How to learn about wine

I think people both overestimate and underestimate how complicated the wine world is.

The way we typically approach learning new hobbies follows some general path of:

1. Learn a bit on your own, enough to spark an interest.
2. Find a group of people that know a lot about the area, put yourself under their wing.
3. Spend a lot of hours and dedication to experimenting, reading, talking, etc. related to your hobby and you will be on your path to being a hobby expert.

Now I am sorry to tell you that wine does not fit this mould. After all, that’s why so many people love wine but admit they don’t know much about it. Wine may, in fact, be one of the most sought after hobbies, definitely with some of the highest barriers to entry, leaving countless broken-hearted and discouraged wineos.

Why is wine different?

Well you see, a hobby in wine could be compared to having a hobby in chemistry… plus a hobby in history, agriculture, geography, geology, sensory experiences… the list goes on. Wine is difficult because truly knowing wine means your knowledge traverses at least half a dozen different disciplines.

Wine is also different because there is no structured way to start developing knowledge. The concepts in wine itself aren’t terribly difficult, it’s the volume and immediate depth you are exposed to in just about any direction you look. Let’s take an example:

You like red wine; well, rather you have figured out that you like Pinot Noir. You are curious about Pinot, so you start googling “what is Pinot Noir?” And the first result is a wonderful article by Madeline Puckette of Wine Folly (love her). [check out the article real quick]

• First fact: Pinot Noir is older than Cabernet Sauvignon. What does that mean? What is the difference between the two? Grapes have been around since the Roman times? What the heck is Timorasso? What is Piedmont Italy? Is it important?

Whew, that was exhausting. And we’re just on Fact #1 of 6. The article continues to explain that Germany produces a lot of Pinot; true — but I wouldn’t say that’s key knowledge about Pinot. It throws around terms like tannins and whole cluster fermentation. It’s a great article — don’t get me wrong! But my point is that this can be a very overwhelming place for someone who is just curious about Pinot Noir to start.

There is also simply an issue of sheer volume when it comes to things to learn about wine. When we looked at the number of wine terms, varietals and regions listed on popular wine websites, we confirmed that this is simply too much knowledge to easily digest in a weekend! 350+ terms, 58 varietals (+ like 10k more that are less common and mostly blended), and 490+ regions.

Bottom line? Wine is overwhelming to learn. I strongly believe that the major reason for that is because there are easier ways and harder ways to start learning about it. In my research about people’s interest in wine, I’ve heard time and time again that people want to learn, but don’t know how. And ways they’ve tried to learn, often result in confusion and information that goes in one ear, out the other. Wine doesn’t have to be this way, that’s why I propose “a learning roadmap” for wine.

Enter a learning roadmap

First, let’s start at a high level. The easiest way to learn about wine is to start with the fundamentals. You will see that as you develop a strong understanding of the fundamentals (which will take you a while in of itself!) then you will have an easier time grasping more specific wine knowledge. Lastly, if you are really digging wine, you can move into the “rare knowledge” space.

The majority of value in knowing about wine comes from a strong grasp of the fundamentals. Think about it this way:

• Fundamentals →Makes you a wine enthusiast, who is able to talk about wine, choose wines, and engage in more specific content if desired
• Specific →Makes you a wine obsessive, who has a strong depth of knowledge in wine and becomes known for that amongst their family and friends
• Rare →Makes you on your path to Sommelier, who is creating a career out of knowing everything there is to know about wine

When you look at it this way, if you are interested in learning about wine, you have a huge opportunity in just learning the fundamentals!

So now, how do we learn the fundamentals? I suggest thinking about it in three ways: grapes, regions, and terms. From here, you can design your own “flow of learning” based on your interests. One recommended flow might be as follows. Start with the basics of each: varietals, terms and regions. And based on what interests you most, follow that path out to more specifics, and more rare knowledge.

Flow of learning

1. Fundamental wine terms (tannins, acidity, body, fruit) + taste and really practice
2. Fundamental wine grapes. Spend a few weeks drinking only Merlot, only Cabernet, only Chardonnay. Try some of the major regions that produce those wines, take note at how similar or different they are.
3. Fundamental wine regions. After getting a handle on the major grapes, take a second pass through but focus on the regions — drink wines from Germany, wines from France, look at maps, read some blog posts, etc.
4. After you’ve done this fundamental understanding, I think you are well primed to start diving into more specifics. I found it very easy to follow my interests in learning once I got to this point — as you come across words that you see often but don’t really understand, taking some time to read about them will develop more of your specific knowledge.
5. Once you get quite deep in specific knowledge, you’ll start stumbling upon rare knowledge. Think reading wine books, following wine newsletters, etc. Now you’re fully entrenched in the nerdy world of wine!

What to start with?

When picking what varietals to start with, you could follow The 6 Noble Grapes, or you could look at it from a data perspective. We pulled the number of wines reviewed by varietal (or blend) from Wine Enthusiast to help us prioritize. If you were to start with the first 7 single varietals — Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Sauvignon Blanc, and Riesling, and Merlot, you will be introduced to roughly ~40% of wines.

We can look at regions the same way. If you explore the top 23 regions (say, based on Wine Enthusiast count of reviews like below), then you are covering ~75% of wines.

In the end, learning about wine should be fun and should help you drink better wine.

If you feel like you’re not enjoying it or getting much out of it, take a break! Or consider seeking knowledge from a different angle.

I hope this exploration of one way to learn about wine helped provide some ideas, but the best way to learn is whatever way works for you! Cheers.