The document outlines strategies for wine tasting from beginner to advanced levels. It discusses establishing a consistent starting point through glassware stance and eye position. For beginners, it recommends "front loading" with common aromas and flavors to make the connection between smell and internal images. More advanced strategies include using submodalities like image brightness and size to analyze wines. Experienced tasters also use internal "maps" and calibration scales to structure their assessments of acidity, tannin, and other qualities. The goal is to teach tasting in a way that improves memory and allows students to analyze wines using their own experiences.

1. Tasting Strategies of Genius
Tim Gaiser, MS
Society of Wine Educator’s Conference
Orlando – August 2nd, 2013

2. Today’s Session

3. Review and Update of the
Tasting Project

4. Strategies from Project

5. Part I:
Strategies For Beginners

6. Part II:
Strategies For More
Experienced Students

7. Exercises

8. Pair Up!

9. A Request …

10. Today’s Wine:
2010 Cantina Terlano
Lagrein Riserva “Poryphery,”
Alto Adige

11. Teaching tasting is the most
rewarding thing we do

12. It can also be the most
frustrating thing we do …

13. The Major Disconnects of Wine

14. Wine is a liquid that
smells and tastes like other things
Complexity!

15. Wine has no inherent vocabulary

16. We use the language of seeing,
hearing and feeling to describe what
we smell and taste in wine

17. Our culture doesn’t place emphasis
or value on olfactory memory

18. Little, if any, awareness that
olfactory and taste memory are
also visual experiences internally

19. The Project :
Modeling the Tasting
Strategies of Top
Professionals

20. Project
Genesis:
2009 Film
Sessions

21. Goals for the Project
• To deconstruct internal strategies of top
tasters
• To replicate and use the best strategies in
order to teach more effectively
• Ultimately to improve how we teach tasting:
–Students learn to taste with more ease in a
shorter period of time
–Students learn using their own memories
and internal maps

22. Project Participants:
• Karen MacNeil
• Evan Goldstein MS
• Tracy Kamens Ed.D.,
DWS, CWE
• Emily Wines MS
• Doug Frost MS MW
• Peter Marks MW
• Brian Cronin MS
• Tim Gaiser MS
• Sur Lucero MS
• Thomas Price MS
• Roland Micu MS
• Emily Papach MS
• Gilian Handelman
• Yosh Han
• Alyssa Harrad

23. Findings

24. Eye positions and patterns are
vital to experienced tasters

25. Olfactory Memory—Image Connection
There is an internal visual
component to smelling and
tasting wine

26. Submodalities:
The structure of internal images can be
as important as the actual content

27. Existence of Internal Image Maps

28. Use of Visual Constructs as Aids for
Calibrating Structural Elements

29. Part I: Strategies for Beginners

30. Strategy I:
Creating a Consistent Starting Point

31. Glassware Stance &
Starting Eye Position

32. Exercise I: Glassware Stance
• Criteria:
–Resting point
–Glass angle: finding the sweet spot
–Passive vs. active inhalation
* Inhalation patterns/angles – where are
you smelling in the glass?

33. Starting Eye Position

34. Importance of Eye Positions
and Patterns
Eye Accessing Cues

35. Eye Accessing Cues

36. Eye Accessing Cues
• Visual memory: up and to the left
• Visual imagination: up and to the right
• Auditory memory: lateral eye movements to
the left
• Auditory imagination: lateral eye movements
to the right
• Internal dialogue: down and to the left
• Kinesthetic (either physical or emotional
sensations): down and to the right

37. Importance of Starting Eye Position
• Consistent start to the sequence of smelling
and tasting wine
• Focus – shutting the world out!
• Coupled with an auditory prompt
• Literally knowing exactly HOW to start

38. Auditory Prompts
• “What’s there?”
• “What am I smelling?”
• “What’s in the glass?”
• “What kind of fruit (etc.) is it?”
• What is this on the end of my fork?”

39. Exercise II:
Finding Your Starting Eye Position

40. Exercise:
• Start by looking down in front and/or to
the left/right
• As you smell the wine move your eyes side
to side slowly
• Use your free hand to point EXACTLY
where your eyes are looking
• Find your zone - the place that feels the
most comfortable WHILE you talk to
yourself

41. Tips
• Use “SOFT” eyes!
• Repetition: practice going to your spot multiple
times
• Finally: play around with smelling the wine and
looking at horizon level and above— see what
happens!
• Keep smelling the wine!

