An expression for that part of the Bordeaux wine region that is on the left bank of the river Garonne. It includes, travelling down river, Graves, Sauternes, Barsac, Pessac-Léognan, Médoc and all the appellations of the Médoc.
Is the winemaking operation of storing a fermented wine in wooden barrels to create ideal conditions for the components of the wine to evolve and so that the wood imparts some oak flavour.
System of fractional blending used most commonly in Jerez for maintaining the consistency of a style of Sherry which takes ist name from those barrels closest to the suelo, or floor, from which the final blend was customarily drawn.
Is the name used by winemakers for a thick liquid that is neither grape juice nor wine but the intermediate, a mixture of grape juice. Stem fragments, grape skins, seeds, and pulp that comes from the crusher-destemmer that smashes grapes at the start of the winemaking process.
According to the 2005 wine legislation, the following types of wine are produced in Tokaj: Dry and semi-dry; These are wines vinified from overripe grapes and matured only briefly. Matured dry wines; botrytis is undesirable. Szamorodni; Comparable to that of Beerenauslese. They are fermented dry or sweet and subjected to subtle maturation under a film-forming yeast. Very like the Jura's Vin Jaune. Sweet Aszù wines; Traditionally, the concentration of wines is measured by the number of puttonyos of Aszù grapes. Essencia; The free-run juice of hand-picked botrytized berries with a sugar content of over 450g / l also 800g and more. Essencia takes years to achieve a modest alcohol level of 4-5%.
Coupage in French, is a practice that was once more distrusted than understood. In fact almost all of the world's finest wines are made by blending the contents of different vats and different barrels.
An instrument for measuring a refractive index, which is related to the amount by which the angle of a light wave is changed when passing through the boundary between two media. The amount of refraction is a convenient way to measure solute concentration of a solution and is widely used in viticultural and winemaking to follow the ripeness of grapes and changes during vinification.
Japanese term derived from two words meaning "delicious" and "essence" and used to refer to what some consider to be the fifth primary taste. It is variously described as "savory" or "meaty".
Term much used in the wine world, initially smoewhat patronizingly but with increasing admiration in the last quarter of the 20th century as the New World's share of global exports rose from 3 to 23%, to distinguish the colonies established as a result of the longer voyages in the 15th century.
Silicon dioxide (silica), a very common rock-forming mineral. It is seen as glassy, colourless grains in rocks such as granite and sandstone, producing sandy soils of low fertility. It also occurs as opaque white veins filling gashes in bedrocks, which weathering loosens into fragments that become the milky white pebbles seen in many vineyards soils.
IP was developed as a concept in 1974, and major development has come from France, Germany and Switzerland. IP emphasizes a holistic approach to viticulture, by considering the vineyard as an "agro-ecosystem". The reduction of chemical inputs, especially nitrogen fertilizer and broad spectrum insecticides, is a first step.
In common viticultural terms, the offspring of two varieties of different species, as distinct from a cross between two varieties of the same species, which is also known as an intraspecific cross.
One of the two principal organic acids of grapes and wines. Ist name comes from malum, Latin for apple, the fruit in which it was first identified. Present in nearly all fruits and berries.