A Family Deep Dive into Wine Education

A few months ago, Sophia, our oldest daughter, and I took a big step in our wine education journey together: we completed the WSET Level 2 Award in Wines. We took the course at New York Kitchen in Canandaigua, which was a fantastic place to spend a few weekends diving deep into regions, grapes, and tasting technique.

Sophia took the exam on the final day of class, but I missed that weekend after catching COVID at a legal tech conference. Unfortunately, when my rescheduled virtual exam date arrived, I was in Montreal visiting my mom in the ICU. So I sat for the test in a small hotel room there. Not exactly textbook conditions, but it worked, and Sophie and I both walked away with the same result: we passed!

Now we’re working our way through WSET 3 together. It’s a big part of the winemaking adventure we’ve been sharing on the blog. Scott’s been focused on production and harvest, and Sophia and I are now learning more about wine, wine regions, how to blind taste, and more!

To assist with our studies, we recently joined a virtual tasting group through the Grape Grind, which has been a fantastic resource. The virtual group offers structured tastings, great discussions, and a community of people who are equally obsessed with wine. If you’re working on any wine certification, I can’t recommend it enough.

Tonight’s session is a blind tasting with a special guest: Nova Cadamatre, Master of Wine and winemaker at Trestle Thirty One (among other impressive things), right here in the Finger Lakes. Tastings like this one are a fun way to keep sharpening our palates as we head deeper into Level 3.

It’s exactly the kind of experience that’s shaping how we think about the wines, and it’s been fun to do it together!

If you liked this post, and want to learn more about Sophie’s wine journey, check out this post.

If you’re following along, thanks for being part of the ride—more stories (and wines) to come. If you want to stay updated on the latest posts, make sure to subscribe to our blog. And don’t forget to check out our Facebook group, Finger Lakes Food and Wine Adventures.

Cheers from the lake,
—Niki and Scott