneath. This all happens when your monthly wine box is delivered to your own home.
Wine Principles
Wine is a living thing, grown in the vineyard, fermented and then bottled.
There's a handful of things – grape, vineyard, weather, fermentation method, ageing style – that will define how it tastes.
As part of your wine subscription, the Wine List teach you one of these each month, so that you can look at any bottle and work out what it tastes like. Learning about wine is great, but all that theory means nothing without putting it into practice. That's why they send you two bottles each month. These are worth around £15-20 on average, and won't be available in your local supermarket, they import wines specifically for our wine subscription.
Interactive tasting cards
Working out what a wine smells or tastes like is hard. In fact, it's commonly cited as one of the hardest things to describe. The tasting cards are designed to help you find the words you're looking for. Whether you're trying to judge how acidic a wine is or find the right stone fruit taste to describe it.
At Wine List, the focus is on learning about wine at home. Their 12-month wine course features classes that guide you through your wine adventure. Starting off, you learn how to smell and taste. Then every month after, you learn the key principles of learning about wine.
How to taste wine
Taste is one part of understanding the flavour of something, but it is not the only thing. Taste requires smell to be complete.
Humans aren't taught to taste and smell. Those two senses are often lumped together. And while we have a vast vocabulary for different colours, we have very few ways of describing how something smells. The first step in learning about wine is really focusing on what smell and taste mean. It's a mindful practice and one you can improve very quickly.
Most humans can only blind-smell and name 20 aromas, the average wine taster can detect and name between 80 and 100. The world experts can detect over 1,000. While there are so-called super-tasters out there, and certain people more disposed to detecting aromas, we can all improve our sense of smell quite easily and quickly. The first step is taking part in mindful smelling.
Online wine course
While their core product is the physical home course. They also recognise that online works as a fantastic supplementary offering. An online wine course that features video content to help you learn. These will supplement each of your Wine Roots, as well as provide visual tasting notes for each month's wines.
Your Monthly Delivery Includes:
1. Wine Roots
The monthly wine course: learn the principles, which you can then apply to every bottle of wine you drink.
2. Two delicious bottles
The Wine List import two bottles of wine directly from winemakers. Small producers, sustainably made. Fantastic to learn from.
3. Tasting cards
Peaches, elderflower, lemons, acidity, it's easy to forget the wine words. That's why the tasting cards are there to jog your memory and help you expand your palate.
The Wine Subscription
The Wine List costs £39 per month
Your first delivery includes:
- An introduction to wine tasting
- Your first two wines
- Interactive tasting cards
- Your learning plan for the next 12 months
Every month as part of your subscription, you'll gain core principles about wine.
By the end of the year, you should be able to look at a restaurant wine list, or the shelves of your local merchant, and understand roughly what the wines should taste of. What you will learn is that every producer, every plot of land, and every year's weather will impact things so you won't ever know for sure. But, you should be able to get a good steer for what stuff will taste like.
You will also have tasted your way through about 24 styles of wine. These will mostly be red and white, but you will also be introduced to skin contact, pink, and where possible some sparkling wines as well. With knowledge of these styles under your belt, you will have an idea for where you might want to explore further.
If you’re interested in becoming a Sommelier at home sign up here. Cheers.