42. Other Eye Positions and Patterns
• Other eye positions used to access:
–Internal imaging “field ” for creating or
comparing images (one’s “IMAX theater”)
–Side: auditory memories about a wine
–Up: using a tasting “grid” as a guide

43. Strategy II:
Olfactory Memory and Imaging

44. The Beginner’s Dilemma:
“But it just smells like wine …”

45. Needed: Awareness!

46. Awareness that there is usually an
internal image connected to smell
and/or taste memories

47. Challenge: how to help the beginner or
novice taster to make that connection

48. Concept: Front Loading
Using the Basic Set to bring awareness to
the image/olfactory connection AND
improve one’s olfactory memory

49. What is the Basic Set?
The 25-30 most common
aromas/flavors in wine

50. Using the Basic Set
• Working with words and images to:
–Make the image/olfactory connection
–Improve memory of the list components
–Use sight and auditory to prompt
memories*
• *Multi- memory learning vs. visual memory

51. Using contrast with olfactory
memory as a tool for learning and
improving tasting

52. Basic Set: Common Fruit Aromas
• Green apple
• Red and/or
Golden Delicious
apple
• Pear
• Lemon
• Lime
• Orange
• Pineapple
• Banana

53. Common Fruit Aromas – Cont.
• Peach
• Apricot
• Black cherry
• Blackberry
• Sour red cherry
• Red raspberry
• Cranberry
• Raisin/prune

54. Common Non-Fruit Aromas
• Roses
• Violets
• Mint/eucalyptus
• Pyrazines – bell
pepper
• Herbs: rosemary
• Lavender
• Pepper: white
and black

55. Common Non-Fruit Aromas – Cont.
• Vanilla
• Cinnamon
• Cloves
• Toast
• Coffee
• Chocolate
• Chalk
• Mushroom &
forest floor

56. Basic Set Modules
• Module I: words and images
• Module II: images
• Module III: words
• Module IV: contrastive analysis

57. Exercise III: the Basic Set

58. I
Look at the image and say the
word internally

59. II
Recall a time when you
smelled and/or tasted the
given fruit, spice, etc.

60. III
In your mind’s “eye” reach out,
pick up a slice of the fruit (etc.)
and take a bite of it …

61. IV
Make your experience of the fruit,
spice or other component as
complete and intense as possible
down to the aromas, flavors and
the texture/mouthfeel

62. V
Intensify your experience of the memory
by doing the following:
a. Make your images (or movie) larger
b. Make your images closer
c. Make the colors brighter
d. Make any sound louder
e. Intensify any physical/tactile sensations

63. Exercise IV:
Experience the Following

70. Rewind! Use Your Own Memories
• Fruit:
–Lemon
–Lime
–Orange
*Where are the
images?
• Non-Fruit
–Roses
–Vanilla
–Mushroom/earth

71. Contrastive Analysis
And trying to make something into
something else …

72. Exercise V: Contrastive Analysis
• Use your images/memories of the
components listed below
• Try to make one image the other
• What happens?
–Lemon into mushroom
–Lime into vanilla
–Orange into rose

73. Now we can begin …

74. Exercise VI: Making the
Olfactory-Image Connection
• “Seeing” what’s in the glass
• With your partner
I. Find at least 3 aromas in the glass (or more!)
II. Show your partner precisely where they are in
your “mind’s eye”
III. Partners: keep track!

75. Keep track of the following:
- Proximity (how close or far away)
- Location
- Size
- Brightness
- Color vs. black & white
- 2D vs. 3D
- Still image vs. movie

76. Report!

77. Part II:
Strategies for
More Advanced Tasters

78. Strategy IV: The Image Map

79. Tasting Maps
• All tasters in the project formed an
internal map of the images of the aromas
in a given wine
• The image maps or grids differ--
sometimes radically --from person to
person

80. Examples of Project
Taster Image Maps

81. Karen MacNeil
2009 Yalumba Shiraz, South Australia
No Consistent Auditory Prompt

82. Evan Goldstein
2009 Yalumba Shiraz, South Australia
Auditory Prompt: “What kind of fruit is it?”

83. Tracy Kamens
2009 Joseph Leitz Riesling Erstes Gewächs
Auditory Prompt: “What’s there?”
Start

84. Emily Wines
Auditory prompt: “What’s there?”
2008 Double Bond Pinot Noir, Wolff Vineyard, Edna Valley

85. Peter Marks
2009 Robert Mondavi Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley
Auditory Prompt: “What’s there?”

