Understanding Wine: A Beginners Guide

Wine is an alcoholic beverage produced through the fermentation of fruits, mainly grapes, containing natural sugars. Then during fermentation, yeasts will convert the sugars into carbon dioxide and alcohols, primarily ethanol, and other chemicals that add to the character of the wine. Many different flavours are produced depending on:

1. the colour of the grapes (See 'The Colour of Wine')
2. the variety of the grapes (See 'Grape Varietals')
3. the ripeness of the grapes

Grapes are also high in fermentable sugars making them ideal for producing wines.

Wine is a complex integration of:

• Grape varietal aromas and flavours
• Fermentation bouquets and flavours
• Additional wine treatments such as oak fermentation or addition of oak products
• Ageing in oak and/or bottle

Wine can be:

• Enjoyed now - a young and refreshing style
• Collected for future enjoyment - a mature and heavy-bodied red

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The colour of wine comes from the skin of the grapes. The juice that comes from most varieties of grape when pressed is white or clear. This is true of red grapes as well. The colour or pigments of red grapes are found in the skins of the grapes. In order to make a red wine from red grapes, it is necessary to leave the skins in contact with the juice during fermentation, this is called maceration. When the skins are placed in the fermenting 'must', the pigments leech out of the skins and colour the wine. When red grapes are pressed and the skins are kept out, the colour of the wine remains white and is considered a 'blanc de noirs' (a white wine from red grapes).



White wines do not usually have the skins left in the must while fermentation takes place. If the wine is being made from white grapes, there is no benefit to the colour and if the wine is being made from red grapes, the skin contact would give an undesirable red colour to the wine. Rose or blush wines can be made with 'limited' skin contact (leaving the skins in the fermenting juice for only a short period of time) but this method is unreliable in obtaining consistent tinting from vat to vat.

Rose wines are more often produced by adding a specific amount of red wine to an already finished white wine.

Champagne & Truffles contains:
Stone House Brut (1 bottle)
Chocolate bar
Dreamy truffles
Dark chocolate squares
Mint chocolate bar

Romantic Reds includes:
(3 Reds)

Maison des Bouachons 'Les Rabassieres' Cotes du Rhone 2006 (1 bottle)

Marlegan Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 (1 bottle)

Poetess Shiraz 2007 (1 bottle)

The shape of the glass is all important for wine tasting
[ the international XL4 tasting glass is the standard ]

The shape is the classic tulip with a wide deep bowl and narrow opening to contain the wine while swirling and trap the vapours. The hand should hold the stem and the glass should be clear (complete absence of colour) so that the colour and clarity of the wine can be assessed.

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When assessing or appraising a wine we use four of our five senses:

• Vision (sight)


• Olfaction (smell)


• Degustation (taste)


• Tactile (feel)

Sight


You make two judgements when you look at a wine.

1. One is the colour, both the hue (the colour of the horizon of the wine) and the intensity. The other is its appearance. From this it is possible to make some judgements about the condition and the age of the wine. The colours of a white wine may be water white, yellow, gold, straw yellow, amber, brown, golden yellow, pale gold or other. Aged white wines will have typically deeper yellows and golds. Red wines may be pink, orange, light red, tile red, brick red, ripe plum and many other descriptions. Ageing will show orange and browns.


2. The wine clarity is essentially how clear the wine is (brilliant, clear, transparent, cloudy, dull, hazy, turbid or other). Naturally the wine should be clear and brilliant.

Smell

The smell of the wine can be divided into its aroma, grape derived odours, and the bouquet, odours derived from the winemaking process.
During the fermentation of the grape many chemical compounds are made which produce odours that can be recognised and described, eg. apple, melon, blackcurrant, blackberry, licorice etc. The maturation of the wine in oak may also add to the smell of the wine through vanilla, caramel and creamy type smells. The list of perceived smells is endless and unfortunately not all are pleasant. Good winemaking endeavours to avoid those unpleasant odours like mousse, foxy or musty type odours.

Taste and Tactile sense

Of the four primary tastes three are predominant in wine tasting: sweetness, acidity and bitterness.
Associated with the sense of taste is the feeling produced in the mouth. Alcohol in moderate concentrations can be perceived as sweet. High alcohol wines may produce a warm or hot sensation. Dissolved carbon dioxide can be felt as a fizz or spritz, and astringent wines can cause dryness or puckering in the mouth. Wines high in glycerol appear viscous and give a fatter or thicker feel in the mouth.
All of these sensations will lead to the overall mouth feel. A balanced wine is one without holes or gaps where all the components fill the mouth with a uniform smooth enjoyable feeling. Balance is what the winemaker strives to achieve.

We are now ready to taste the wine.

