How do you organize a wine tasting party?

The goal of a wine tasting is to discover new wines and have fun.

First decide what you want to taste: varietals from different wine regions, a few different varietals, different vintages of one producer’s wine? Tasting more than four to six different wines is not recommended as palate fatigue may overcome your guests. Once you’ve decided what you are going to taste, buy enough of each wine so each guest can taste it (plan on a "taste" of about 2 — 3 ounces) and some left over to enjoy after the tasting. Alternatively, you may ask your guests to bring a specific wine or a wine of their choice in a specific category to taste.

Taste the wines blind, that is cover each with a sheet of aluminum foil and mark it with a number for identification. For a casual tasting, provide each taster with a wine glass, a pencil and paper and ask them to taste each wine at their leisure. Also provide a bucket for dumping wine and some bread or plain crackers to cleanse palates. You may want to let each pers