Kathleen Lisson: Hi, Kathleen Lisson here. I am just going to give you ten quick tips on how to make the most from your next vineyard visit. So you're visiting wine country. What a great idea. Some of my most relaxing and interesting vacations have been at wine countries around the United States.
So the first thing you want to do right after you figure out which city you're staying in is hit the Internet, visit the wineries websites and also the wine trail websites and when you go on the wine trail websites, ask for brochure. They'll give you more information about the wineries including their hours of operation, what type of wines they serve? Whether they charge for tastings and tours? And the wine trail brochure will also have a handy map which will help you which wineries to visit on your trail.
When you're making up your schedule, remember, this is not Disney World. You do not to fit in the entire park, the entire wine trail in one day. You'll just end up exhausting yourself and you won't remember much the next day because you will be trying too much wine.
Book in about 45 minutes for each wine tour and also remember to include time for lunch, time for snacks and time for driving in between the wineries. The phrase of the day in wine country, it's not for me. You can use this at the tasting room, you will taste white wines, you will taste red wines, maybe some sparkling wines, may be some fortified wines.
If you don't like a particular wine, just say, hey it's not for me. Definitely, you don't have to try or swallow anyone that you don't enjoy and you definitely don't have to buy a bottle that you don't enjoy.
Use the dump bucket. That's the big bucket there on the side and you could either pour your extra wine out or if you practiced spitting in the shower previous year trip, go ahead and spit the wine out too.
Okay. The next tip is eat lunch or you'll feel it at 4 O'clock. Trust me, I've been to wine country, so I know this problem personally. You get up at 10 O'clock, you visit a couple of wineries, pretty soon it's 1 o'clock, you feel jazzed, you feel great. You want to visit that next winery but if you don't stop and eat lunch, you'll feel so tired at 4 o'clock, you won't want to go out to dinner with your friends. All you want to do is hit the couch for a nap.
So remember to plan in and use that time at 1 O'clock or noon to have a nice healthy lunch. Now where you're going to get that lunch? The best way to do it is to pack a cooler. Pack a cooler in your car and put it in the back seat, preferably where the people's feet, go so it's out of the sun. What should you put in the cooler? Some bottled water, snacks that you enjoy, fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, some sandwiches, pretzels, whatever you think you're going to eat for the day. As you get out of the winery, have a snack in between each winery while you're driving and then as you empty that cooler out by eating the food, you'll have place that you could put those bottles of wine that you really cherish. Wine really, really likes being at 55 degrees so it's not going to like in the heat of your trunk. Instead put it in that cooler with your cool food and your ice pack and your wine will come home fine.
Okay, the next tip is use your wine journal. This is a wine journal and you could have them at, they sell them at Barnes & Noble, all the local book stores, in the winery gift shops. Basically a wine journal is an easy place to put all the information about the wine that you've tasted, all your impressions about each type of wine you taste. Now you think you can't fill this whole book, but if you go to three wine tastings, four wine tastings, you can taste as much as 50 wines in a day and you think you're going to remember the ones you love but trust me after 50 wines you won't remember much.
So use this handy wine tasting journal. You can put all of your information about the wine that you see from the bottle. How you liked it? What you think is a good wine and good pairing and your discussions with the people behind the bar and you can also talk to the people a bit behind the bar about the wines that you buy, to get even more information that you can use when you're back at home.
Some great tips to put in this is ask the winery staff, “Hey, what is the wine going to taste like in 10 years and 15 years?” If you're in Napa and you want to buy some beautiful bottles of Cabernet, when should I open this Cabernet, when will the Cabernet be too old to open and then put hey, buy the Cabernet, taste it between like 2010 and 2015 but make sure to open up all before 2015 or whatever the wine staff tells you.
Also, ask the wine staff when it's 2010 or 2015, what is this wine going to taste like versus what it taste like now? They are the absolutely experts in their own wine. So you're going to find information about those wines that you will never be able to find at your corner wine shop because they just don't have the expertise in every single bottle of wine like the people of the winery do.
Next thing, bring cash to the wineries. Some wineries have a credit card minimum and if you just want to pay for tasting if you decide you don't like any of those wines, it's easier to just hand them some cash then to buy one that you're really not interesting in.
The next tip is bring a sweater. You think especially in the summer hey, all I need is the t-shirt and shorts, the sun is beaming, it's 80 degrees up, why do I need a sweater? Well, if you're going to take a winery tour, the winery cellars, 55 degrees year around so you're definitely going to need that sweater to put on to feel comfortable so you're not shivering like the rest of the tourist in their t-shirts and shorts.
Also another interesting idea if you're in Upstate New York in the dead of winter when it's 15 degrees out, take a winery seller tour. That 55 degrees is going to feel like heaven. Other things that you should wear and not wear when you go to the winery, don't wear heels. Trust me ladies, wine country can be a beautiful place. You can feel like the wine and the jazz and the expensive food and the cuisine, it can be a really upscale vacation but it's specifically in New York where I have been to out of wineries, their vineyards are a working farm and that means you'll see tractors, you'll see actual grape wines with the grapes that they make the wine out of and you'll also see more often than not an unpaved parking lot which means scrabble that will growing near beautiful heels. So go ahead, give those heels a rest, bring them out for a nice dinner in town but when you're going to the winery, opt for a flat shoe or a shoe with the chunky heel.
Other things you shouldn't bring, don't use mouthwash, scented lotion, fragrance, gum or mints. These things will all -- the mouthwash in the gums and the mints are going to change the taste of the wine in your mouth and when you're evaluating wine, you want to see what the wine really tastes like and the lotion and the fragrance are going to not only impede your nose in actually smelling what the wine tastes like but unfortunately the noses of the people on either side of you.
So for a better experience, don't use any of these when you go to wine country. Save them for dinner or save them for when you get home.
These have been some quick suggestions. If you have additional suggestions please you can leave them in the comment section. Also visit my blog at kathleenlisson.blogspot.com and have a great wine country vacation. Thanks for listening.
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