Beyond Flavour

Beyond Flavour: Wine Tasting by Structure is Nick Jackson MW’s book on wine tasting. The first edition was released in 2020 to widespread acclaim, and the second edition was published in September 2022. Beyond Flavour is available to purchase on Amazon (USA, UK), in paperback, hardcover and Kindle formats.

Beyond Flavor describes a different approach to wine tasting than the one usually taught in wine education. Rather than focusing on the flavours of a wine as the primary means of identifying the origin and grape variety of which the wine is composed, Beyond Flavour advocates an approach based on assessing a wine’s structure. For white wines, that means acid structure, and for red wines, tannin structure. Nick argues that each major variety has a slightly different structure, and by assessing the structure, it is possible to distinguish varieties from one another without recourse to flavours, which can be inconsistent and unreliable markers.

If you need more than 10 copies of the book for a group or society, or if the book is not available in your local Amazon store, please contact Nick to discuss possibilities.

The Second Edition

What’s new in the second edition? First, a few facts and figures:

  • Available in hardback for the first time, along with paperback and Kindle editions

  • The second edition has 33% more words and 47 more pages (and the book is bigger - 6 x 9 inches as opposed to 5 x 8 inches)

New content:

  • Producer recommendations for each variety and major region of origin

  • A ‘confusions’ section in each variety entry, detailing how to distinguish between similar tasting varieties

  • Every variety entry has been re-organised, and now begins with a clear statement of the variety’s structure

  • All the regional style discussions now immediately follow each relevant variety, reducing the need to flip between sections

  • Three new variety entries (Verdejo, Tannat, Saperavi)

  • Each variety entry has an illustration. There are some duplicate illustrations due to similar structure profiles, but every entry now has an accompanying illustration

  • A table of structure, summarising each variety’s structure (available for download below)

  • A table of indicative analytical values, summarising alcohol and sugar level in key sparkling, sweet and fortified wines (also available for download below)

  • Much of the content has been re-written, incorporating new insights, especially the new concept of ‘construction,’ which tries to move our understanding of varieties beyond simply structure and into a more holistic view of how wines work in the mouth

  • A glossary of wine terms used in the book

  • An index

Downloads

Vintage Guide

The vintage guide included in the first edition is now available here. Keeping it online ensures I can keep it updated.

Reviews

Wine Spectator: ‘quietly the best wine book to come out in recent memory’ (April 2020)

Wall Street Journal: ‘get a copy of ”Beyond Flavour” and practice blind tasting on your own’ (April 2020)

The Financial Times: ‘groundbreaking…revelatory’ (August 2022)

The Times (UK): ‘a radical reimagining of how we assess wine’ (April 2020)

The Economist: ‘Flavours, he realised, are not a reliable way to identify a wine…he came up with an alternative method, now widely used.’ (February 2023)

Australian Financial Review: ‘helps you taste…afresh’ (March 2020)

Jamie Goode, Wine Anorak: ‘stroke of genius’ (February 2020)

Forbes: ‘a “cliff note” to the wines of the world’ (March 2020)

Journal of Wine Economics: ‘tremendous insight throughout’ (vol. 15, 2020, #1)

Mike Veseth, The Wine Economist: ‘I find the focus on structure instructive and that it adds to my enjoyment of wine’ (October 2020)

More information

You can hear Nick discussing the first edition of the book on the GuildSomm podcast here and watch a webinar with him hosted by 67 Pall Mall here.