Daviot Kelly, Staff Reporter
Guests eagerly sample the different cheeses offered at the National Commercial Bank Capital Markets Wine and Cheese Party. - PHOTOS BY WINSTON SILL/FREELANCE PHOTOGRAPHER
AAH, FRIDAY evening! Perfect for sitting by the pool, sipping world-class wine and munching on delectable cheeses.
Now, this scene wasn't played out last Friday at some five-star resort on the coast, but at National Commercial Bank's (NCB) Wellness Centre on Phoenix Avenue.
This was a crash course in the art (and it is an art), of wine tasting, and Christopher Reckord, Jamaica's premier sommelier (professional wine taster), was the visiting professor, and he was ready to teach.
He went through the whole gamut of his repertoire from explaining why red wine glasses are usually bigger than their white counterparts (because the white are usually served colder), to pairing specific wines with cheeses. He introduced guests to the Wine Aroma Wheel, a chart which helps the drinker identify various characteristics of the wine, including the region from which it hails.
NCB's Lorraine Green said the wine tasting was another event the bank's officials wanted to introduce to their customers.
"Also, this time of year, there are wine harvests going on and various wine and cheese events. So this is our way of recognising the worldwide trend," she reasoned. But with all the 'education' going on, let's not fool ourselves people; the guests were here to try the wine. With five different cheeses on offer, the commandment from Reckord was "Go forth and try and taste".
Even Chris Williams of NCB Capital Markets was having a learning experience.
"I thought it was always impolite to put your nose in the wine glass to smell it," he joked. Wines from New Zealand, Australia, France and the United States (California) were there to be sampled by eager guests. And the 'pupils' seemed to have been taught well by the professor of potables. They were there swishing their wine glasses around trying to identify the colour and cleansing the palate with the various cheeses.