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New World coverage has been extended for both Australia and South America; some New World regions even have their own entries for the first time, including Rutherford, Oakville, and Stag's Leap from California; Mendoza (Argentina); Limestone Coast (Australia); Central Otago and Martinborough (New Zealand); and Constantia (South Africa). And Old World coverage has grown too, with the addition of Toro (Spain), the Peleponnese (Greece), and Georgia. It's a truly incomparable book.

Wine tasting

1. To appraise the wine, the glass should be clear and one third full.
2. Tilt the glass on a 45-degree angle away from you with a white background so the visual assessment can be made.
3. Swirl the wine in the glass several times so the volatile chemicals, those that give rise to the wine's aroma and bouquet, can collect in the glass.
4. Smell the wine with 2-3 full quick sniffs. If you continually sniff the wine the smells will become confused. Most people can only detect 3-4 different smells at one time.
5. Make a written or mental note of the smells and your assessment.
6. Now take a generous mouthful, suck air through the wine (try not to dribble), swirl it around the mouth so as to cover the mouth with the wine, spit out the wine and record your impressions - (at a formal tasting, a spitoon will be provided).
7. Predominant tastes and odours are best detected with the mouth empty as the volatile chemicals will rise through the retronasal passage. As the wine warms when swallowed vapours will rise up through to the nose, for further smell detection. Many perceived tastes are indeed a smell. Try to taste the same wine while holding your nose closed and you will find the tastes you were able to detect difficult to find.

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The mystery and fascination for wine has existed for centuries, and it is this fascination that has become a passion for those genuinely interested in viniculture. Many of these wine lovers, take the next step to turn their passion into a career such as a sommelier or even working in the wine industry.

Higie and Feick's (1989) paper defined this fascination as one of enduring involvement (EI), which suggests that it is "a stable trait that represents an individual's degree of interest or arousal for a product on a day-to-day basis; an ongoing, long-term interest".

Three specific components of the wine lifestyle, winery visitation, wine drinking and wine club participation, were chosen as the means of measuring an individual's EI.

The higher the wine knowledge a person has, tends to lead to a higher spend on wine per month, larger wine cellars, and were more likely to drink on a daily basis. Gathering this knowledge is what it is all about.

How big can a wine bottle get?

Capacity (Litres) followed by the number of standard size bottles contained:

Standard (.75) 1
Magnum (1.5) 2
Jeroboam (3) 4
Rehoboam (4.5) 6
Methuselah (6) 8
Salmanazar (9) 12
Balthazar (12) 16
Nebuchadnezzar (15) 20

Annual Wine Production

Italy - 653 million cases of wine
France - 550 million cases of wine
Spain - 385 million cases of wine
United States - 245 million cases of wine
Australia - 110 million cases of wine
South Africa - 100 million cases of wine
Chile - 65 million cases of wine

Sauvignon Blanc - Sauvignon Blanc is a white wine best known for its grassy, herbal flavours. Sauvignon Blanc is also called Fume Blanc, and is a popular choice for fish and shellfish dishes.

Pinot Gris (Pinot Grigio) - The low acidity of this white varietal helps produce rich, lightly perfumed wines that are often more colourful than other whites. The best ones have pear and spice-cake flavours.

Chardonnay - Chardonnay is a white wine which can range from clean and crisp with a hint of varietal flavour to rich and complex oak-aged wines. Chardonnay typically balances fruit, acidity and texture. This varietal goes well with everything from fish and poultry to cheeses, spicy foods and nut sauces.

Muscat - The white Muscat grape produces spicy, floral wines that often do something most other wines don't: they actually taste like grapes. Muscats can range from very dry and fresh to sweet and syrupy. This varietal is often served with puddings and chocolate desserts.

Gewurztraminer - Gewurztraminer is a white wine that produces distinctive wines rich in spicy aromas and full flavors, ranging from dry to sweet. Smells and flavours of litchi nuts, gingerbread, vanilla, grapefruit, and honeysuckle come out of this varietal. It is often a popular choice for Asian cuisines and pork-based sausages.

Riesling - Rieslings are white wines known for their floral perfume. Depending on where they're made, they can be crisp and bone-dry, full-bodied and spicy or luscious and sweet. The flavour is often of peaches, apricots, honey, and apples and pairs well with duck, pork, and roast vegetables.

Pinot Noir - Pinot Noir is a red wine of light to medium body and delicate, smooth, rich complexity with earthy aromas. They are less tannic than a Cabernet Sauvignon or a Merlot. Pinot Noirs exude the flavour of baked cherries, plums, mushrooms, cedar, cigars, and chocolate.

Zinfandel - Primarily thought of as a Californian varietal (though recently proven to have originated from vineyards in Croatia), Zinfandel is a red wine with light to full body and berry-like or spicy flavours. The Zinfandel grape is also widely used in the popular off-dry blush wine known as White Zinfandel. The Red Zinfandel pairs well with moderately spicy meat dishes and casseroles.

