The WSET (Wine and Spirit Education Trust) is considered one of, if not the, most prestigious routes to wine education available. Lyn will be leading a course in March for Fine Vintage, Ltd, the most comprehensive WSET provider in North America - this class is a three-day course leading to a certification at Level Two or, in WSET parlance, the Level Two Award in Wines and Spirits.

WSET Level Two is offered over two weekends so you have three days of intensive class study and tasting without interrupting the business week: Sunday, March 8, Saturday March 14 and Sunday, March 15, 2015.

The Level 2 Award in Wines and Spirits naturally follows on from the Level 1 course, although you are not required to take Level 1 if you already have a good understanding of wine. The classes are entertaining as well as informative and include a diverse array of students that is usually a mix of passionate consumers and people from the hospitality industry and beverage trade. Level Two is the ideal place for the wine lover to gain some solid technical knowledge and tasting experience that just cannot be gained from reading magazine articles and books.

Some of the wines featured in one of the three days of the Level 2 course in November, 2014

Level 2 is a significant step up from Level 1 and includes tasting more than 50 wines and several spirits over the course of the three days. I've found that tasting this range of wines with a knowledgeable tutor is an excellent way to get a real fix on one of the WSET program's strongest elements, structured tasting. This can't easily be learned in a self-study program; it can only be truly understood as part of a series of guided tastings. Part of the reason to take a WSET course is to get a dependable framework for tasting, a system on which you can depend no matter what wine you are sampling. Working with the textbook and the study guide (both provided in advance as part of the course), you'll also finely hone your tasting skills as well as your knowledge not only of what different wines taste like, but why they taste different.

Over the three days of the Level Two course, we'll delve into the following areas:

•  Growing grapes

•  Making and maturing wine

• The art of tasting in detail

•  Food and wine matching

• The classic grape varieties

• French and German wines

• Italian, Spanish and Portuguese wines

• New World wine regions

• Sparkling and Fortified wines

• The major spirits

The final hour of the course is given over to a comprehensive exam that, when passed, entitles you to the Level Two Award in Wines and Spirits, a highly coveted certification within the hospitality industry. Passing the exam and gaining a Level 2 certification is a serious accomplishment. It's not an easy exam, which is why you want to study the material in an environment with a proven record of success. Fine Vintage, Ltd. is the most successful WSET provider in North America, with a 97% pass rate... Just sayin'!  Looking to really polish your wine and spirits knowledge and tasting skills? To my mind, this is the without question the best place to do it!

For more information on the Level Two course, click here to open a new window on the Fine Vintage, Ltd. website. And to register for the course with Fine Vintage, click here.