Let’s really get into wine this year, shall we? I want to seriously focus my wine study in 2011, and I’d like to take you along with me.

Here’s something to start us out. On January 7 from 5 to 6:30pm, Taste at the Seattle Art Museum is hosting Gilbert Cellars for the restaurant’s monthly wine tasting.

The tasting costs $10. For this you get two glasses of wine along with a little tutorial about what you’re drinking and three snacks—two of them savory, one of them sweet.

Gilbert Cellars is a Yakima Valley winery that makes a bunch of wines—the cab franc is consistently well-rated, and of the 2007 cab sauv, critic Jay Miller writes: “a medium-bodied wine with layered fruit, spicy flavors, good volume, and some elegance.” He gave it 91 points.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not suggesting attending casual wine tastings is going to turn us into Jay Miller. What I am thinking is that thinking about wine, taking notes, and approaching these little happenings as opportunities to taste and talk more about the wines we encounter does, little by little, help us become more educated drinkers. And I don’t know about you but the more I know about wine, the more I really enjoy drinking it.

Call Taste to reserve your place at the tasting or email [email protected]