I tracked the book down at the local library and read it over a wet weekend. One of the sub-projects from the recently
completed
e-assessment project, was to help cookery students learn how to
taste. As tasting was deemed to be something ‘everyone is able to do’, the
cookery teaching team did not place much emphasis on overtly teaching students
how to taste. Learning how to taste like a chef, was therefore chiefly learnt
through modelling from the chef tutors.
The chef tutors only realised that students were unable to
articulate the sensory evaluation of dishes when students were required to
reflect on the cooking process of dishes as part of the evidence gathering
towards collating eportfolios. The researcher for this sub-project, is a food
and beverage tutor, who had come from the tradition of being taught how to
taste wine. Part of the project, was therefore to try to make overt and
structured, the ways food tasting could be described. Mindmapping and
notetaking apps were introduced to assist with learning the ‘language of
tasting’. These apps were to facilitate the sharing of dish descriptions and
evaluations to assist students to widen their sensory evaluation vocabulary.
Back to the book, which has 11 chapters, tracing the journey of the author,
from novice / layperson to practicing sommelier. The author was able to make a
head start using her contacts as a tech journalist and with the rationale of
the book as a lever into the rarified world of professional wine tasters. Being
a sommelier entailed not only being able to taste wine, but also to sell it,
provide good service in fine dining restaurants and gain a foothold into a challenging but well-paid occupation (when compared to other hospitality work).
To begin, the author managed to gain an entry level job as a
‘cellar rat’, assisting with the storage and re-stocking of a wine cellar in a
prestigious restaurant. She was able to make friends with several well-known
sommeliers and join them for their tasting sessions. This led her to prepare
for the first level of accreditation to become a sommelier through eligibility
to take the Certification exams.
By the end of a hear, the author was working as a sommelier
in a wine bar, had passed the first of a series of professional exams, and also
established, through a fMRI scan, that her brain reaction to wine, was similar
to experts. So the year of hard graft, tasting many wines and learning the
esoteric knowledge components of wine making, had triggered a change in her
brain structure.
The perceived method towards training the brain therefore,
begins with training to smell. ‘Stocking the sense memory’ was essential to
being able to connect the descriptive wine terminology, with tasting and
identification of wine. The patterns of taste has to be organised, so the
patterns connect with wine types, grape varieties, regions etc. Apart from
learning how to taste wine, service of wine required skill training through
repeated practice and an understanding of the psychology of people’s social
relationships. In short, sommeliers really have to work for their pay.
Overall, the book provides a good insight into how a novice,
learns a complex set of skills, connects the sensory sensations to a large bank
of knowledge, and utilises these in a demanding occupation. A sommelier, is the
sum of all of these and each, brings into the job, their own personality and
characteristics as well.
All in, a good read and a relaxed way to learn much about
the world of wine.
