A wine label is like a synopsis of the wine, attached to the bottle. It is part ID card, part storyteller for the wine it represents. You can acquire data and much more from it. Here is how it goes.

1. Old World Labels (mostly from Europe) tend to be more concentrated on the region and it is common to find that proudly labelled on the bottle, sometimes even more prominently than the name of the winemaker. This stems from their winemaking philosophy that wine is mostly made by good ol’ Mother Nature and man merely tends the grapes along the process, easing them to their final conclusive stage. Hence the star is the land, the air, the soil and the climate. Humans are the sidekick.

2. New World on the other hand (Australia, USA, South Africa, Chile, Argentina, etc.) prefer to believe more in mankind’s power of ‘conversion’. Hence the land loses limelight as the grape finds more prominence on the labels. This makes them easier to understand as what is written is what is contained and, unlike in the case of Old World wines with their region-specific labels, one is left with less guesswork trying to suss what is contained in the bottle.

3. Once you have figured out this, the next step is to figure out the winemaker. This is important because more than just the region or the grape, it is the winemaker’s individual style that brings a certain sense of appeal to a particular wine, something that you may not find in another wine from the same region, or even from across the road for that matter.

4. Then, another thing to try and remember is the vintage. Pronounce that to rhyme with “age”, not the “Taj”; our hospitality industry has created a new word by pronouncing this rather simple word as “vin-taaaage”. This is the year that is mentioned on most wine bottles if they adhere to certain packaging standards and regional requirements. The notion of knowing the year is that it tells you the year when the grapes used to make that particular wine were harvested. This helps in the case of wines which are meant to be aged. A year which didn’t receive too much sunshine, or was washed away with rain would produce lesser quality grapes, making wine that would not age as well as wine made from grapes from a better year. This knowledge is the crux of the entire wine auction market.

5. You will always have a mention about the “quality” of the wine, especially for European wines. These mentions change from one country to another and while they do not exactly translate into quality, they do seem to invoke a certain sense of reliability. If you are an absolute novice at wine buying, I would suggest you look out for such mentions. AOC, DOC, DOCG are the usual mentions.

6. Words like “Cuvée”, “Prestige”, “Spéciale” and the sort do not mean anything. They define quality in wine as the word “shiny” defines for a diamond!

7. The word “Reserve” is tricky. It can be a legal term in certain areas where it implies longer ageing before the wine is ready to be sold whereas elsewhere it can mean the winemaker’s interpretation of a more serious wine. And then sometimes, it just means a smarter marketing manager!

8. In sparkling wines (especially champagne), Brut means dry (Extra-Brut is also available), Sec means semi-dry, Demi-Sec means semi-sweet and Doux means sweet. Know it. Brut is generally the most popular style but Zero Dosage is all the new rage in Champagnes nowadays; they are the driest form of Champagne that has become possible partly due to technique improvements and taste and preference evolution, but also partly due to Global Warming.

9. Mention on a bottle which says (or translates) “bottled at property” is a good thing. It means the wine was bottled by the maker and also didn’t need to travel much after being made. It also means more control over the making and ageing process as a wine which is bottled by a trader is seen as less quality-oriented and little can be said about its maturing process.

10. A back label is a good thing to read through. It may not have the essentials but it often may have a tasting note, or some other useful service tip which can help you decide whether the wine is the right one for you or not. Sadly, none I have seen so far have ever been written with the Indian market or consumer in mind; not even on Indian wines. Therefore, avoid them. They are as important as the points on that show, “Whose line it is anyway?”

So much for reading a wine label. I honestly wanted to simplify it, but wonder how much I have succeeded. I guess I may have to turn around full circle and return to where I started. If you recall, in the beginning I made a remark about how people do not read a wine label much, just as is the case with articles in a magazine like Playboy. Well, in retrospect, I think such behaviour is far from disturbing and I for one would never try and correct such because in the end, with Playboy as with a bottle of wine, the best bit definitely does not lie in the reading!