Syrah (Shiraz) - Syrah can produce monumental red wines with strong tannins and complex combinations of flavours including berry, plum and smoke. It's known as Shiraz mainly in Australia and South Africa.

Petite Sirah - Petite Sirahs are red wines with firm, robust tannic tastes, often with peppery flavours. Petite Sirahs may complement meals with rich meats.

Merlot - Merlot is a red wine with medium to full body and herbaceous flavours. Merlot is typically softer in taste than Cabernet Sauvignon. It's flavours and aromas include blackberry, baked cherries, plums, chocolate, and mocha.

Cabernet Sauvignon - Cabernet Sauvignon is a red wine known for its depth of flavour, aroma and ability to age. It is full-bodied and intense, with cherry, currant and sometimes herbal flavours. Cabernet Sauvignon may have noticeable tannins.

Champagne/Sparkling Wine - These wines are made effervescent in the wine-making process.Champagnes and sparkling wines range in style from very dry (natural), dry (brut) and slightly sweet (extra Dry) to sweet (sec and Demi-Sec). Many sparkling wines are also identified as Blanc de Blancs (wines made from white grapes) or Blanc de Noirs (wines produced from red grapes).

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Many of us have heard about red wine being good for our health, but do we know why? Here are some tips which may help you appreciate your glass of wine more, knowing that it is actually doing you some good.

1. Drink in moderation.
   To benefit from drinking red wine, it must be drunk in moderation. Studies have shown that it helps in the prevention of heart disease. In fact, these studies also show that for middle aged people, one glass of wine for women and two glasses for men will actually lower the risks involved with heart attacks by between 30 and 50 percent.


2. Lowers cholesterol .
   Some of the benefits are the ability of lowering LDL or bad cholesterol within the body. This means that, again by drinking in moderation, the body's cholesterol level will be reduced, so reducing the risk of having blood clots due to fatty deposits in the blood vessels.
   
   It is important to know that these benefits only come from red wine that is drunk in moderation, and not by drinking too much. Just because it is good for you does not mean you can drink more than is actually recommended. Drinking too much wine puts you more at risk of certain medical conditions such as high blood pressure, cardiac arrhythmia, stroke, obesity, cholesterol build-up and cardiac arrest.


3. Source of antioxidants.
   Being a good source of antioxidants which cleanses the human system, red wine is indeed beneficial to the body. Other substances found in red wine include Resveratrol, which is a substance know to help increase the levels of HDL or good cholesterol, and various other antioxidant properties that assist in the prevention of blood clot and plaque formation within the arterial walls of the veins and arteries, as shown by medical studies.


4. A healthy lifestyle.
   It should also be importantly noted that in order to make use of the benefits red wine provides, a healthy lifestyle must also be maintained in conjunction with drinking red wine. By having a body that is generally in good shape overall, the ability to make use of the red wine benefits is much easier to achieve and prosper from.


5. Scientists say red wine can stop you going deaf.
   Moderate amounts of red protects the delicate hairs in the inner ear, according to Dr Jochen Schacht in America. He told New Scientist magazine that experiments found antioxidants in red wine neutralised chemical agents that attack the hairs.
   
   Red wine has similar protective properties to green tea, he said, after conducting tests on two sets of patients.

So you know that red wine is good for you, but what are the best foods to accompany your wine? In general they say that red wine goes with red meat - this is true - but if you prefer your red wine with, say chicken, then go ahead, after all it is your personal preference.

Some of the varieties of red wine I would recommend are Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Merlot, Shiraz.

The Health Benefits of Drinking Red Wine

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Many people complain of headaches caused by wine. Often these headaches are attributed to sulfites in the wine, though there is some debate among doctors and wine lovers as to whether this is really the cause.

But no matter how you get them, now it seems that their cure may be found in the same glass they came from.

At least that's what a growing trend among Indian women might lead you to believe. Apparently wine-based spa treatments are all the rage in the city of Jaipur, one of the larger cities in the Indian state of Rajasthan. Jaipur is known as the "pink city" after the predominance of the color in much of its stucco exteriors, but it may soon earn that name from the rosy cheeks of its women who seem to be enthusiastic adopters of the wine facial.

"After the facial, I felt very relaxed, and it is only with this facial, that I get the maximum glow on the skin", says one of the regular customers to the city's wine spas, where the treatment is offered not only as a skin tonic but also as a way of relieving anxiety, stress, and yes, headaches.

So next time you feel one of those wine headaches coming on, you've got two options, you can either stop drinking, or you can splash the contents of your glass onto your face and see if someone else is willing to rub it in for you while you relax for a few moments.

A few important questions on wine facials come to mind:

1. How long does it take for the wine facial to begin its miraculous work?
2. What happens to the wine after the facial? Can it be reused on another customer?
3. If this works so well for one's face, might it work even better for the whole body?

