Learning how to taste and explain whether you like something or not is not nearly as complicated as a lot of people who teach about wine make it seem. After you sit down with me for an hour and a half, the whole thing will seem a lot less mysterious.

The hardest thing to learn about tasting wines is knowing how to describe what is in the glass that you just tasted. In my experience working in wine, I've found the only way to learn is to taste something in the presence of an expert, and guess at what you think it tastes like. The expert can then taste the wine, and give you feedback on your accuracy. Much of the terms professionals use to describe wine can seem arbitrary and confusing. That's because most of the terms were made up in the first place! Nevertheless, the wine profession has gotten to a point where terminology has become somewhat standardized, and you can classify wines into a few simple categories. What does an earthy wine taste like? When you taste one with me, I will teach you to recognize it, and that instantaneous feedback will start building your wine vocabulary right away.

Here's a rundown between traditional classroom experiences and a custom designed wine tasting from Home Wine School:

In a traditional wine class you travel to a location, and sit with a large group of people you don't know. The wines your drink are chosen by the teacher/school to best meet the needs of the group as a whole. You taste your wines, and then when the class is done, you leave and have to go somewhere else if you'd like to drink some more. You might have a chance to buy the wines you tasted if you like them, but you'll have to wait until you get home to open them. You might find it difficult to ask as many questions as you'd like because you're worried about dominating the time from the other people in the class. Even worse, you might be intimidated by the teacher and be afraid to ask questions.

With a Home Wine School class, you just sit back in your living room and wait for me to come to you, and enjoy the lesson with your signicant other and maybe a few friends. The wines you taste will be chosen especially with your tastes in mind, which I will choose for you based on a questionnaire you fill out for me before the tasting. The bottles I bring over are yours to keep, and you can enjoy them the rest of the night, or if you want to drink them later, I will seal them for you with a special argon gass that will allow you to enjoy them for several days after the event. And because I believe strongly in wine education without pretense, you will feel comfortable asking any and all questions that might come to mind among the comforting presence of your friends or family.

If you take a look at my pricing structure, you can see that the key value of one of my classes is intimacy. That's why it's worth paying $300 for a two person tasting. The feedback you receive in a 15 person classroom is obviously much less than in a 2-4 person group.