The Simmons' Wine Tasting Party

Saturday night, Matthew and I were invited to the home of another expat family for a wine tasting party. Our hosts were Reno and Susan Simmons. There were 14 bottles of wine all covered with aluminum foil and a letter on each bottle. Reno and Susan had created two games. The first was the "easy" game. This game included 7 wines (red and white) from across France. Sheets were handed out that had the names and type of grape for all seven wines, and most had a description of the wine. The object was to taste from a bottle and try to match it to the name, type of grape, and/or description from the sheet. The fact that there were white and red wines, helped narrow down the choices. The second game (the impossible game!) included 7 wines, all red and all from the Languedoc region of France. By the time I got to this game, everything was tasting the same so I only tried about 3 and guessed on the other 4. Although I tried to remember everything I had learned at the International Women's Club wine tasting in November, I think most wine connoisseurs would have cringed at my tasting strategies (including cleansing my palette with bacon wrapped scallops, escargots, and other yummy things to eat!). When Susan announced the winners, Matthew and I were not surprised to not have won. We all got our sheets back and I was proud to see that on the "Tour de France" game I got 4 out of 7 right. On the Languedoc wine game I got 1 out of 7 right (which was the same number as anyone else got)! It was a great night of wine, food, and fellowship with other expats.