Tasting club · amateur circle · the year's programme
Amateur wine tasting club: the year's programme and the bottles for each session
One session a month, six to eight wines, a dozen members who pay their share: a tasting club buys a little at a time but all year round, and it needs a theme for each session. Enter the size of the club and the budget per member; the programme gives, session by session, the theme, the number of bottles and the price you can spend on each.
Your club's programme
Nothing is sent until you click on the quote. A tasting pour is 5 cl: one bottle serves fifteen tasters.
Keeping the sessions going all year
- One theme, one question. “What separates a Pauillac from a Margaux?” fills an evening; “some Bordeaux” doesn't. Vertical or horizontal tasting gives the two formats that work best.
- Blind, at least every other time. Bottles in a sock, numbered; reveal at the end. Read the labels afterwards, with reading a Bordeaux label.
- One older wine during the year. A session around a thirty-year-old bottle, with what you need to know about the fill level of an old bottle and about aerating or decanting.
- Keep the accounts separate. A treasurer, a fee per session, an order per quarter: that is how a group purchase among friends works, just more regular.
A one-off evening with friends, with no club behind it, is better calculated on the tasting with friends page.
How many bottles for a session?
A 75 cl bottle serves fifteen 5 cl pours. For twelve members and six wines, six bottles are enough; above fifteen members, you need two of each. Allow one extra bottle for the wine people will want to taste again.
Should a club go through a wine merchant?
Not for one session. Over a year, yes, if the club wants classified growths, older vintages or the same château across several years: that is where a Bordeaux wine merchant has what a wine shop would have to order. One order per quarter, delivered to the treasurer, covers three sessions.
Can you buy a single bottle of each wine?
It depends on the wine: some are sold by the case, others by the bottle. The quote says which; mixing wines in the same case can be requested in the message.