Awesome! Time to celebrate!

Congrats Cecil!

Congrats!!!! See you on the 18th.

congrats to Cecil! cheers

Congrats Cecil. Got mine back in May.

That's great! Are you "using it" at all? Planning on going any further?

Absolutely. Getting ready to start studying for the spirits portion, CSS. Depending on how that one goes I intend to start the Sommelier process. I imagine the spirits exam won't be as hard as the wine one. At least it was for me.

Yeah. The test was a real beating for me. I ended up scoring just fine, but was wiped out by the end.

Oh yeah. I remember going into the exam thinking please don't ask me anything on the chemistry....and Italy. Are you in the industry?

No. Just a hobby.

Actually the grape/growing/wine stuff was easiest for me. Got 100 on all of them. Italy was tough, of course, because... well.. it's Italy. Ironical South Africa was my lowest. Had six questions on it and just didn't have a clue on most of them!

So please fill me in since I'm too lazy to Google. What is this test, who is it geared towards, what's the format, and what's the content?

The "Certified Specialist of Wine" is the first of two tiers of wine certification offered by the Society of Wine Educators. It covers the entire world of wine, from growing, varietals, vinification, basic chemistry, faults and most all of the world's wine regions. There is no tasting/palate component. The initial investment (Study guide, Workbook, Test fee and membership ) is about $700. You have one year to take the test. The test is 100 multiple choice questions with 75% as passing. The pass rate for first tame takers is about 50%. It ain't an easy test.

It is equivalent to something between level 1 and level 2 of the CMS (Court of Master Sommeliers) certifications and a little above level 2 for the WSET (Wine & Spiritets Educational Trust) certifications.

There is a "Certified Wine Educator" above it, but that is a three year track with a bunch of blind palate requirements as well as blind fault recognitions and some essays. I'm probably not going to attempt it. The initial attempt pass rate is 12%.

The CSW/CWE are typically more industry oriented, than service oriented.

Thanks for the info, Cecil. Sounds like a fun project and congrats again on the achievement. With no tasting component, maybe I could dive in...

By the way, I saw a Christmas present for me from my wife last night as I was wrapping my son's presents...Shadow in the Vineyards. Thanks for the recommendation, Cecil. I'll read it as the Aggie offense sputters out in Nashville.

I would encourage you to, especially since in your current drinking circumstances it would provide a significant outlet for your wine hobby. One thing is that the studying is pretty hard, so an evening glass of wine (or more) isn't really possible when studying! It does take a commitment. I took 8 months. No, that wasn't daily, and there were several week long periods I put it aside. But it totals to a significant number of hours.

You can buy a Kindle Edition of the Study Guide on Amazon for twenty bucks. You'd need the paper copy, but it would show you what it's all about.

I'll add that to my list of things to do:

Work
Get CFA
Raise kid
Train puppy
Gym
...
...
...

Study for Certified Specialist of Wine


*sigh* it might be a while...

Kudos to you. Definitely not an easy test and even more impressive that you did it for a hobby. The chemical make up and sugars/acids really got to me. Hopefully one day I can get a cellar going like you and some of the other fellas on this thread. I'm big into Pinot Noir and starting to dive into Cab Franc. Inkblot Cab franc (2010) by Michael David winery is one my favorites. TBH I'm not opposed to drinking any varietal.

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Get CFA

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This is going to be tough if you can't drink.

I've actually indefinitely postponed that. After the heart thing, I decided to live and enjoy life for a while. The doc said no stress so the only thing I am worrying about is which island to visit next.

I'm almost done, so feel free to reach out of you decide to go through with it.

Congrats, Cecil Wow, impressed.

My Schrader allocation is here if anyone wants it! (I'm buying too, just not off mine)

Ancillary Pinots just got here. Looking forward to trying the whole cluster bottles...

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Ancillary Pinots just got here. Looking forward to trying the whole cluster bottles...

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I was able to grab an extra bottle of whole cluster from them so I may sacrifice one over the holidays to report back on.

Putting them in the chiller I found a 2012 whole cluster. It will be gone by Christmas...

Trying to impress the in laws?

No help here. I have never gone that high for a bottle. I have had some great $30-$80 bottles though.

Go to wine.com and search on Shiraz or whatever you want and then sort by price. At that price range it's all gonna be good. You can also choose by the rating.

If it's cab, particularly Napa, review a few pages in this thread.

Have fun!

I have several high end wines for sale for under $200. Send me an email!

I received a bottle of 2001 Vineyard 29 Aria and a 2004 Copain Hein Family as a thank you for cooking for a small charity event. Given that my storage is full, and the giver of said bottles said to drink them now, I did. The Aria was still holding together well, but was beginning its downhill slide. The Copain was drinking beautifully.
And it seems I'm going to start studying for the CSW test. I'll see how it goes, and if I think I can pass it, I'll drop the $500 to take the test.

I'm sure you can. You can get the study guide on Kindle for 20 bucks. I think you do need a paper copy of the study guide though. The workbook, maybe not.

The online SWE academy is different from the study guide, harder in some ways. Most importantly, it's practice quizzes are harder than the ones in the study guide. Not as hard as many in the exam though.

Given your knowledge as is, I think you'll be a lot further on than I was at the beginning.

One hint given me that I didn;t adhere to but should have: Reference your appellation learning to the maps. You just can't study the maps enough, including grapes, relationship to other appellations, and styles. I already have .pdf's of the study guide, workbook and maps. If you'd like them my email is in my profile.

Please email me those pdf's. Everytime I try to email you, your company spam filter blocks me!

Whats the best way for a beginner to start to understand the differences in wines, vineyards, etc. Are there easy to read books on this stuff?

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Whats the best way for a beginner to start to understand the differences in wines, vineyards, etc. Are there easy to read books on this stuff?

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Drink. A lot.