Walking into an event held by the Wine Tasters of Muskoka is an impressive sight. Table after table lined with glass after glass of wine. An oenophile’s delight.

With 54 people at a sitting, and eight wines to get through, the amount of time it takes to fill the 432 glasses with a few mouthfuls of different vintages seems staggering. The glasses are drained quicker that it takes to set up, no doubt.

The club is run by David and Nina Margesson, a couple with a passion for wine and the desire to make sure it is enjoyed across Muskoka. David is the host for the evening taking the packed room through each wine he has picked from the LCBO or his cellars for the evening.

The last meeting of the club had French reds on the menu taking in famous varietals such as cabernet sauvignon, pinot noir, merlot and syrah.

The meetings are an ever-evolving evening dedicated to wine. David and Nina used to let people taste the wines and open the floor for discussion. Now David explains a bit about each wine before it is sampled and then opens up the floor for discussions about bouquet, taste, aftertaste and overall impressions.

Each taster has a scorecard in front of them and gives each wine a tally and rank. The table then nominates its favourite and the group votes on the best wine of the night. There is also a detailed explanation of each wine and David lets people know what bottles are available, and for how much, at the LCBO.

The blend of people at one of the tastings is very mixed. Some are there to enjoy an evening with friends, others to expand their knowledge of wines. Some could drink a 1997 bordeaux from the Chateau Moulin St Georges vineyard and claim it was lacking body because 1997 was a very wet summer in France and the grapes did not ripen well. Others joked that they could smell grapes when testing the bouquet.

One woman quietly insisted she could detect smelly cheese when sniffing at a glass and was surprised and impressed with herself when David explained that guests could get a whiff of the richness of a ripened blue cheese off the same wine.

There was also confusion as a few of the tables thought a 1997 Paul Jaboulet Crozes Hermitage was particularly quaffable while another table all turned their noses up. It turned out that one of the two bottles had gone off and it was struck from the voting for half the group.

At the end of the tasting the points are added up and the favourite wine is decaled. In the end it was a toss-up between the least expensive wine, the Chateau De Gourgazaud at $13.20 per bottle, and the 2003 E. Guigal Chateauneuf-du-Pape at more than $53.

“It is not always the case that a higher price tag means a better wine,” said David. “It could be that it is just a rare bottle or similar wines from the vineyard came with a good reputation. That is one reason why we do these kinds of tastings. It gives people a chance to sample a wide variety and give them confidence to have an opinion on what they like. Of course anyone wanting to try that Chateau De Gourgazaud better hurry. I can’t see it being on the shelves for long at that price.”

After being hosted by a number of venues in Muskoka, the Riverwalk restaurant in Bracebridge will be home to the club’s tastings for the next year. Dinner follows one of the tastings with a select but stunning menu prepared by David Friesen. On the menu that night was oven-roasted garlic and goat’s cheese crostini, Muskoka wild leek and potato soup to start, with a choice of foie gras stuffed jumbo quail, local spring vegetable and sea scallop risotto or grilled beef tenderloin for the entree.

For more information on Wine Tasters of Muskoka call David and Nina Margesson at 705-765-3774 or visit its website at www.winetastersofmuskoka.com.