Wine IQ

These hospitality professionals tirelessly oversee wine lists, make recommendations to diners, uncork bottles, pour wine and much more:

Sommeliers

Sous Chefs

Concierges

Cellarologists

Many winery owners employ the help of these wine-science professionals, whose degrees demand a mastery of chemistry and microbiology:

Enologist

Decanters

Viticulturists

Cellar Rats

Wine barrels are made by coopers. What do they do to the inside of each barrel to tame the raw woodiness and mellow the tannins?

Coat the wood with flavored waxes

Toast the staves with fire or an oven

Season the barrels with old wine before filling them with the newest vintage

Salt-bake each barrel

A winemaker may perform bâtonnage, the careful process of stirring the lees (dead yeast cells produced during winemaking) back into a wine after they settle at the bottom of a barrel during fermentation. What does this do to the wine?

Imparts smoky, spicy notes to the wine

Sharply increases the wine's acidity

Give the wine's tannis a dusty quality

Increases flavor, aroma, and texture

In Champagne and at other sparkling wine houses, what is the name of the person responsible for gently turning and upending each bottle until all of the sediment has collected in the neck of the bottle?

Dosager

Tirager

Twister

Riddler

Why might a winery choose to hire a team of hardworking grape pickers to harvest vineyards by hand instead of using a mechanical harvester?

They trust humans to harvest the grapes more gently and discard diseased grap bunches

Mechanical harvesters are banned in their appellation

The terrain of the wineyard is too steep or difficult for mechanical harvesting

All of the above

Overseeing tastings, hosting events, encouraging direct-to-consumer sales and being the public face of a wine estate are often in the job description for which of these winery workers?

Courtiers

Viticulturists

Tasting room managers

Winery dogs

Vineyard owners might call upon the expertise of professionals to help them with “vine training,” which means:

Hand-harvesting grapes with expensive but unparalleled precision

Deliberately exposing wines to certain diseas and pests to reduce grapp yeilds and improve wine quality

Playing music for the vines

Tellising and shaping the growth of the vine to encourage ideal grape growth

How much wine is in a single barrel?

50 gallon

75 gallons

60 gallons

10 gallons