What Should I Save About a Wine I Want to Buy Again?
If you find a wine you really like, you do not need to write a detailed tasting note to remember it. You just need to save enough information to identify the bottle, remember why you liked it and decide whether it is worth buying again. At a minimum, save:
A photo of the label
The producer and wine name
The vintage, when relevant
The grape or general wine style
What you liked about it
Approximately what you paid and where you bought it
Whether you would buy it again
That is usually enough to turn a good bottle into something useful later. The goal is not to document every detail of the wine. It is to make sure that six months from now, when you are trying to remember that red you loved with dinner, you can actually find it.
Take a Photo of the Label
If you only have time to do one thing, take a photo. Wine names, producers and labels are surprisingly easy to forget. You might remember that it was a Cabernet with a cream-colored label, but that description will not help much when you are standing in the wine aisle a few months later. A clear photo of the front label gives you a visual reference and usually captures several useful details at once, including the producer, wine name, region and vintage. It also means you do not have to type everything into your wine journal while you are trying to enjoy the bottle.
Save the Producer and Wine Name
A photo is useful, but recording the producer and wine name makes the bottle much easier to search for later. This becomes especially important as your wine history grows. Scrolling through dozens of bottle photos is not much better than trying to remember the wine from scratch. Saving the name gives you something searchable. For example, instead of remembering, "That really good Pinot Noir we had a few months ago", you can find the exact bottle. This is one of the simplest ways to make a wine journal useful without turning it into homework.
Record the Vintage When It Matters
You do not need to obsess over vintages, especially when you are just getting into wine. But if the bottle lists a vintage, it is worth saving. A 2022 and 2023 version of the same wine may not taste exactly the same. Weather, growing conditions, aging and winemaking decisions can all affect the finished wine. You do not need to know whether a particular vintage was considered "good." Just record the year so you know exactly which version you tried. For non-vintage wines, simply leave it out.
Save the Grape or General Style
Knowing the grape or style gives you more than a way to identify the bottle. It gives you a clue about what else you might enjoy. Maybe the bottle was a Sauvignon Blanc. Maybe it was a Rioja. Maybe you do not know the grape at all, but you know it was a light, crisp white wine. That is still useful. Over time, those details can reveal patterns in what you like. You might discover that many of your favorite reds are medium-bodied and fruit-forward. Or that the white wines you buy again tend to be crisp, dry and high in acidity. You do not need perfect wine terminology. Save whatever description is useful to you.
Write Down Why You Liked It
This may be the most valuable part of the entire entry. A rating tells you how much you liked a wine. A short note about why you liked it tells you what to look for next. And this does not need to sound like a professional tasting note. Something as simple as this works:
“Fruity, smooth and easy to drink. Not too dry. Great with dinner.”
Or:
“Crisp and refreshing with a lot of citrus. Would be great in the summer.”
Those observations are useful because they describe your preferences in language that actually means something to you. If you want a little more structure without making wine journaling complicated, Wine Tasting Notes Template walks through what you can record.
Save the Approximate Price and Where You Bought It
A wine can be delicious and still not be something you would buy regularly. Price adds important context. You might love a $60 bottle at a special dinner but decide that the $18 bottle you had the following weekend offers much better value for something you would keep at home. You do not need to save the price down to the penny. Even something like "$20–25 at Total Wine" can be enough. Where you bought it is useful for an even simpler reason: if you want another bottle, you know where to start looking.
Answer One Question: Would You Buy It Again?
This is the simplest and arguably most useful question you can answer about a bottle. Would you buy this wine again? Yes or no. A wine can be interesting without being something you want again. You can appreciate a bottle, give it a respectable rating and still decide you would rather spend your money on something else next time. The opposite can happen too. A wine might not feel extraordinary, but at $15 it could be exactly the kind of bottle you want to keep around for weeknight dinners. That is why the "Would you buy it again?" decision can be more useful than a numerical rating alone. For a deeper look at making that decision, read How to Know If a Wine Is Worth Buying Again.
What You Do Not Need to Save
This is where wine journaling can become unnecessarily complicated. You can record detailed tasting information such as:
Appearance and color
Aroma intensity
Specific fruit, floral, herbal or earthy aromas
Acidity
Tannin
Alcohol
Body
Finish
Food pairing
Serving temperature
Detailed tasting descriptors
Those details can be useful, especially if you enjoy learning how to taste wine more deliberately. But they are optional. If your goal is simply to remember wines you enjoyed and make better buying decisions, you do not need to complete a professional tasting sheet every time you open a bottle. A useful wine journal is one you will actually keep using. That is the idea behind How to Keep a Wine Journal Without Overthinking It, record enough information to make the entry valuable later, then get back to enjoying the wine.
The Simplest Wine Entry That Actually Works
If you want to keep things minimal, an entry might look like this:
Wine: Example Winery Cabernet Sauvignon
Vintage: 2022
Style: Cabernet Sauvignon / full-bodied red
Price: About $22
Bought at: Local wine shop
Why I liked it: Dark fruit, smooth texture and not overly tannic. Really good with steak.
Would I buy it again? Yes
Photo: Front label
That is it. No twenty-point tasting sheet. No need to identify five different aromas. No pressure to decide whether the acidity is medium or medium-plus. You have enough information to identify the wine, remember the experience and make a better decision the next time you are shopping.
Your Wine Notes Should Help Future You
The best wine journal is not necessarily the one with the most information. It is the one that answers the questions you are actually going to have later:
What was that bottle I liked?
Why did I like it?
How much did it cost?
Where did I get it?
Would I buy it again?
Once you start saving those answers consistently, individual bottles become more than isolated experiences. You start building a record of your own preferences. And that can make choosing your next bottle considerably easier.
Keep Track of the Bottles You Want Again
Somm Scribe gives you one place to save the wines you try, record what you liked and keep track of whether you would buy them again. Instead of relying on photos scattered through your camera roll or trying to remember a label months later, log the bottle while it is still fresh in your mind.
Log your next bottle in Somm Scribe and start building a wine history you can actually use.
