Why I like using the Wine Aroma Wheel

by Isabelle @ Wine Tasting Demystified
(Atlanta, GA)

I have used the Wine Aroma Wheel in my teaching and training workshops with wine professionals for many years. I was not the only one! The Wine Aroma Wheel has been used by many wine education programs in North America.

I have found that the 9” wheel enabled the most intimidated taster in the room feel comfortable sharing their sensory experience, starting by using the most general terms on the wheel. This is a very effective tool.
It is a tool that helps you categorize the aromas you perceived when smelling or when tasting the wine.

Why would you need to categorize wine aromas?
Not to impress your entourage, no!

Categorizing wine aroma helps you remember the wines you have tasted and also helps you to share with others what you experiencing.
Think of how you would describe a painting to someone who is blindfolded.You may describe the size and shape of the canvas, the colors, the objects or people represented pn the painting, etc. Your description can be very general or very detailed.
Well, you can do the same way when you smell or taste wine. You can describe with generic terms such as fruity, floral, or spicy.
And start analyzing what you perceive: Are they more fruity cooked or fruity fresh, from berries or stone fruits?
With such a process, you start decomposing your perceptions, you start being more specific and therefore more able to articulate your tasting experience to others .

Ann also developed a sparkling wine aroma wheel using the same principles of aroma categorization, including aroma descriptors specific to this wine style.


I hope you will find this wine tasting tool as useful as I do.

Note that this review is an excerpt of my article published here

Comments for Why I like using the Wine Aroma Wheel

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Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wine wheel received
by: Anonymous

Received in fine shape. Looking forward to using it often, until I’ve sampled enough wines to have the wheel memorized!
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		A Nice Tool, However...
by: Isabelle

Thanks for the feedback, Doug. The Wine Aroma Wheel and the Sparkling Wine Aroma wheel are labeled properly. They correspond to the descriptors published by Dr. Noble. Your observation on the layout is well taken. We are working on a new design and will correct the reading flow of the descriptors. Cheers!
Rating
starstar 		A Nice Tool, However...
by: Doug Blasco

While this is a good and useful tool, the problem I have is shown on the Banner Photo for this page.
Starting at the Upper Right, you have Canned / Cooked, then Dried, Nutty, and Caramel.
After that, you have Resinous. Take note that the field Resinous and the following descriptors are all printed Backwards to the other fields.
On the wheel labeled as The Wine Aroma Wheel, if you put Spicy at the 3 o'clock position, then Floral, Microbiological, Oxidized, and Chemical are all printed backwards to the other fields.
The wheel labeled as Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel is all printed correctly.
But I also have to ask if the Wine Aroma Wheel and the Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel are also labeled in reverse.
Looking at the descriptors, it looks like the Wine Aroma Wheel should be the Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel, and vice versa.
Quality Control is a very big thing with me.
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Love them!
by: Elizabeth A Culinary Center NYC

We have used the aroma wheels for years in our professional sommelier training course. They are such a helpful way for new tasters to describe what they are detecting, as well as for more experienced tasters to be specific in their notes.
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I've been a fan of Ann Noble's Wine Aroma Wheel (and the Sparkling Wine Aroma Wheel) for decades.
by: Rob - Greenwich, CT

I've been tasting wine seriously, semi-professionally and professionally for some 60 years and have found the Aroma Wheels to be outstanding aids to develop a consistent tasting vocabulary which enables tasters to communicate their meaning to other wine drinkers and tasters more accurately and efficiently. It's a fine teaching tool.

I have led wine tours (groups of up to 30) in California for more than a decade. All tour participants are given Wine Aroma Wheels and instructed in their use at our initial reception and we use them during the course of guided tastings throughout our tours.

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