Hosted by wine educator and published author Clare Burder, this four-week introductory wine course has been running in Melbourne for six years. We think it's the best wine course in Melbourne because it's unpretentious, fun, interactive and very much aimed at providing you with insightful, practical & truthful information to help you buy, drink and talk about wine in a way that suits you and your lifestyle. Did we mention it's fun?? It's really fun.
This course is running on the 6th, 13th, 27th September + 4th October, from 6.30pm - 9pm in Fitzroy. We'll make up a beautiful hard copy, personalised gift voucher for this course and post it to you. Keep reading for the glorious details!
Who is this wine course for?? This course has been written specifically to cater to people who love drinking wine but are still quietly mystified by the sheer amount of information out there. As an introductory/101 course, you don't need any prior knowledge just an interest in wine! You'll receive a fantastic little book filled to the brim with all of the course content including maps, buying guides and all those pro-tips that will make your wine buying decisions easy. And because our courses are super social & interactive, you'll get ample opportunity to have your questions answered, make new friends and legitimately have cheese for dinner four nights in a month.
Format: 4 x 2.5-hour classes over four weeks. All classes run 6.30 - 9 pm and include enough amazing cheese to be considered a light dinner.
This course focuses almost entirely on Australian wine and Australian regions, with tastings of almost 40 incredible wines across the four evenings. We investigate in detail basic wine appreciation, how to judge quality, food matching and the main grape varieties, regions and wine styles in Australia. You'll also learn all about winemaking, how wine pricing works, the key vintages to look out for, how to understand wine labels, how wines are classified on wine lists and bottle shop shelves plus a bunch of other useful info to get you super confident when that wine list hits the table. You'll hear great stories about the wines and winemakers, get some insight into the wine industry (and how it communicates with consumers) and get loads of fantastic recommendations around where and what to drink in Melbourne and beyond.
Week by week details >>
Week one: We kick off this great course with an introduction into vineyards, regions, grape varieties & wine regions. Sounds pretty standard huh! Its true, but you have to start somewhere! Things get more interactive when we teach you how to taste and tell you all about what is going on in your brain/mouth/nose when you taste wine. We move on to investigate the fantastic worlds of Riesling & sauvignon blanc and introduce the three main concepts behind food and wine matching.
Week Two: In week two we teach you how white wine is made and the main flavours/styles/categories of the white wine spectrum. We taste a great lineup of Pinot Gris and Pinot Grigio, Chardonnay and finish off with a bracket of other white wines fantastic things like Viognier, Arneis and orange wine. Also in this class, we tackle the debate around natural wine, preservatives and labelling and of course, continue exploring food and wine matching in glorious detail.
Week Three: This is the big reds week! Kicking off with an introduction to red winemaking, we taste a great lineup of Pinot Noir before delving into the inky worlds of Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon. We talk all about cellaring, pricing & serving, decanting and any other little bits and pieces that come up while continuing to talk all about red wine and food matching.
Week Four: We kick off the last class with a bracket of other reds lovely wines like Tempranillo and Sangiovese. After finishing off the reds section with any unanswered questions, we then move onto the world of sparkling wine learning about how its made, the main styles and how to distinguish quality. We finish with an incredible lineup of Aussie sparkling and a toast to the end of the course with a cheeky little dessert wine.