86. Tim Gaiser
Pattern from several wines
Auditory Prompt: “What’s there?”
Start

87. Comment: tasting is a
synesthetic experience

88. Exercise VI: Review Your Image Map
1. Review your previous aromas/images
2. Find more if there
3. Questions:
- What happens to the images once you
create them?
- Do they move?
- Can you find them again if you need them?
4. Map image location

89. Strategy V: Submodalities
The Stuff of Thought and
the Fabric of Experience

90. What are Submodalities?
• Moda: Greek term for the five senses
• Modalities: the inner representation of the five
senses: visual (V), auditory (A), kinesthetic (K),
olfactory and gustatory
• Submodalities: the structural qualities that
each internal modality can possess

91. Common Submodalities: Visual
• Black & white or color*
• Proximity: near or far*
• Location*
• Brightness*
• Location*
• Size of image*
• Three dimensional or
flat image*
• Associated /
Dissociated
• Focused or Defocused
• Framed or Unframed
• Movie or still image
• If a Movie-
Fast/Normal/Slow
*Driver Submodality

92. Auditory
• Volume: loud or soft
• Distance: near or far
• Internal or external
• Location
• Stereo or mono
• Fast or slow
• Pitch: high or low
• Verbal or tonal
• Rhythm
• Clarity
• Pauses

93. Kinesthetic
• Intensity: strong or
weak
• Area: large vs. small
• Weight: heavy or
light
• Location
• Texture: smooth,
rough or other
• Constant or
intermittent
• Temperature: hot or
cold
• Size
• Shape
• Pressure
• Vibration

94. Exercise VII: Submodalities –
From Nose to Palate

95. • With your partner:
• Taste the wine
–Note how the flavors change from nose to
palate – do the images change?
–Does the image structure change too?
– Size, brightness, color, proximity,
dimensionality
–Does your map of the wine change as well?

96. Exercise VIII:
Changing Submodalities

97. • Choose one aroma/flavor
• Experiment with the following while smelling
the wine:
–Size: smaller vs. larger
–Closer vs. farther away
–Brightness
–Color vs. black and white
–2D vs. 3D
• How does each change affect the wine?
• Change one thing at a time! Then Reset It

98. Submodalities Check List
• Size: smaller vs. larger
• Closer vs. farther away
• Brightness
• Color vs. black and white
• 2D vs. 3D

99. Strategy VI: Calibrating Structure
with Visual Constructs

100. Tasters in the project use internal visual
constructs or cues to calibrate the
structure of wine

101. Structural Calibration: Emily Wines
• Uses different internal scales for structural
elements.
• Acid: yellow ruler about 12” long with markers
for low, medium, etc.
– Tastes wine and then points to a mark on the
ruler
• Alcohol: 24” blue ruler with a “level”-like
bubble that moves to the appropriate mark

102. Structural Calibration: Emily Wines
• Tannin: piece of wool stretched out, thin
at one end and much thicker and larger
at the other.
–Texture combined with amount of
tannin
• Finish: image of the horizon
–The longer the finish the farther down
the horizon can be seen

103. Structural Calibration: Tim Gaiser
• All structural components calibrated with a 3-
4’ “slide rule”-like device with a red button in
the middle resting at “medium”
• As I taste the wine the button moves until it
matches the amount of acid, alcohol etc., I’m
sensing on my palate.
• Internally I point to the marker on the ruler
and say “it’s medium-plus” or whatever
• If I’m not sure I bring the ruler in closer to me
and more increments on the ruler appear

104. Exercise XI: Installing Your
Calibration Scale
• With your partner:
• Create your scale: use a ruler, dial or
whatever works best, easiest – make it
BIG!
• Locate “low,” “medium” and “high” on
the scale (also med- and med+)
• Place calibration “button” or “marker”
etc. at medium

105. Installation Cont.
• Calibrate for acidity, alcohol, tannin
• Use EXTREMES!
• Examples:
–Acidity: lemon juice for high and water for low
–Alcohol: port for high vs. Moscato di Asti for
low
–Tannin: Barolo (Fernet Branca?) for high vs.
Nouveau Beaujolais for low

106. Exercise XII: calibrate the structural
elements of the Terlano Lagrein
Acidity
Alcohol
Tannin

107. The Future …
• Open source project
• This presentation and the Basic Set will be
available at slideshare.com; link on Facebook
and link in my blog
• Experiment! Have fun with it!
• Report in!
• Funding wanted …

108. Thanks
• Richard Bandler and John Grinder for the
principles behind this work.
• Tim and Kris Hallbom, Robert Dilts and Suzi
Smith for their superb instruction and
guidance.
• Taryn Voget of the Every Day Genius Institute
for her help and guidance in the DVD project

109. Project Participants:
• Karen MacNeil
• Evan Goldstein MS
• Tracy Kamens Ed.D.,
DWS, CWE
• Emily Wines MS
• Doug Frost MS MW
• Peter Marks MW
• Brian Cronin MS
• Tim Gaiser MS
• Sur Lucero MS
• Thomas Price MS
• Roland Micu MS
• Emily Papach MS
• Gilian Handelman
• Yosh Han
• Alyssa Harrad

110. ©2013 Tim Gaiser MS
www.timgaiser.com/blog
tgaiser@earthlink.net