Rosé wine tasting evening with friends

Rosé wine tasting evening with friends

As you may be aware, we regularly enjoy wine-tastings locally and abroad but decided it was time to try our own. As a group of 7 friends, only one prefers Rosé wine, one doesn’t really drink wine at all as he prefers beer, and the rest of us were willing to give it a try. So, with a list of 40 – yes, 40 – possible wines available from Tesco (and there were still some others they had that I didn’t include on my list) for everyone to choose a different brand and each bring a bottle, we planned lots of nibbles based on recommended foods on the labels of most of them. There were an additional two rogue bottles, one from Lidl and one from B&M (though branded names available widely).

It is surprising to see such a range of foods recommended to go with Rosé wine, including spicy garlic snacks and Indian food, chicken and salad dishes, fish and seafood, or ‘party food’ whatever that might mean! I drew up a Comments sheet for everyone, to note wine name/ colour/ smell/ 1^st taste/ food/ 2^nd taste, all very technical. However, I also know from past experience that things don’t always follow the plan, so we only had a small shot glass each to sample each wine and make notes, then it was of course a free-for-all to finish off the 7 bottles. A tough call.

Pleased to say that it went surprisingly well as everyone was actually interested to see whether they liked any of the Rosé wines we had. The first comments related to the fascinating range of shades of pink there were, ranging from the palest hint of colour to a deep pink-orange shade. The following list summarises what we all thought of each wine.

-          Tesco – Calvet Rosé d’Anjou – medium shade pink, sweet and fruity smell, after spicy Indian food is dryer than first taste

-          Tesco – Gem Languedoc Serac – a beautifully shaped bottle, the palest hint of peach colour, no discernible smell or taste, and even after Indian food it was exceptionally under-whelming.

-          Tesco – Côtes de Provence – pale pink colour, smelt dryer, pleasant taste even after fish.

-          Tesco – Barefoot Pink Moscato – definite pink, sweet perfume (definitely a sweet wine), interesting after savoury and Indian food as it tasted more tangy than sweet.

-          Tesco – Straw Hat – medium shade of pink so quite attractive with a definite raspberry sweet smell, changed a bit after fish and a rice dish so not quite so sweet, more of a taste to it really

-          Lidl – Shiraz Rosé – a darker colour than the others, sweet smell and strong first taste but better after a range of party foods becoming more soft and fruity.

-          B&M – First Cape Shiraz – a dark pink, dryer than most of the others and still a bit harsh after food.

The general feeling was that this was a great way to try wines we wouldn’t normally choose, and we were all surprised at the range of different types of food suggested on the labels. They were mostly sweet, as we expected, but some of them worked really well with the spicy foods. It was clear from comments that you either like sweet or dry wine, whatever the colour, but that we could all see how it changes following food (which we knew, of course, but this was a great way to demonstrate it especially to the non-wine drinkers amongst us).

My favourite was the Tesco Côtes de Provence, someone else liked the sweet Barefoot Moscato, someone else the very sweet Straw Hat (which I hated) and finally the only one to like the featureless Gem is not a wine drinker and liked the exotic shape of the bottle!

This was a great way to spend an evening with friends, to try something that we would not otherwise bother looking at, and to look more closely at the suggested foods on the labels. I was surprised at how vast the collection of Rosé wines is at Tesco, so will look at ranges offered at other stores. We are now planning a series of tastings in this format with a selection of Sauvignon Blanc wines, move on to selections of reds, and even a range of Port wines to explore alongside a cheese selection.

Note we are only looking at wines that everyone can access easily at a local store rather than maybe a smaller selection available from a wine merchant. If anyone would like to donate a selection of half a dozen whites, reds or more Rosé wines, feel free to do so – for example, M&S, Morrisons, Waitrose, and of course Tesco!