The matching of a wine to a particular food is quite a skill, but once your palate develops - all it takes is practice - the task will become easier.

Food matching tips from the experts is a great place to start, and get a feel of wine-tasting terminology. An accurate description of a wine will make it much easier to match it up with a food.

Example:
We have some delicate fish like trout, what's the wine going to be?

1. Trout is a delicate white meat ...
2. So, we need a delicate wine.
3. A red wine is not a delicate wine - so it's going to be a white.
   
4. Why is red not delicate? Well, it is a fuller, heavier in body and contains tannins (which are bitter to the taste) - not what we want with trout.
5. Now we are searching for a style that will enhance but not overpower the fish.
6. Something fresh with a citrus flavour would be good - we often add a squeeze of lemon onto the fish.
7. We now look for a wine that is young and fresh, with a citrus or herbaceous character (apples/pears/melons/grass, etc.)
8. The wine could easily be a young Riesling or Sauvignon Blanc which both have these characteristics. An older wine has lost it's freshness and some acidity, so the age is important - that is why white wines don't age as well as reds.
9. So there we have it, we have made our first match.

I'm sure you are familiar with all those adjectives, used by professional wine tasters, when describing a wine they are tasting. Here are some examples:

• "Clean and fresh on the nose with hints of apples and pears."


• "Tight marmalade and apricot nose which is complex but a touch closed. Great concentration on the palate which is rich with a fat texture: lovely plump apricot and lemon fruit."


• "Fresh, fine nose, with some rich coffee-like notes. The palate is a bit gravelly with pure, intense fruit."


• "Opaque red/black colour. Tight nose with complex tar, black fruit and spice notes. Massively tight on the palate with firm tannins dominating. Lots of spicy richness here and a firm core of minerally, tarry fruit."

The more wine tasting you do, the more acute your palate will become - practice makes perfect! With the help of Food matching tips you will be tasting and spitting like a pro in no time at all!

Learn the 5 Top Tips For Matching Food With Wine.

If you are tasting a lot of wines, you need to spit out for obvious reasons, the professionals spit into a spitoon.

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• In Greek mythology Bacchus was the god of wine, Bacchus is also a grape variety.
• 1 tonne of grapes will make approx. 800 bottles of wine.
• Italy is the world's largest producer of wine producing 5,877 million litres of wine in 2006. (most recent figures available)
• There are some 10,000 varieties of wine grapes which are grown across the world.
• It takes some 3 years before a newly planted grape vine will be ready to be harvested and the grapes made into wine.
• The longest recorded champagne cork flight was 177 feet and 9 inches, four feet from level ground at Woodbury Vineyards in New York State.
• Foot treading of grapes is still used in producing a small quantity of the best port wines.
• There are about 400 species of oak, though only about 20 are used in making oak barrels. Of the trees that are used, only 5% is suitable for making high grade wine barrels. The average age of a French oak tree harvested for use in wine barrels is 170 years!

1. How many acres are planted to grapes worldwide?
2. Among the world's fruit crops, where do wine grapes rank in number of acres planted?
3. How many countries import California wines?
4. What was the primary fruit crop in Napa Valley during the 1940's?
5. How many gallons of wine were lost in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake?
6. When was phylloxera first discovered in California?
7. How many acres of Napa County vineyards have been replanted in the last 15 years because of phylloxera?
8. How many more acres of Napa County vineyards will need replacement?
9. How long does it take to harvest a commercial crop from newly replanted grape vines?
10. How many varieties of wine grapes exist worldwide?
11. How much does it cost per bottle to age wine in a French oak barrel?
12. How much does it cost per bottle to age wine in only new French oak barrels?
13. How much white zinfandel is consumed in the USA?

1. 20 million
2. #1
3. 164
   
4. Prunes
5. 30 million
6. August 19, 1873
7. 10,450
8. 4,450
9. 4-5 years
10. 10,000
11. 90 cents
12. $2.50
    
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General wine info:
Do's and Don'ts - Serving Wine
Serving Temperatures for Wine
How to Preserve an Open Bottle of Wine
Classic Grapes of the World
Choose your Wine by Style Wizard
How To Become A Wine Tasting Expert


White wine info:
Why Merlot Wines Are So Popular
Riesling is the Best White Wine, Yes Or No?
Gewurztraminer - A Spicy Wine and Unruly Vine


Red wine info:
Pinotage - South Africa's Famous Red Wine
How to Make the Best Red Wine
Shiraz - A Versatile Wine in Australia


Food and Wine:
Matching Food with Wine
Wine and Food Pairing - Salmon


Health and Wine:
Do Sulfites in Wine Cause Headaches?
The Health Benefits of Drinking Red Wine


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There are fewer corked wines nowadays due to the introduction of the screwcap.

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