Expertise in the beverage industries has a long tradition (e.g. where a company expert graded teas) but was relatively neglected by science until after World War II. By drawing on methodologies and theory for studying expertise in domains such as chess playing, researchers in the fields of wine and beer have begun to elucidate the cognitive processes implicated in the acquisition and implementation of expertise relevant to analytical sensory evaluation in the domains of wine and beer. The present article reviews research that makes evident how our perceptual, conceptual, memory, imaging, knowledge representation, judgment, and language abilities can be affected by domain-specific experience and knowledge accumulation. This review also makes explicit the complex nature of many of the underlying cognitive processes implicated in development of expertise. Despite lack of consensus in results in some areas of research, outcomes of reviewed studies overall demonstrate that experience in a sensory field influences both perceptual and thought processes in ways that provide experts with advantages over less-experienced individuals in terms of competency, speed and in reduction of cognitive load.