Winemaking Flashcards
Which is the winemaking method involved in the champagne production?
Champagne is produced by the “Champenoise” method, also called traditional, or classic, method, with a second fermentation in the very bottle in which the wine is to be sold.
Champagne grapes require both high acidity and phenolic ripeness, a combination that is much easier to achieve in cool Champagne. To preserve acidity, grapes are harvested early at a low must weight.
What makes the difference between the various maisons’ style?
- The chief difference between champagne brands lies in the making of the cuvée (the art of the assemblage), as the blend of dry base wines is called, which quality depends of course on the experience of the chef the cave in assembling the young wines (which are often deepened by a dose of older, reserve wines) and on the quality of the raw material itself (which character can vary considerably, depending the vineyards site even in those is considered the heart of Champagne).
- Then, is also very important for the champagne style a producer wants, the time spent on the lees, which is for law minimum 15 months. Generally, the longer, the better (stability, character, age worth and lengthiness of the palate).
- The amount of sugar present in the liqueur d’expédotion (dosage).
Which is the mandatory minimum requirement time of lees contact?
15 months for non-vintage champagne, and 36 for vintage wines (although many producers exceed these minima).
When the Champagne industrialization began? Thanks which maison? Which was her discovery?
The industrialization of champagne began with the widow (Veuve) Clicquot in the early 19th century.
Her achievement was to devise a way of clearing the wine of its sediment without losing the bubbles.
Riddling, or remuage, in perforated racks known as pupitres was the solution that still nowadays is making, in order to permit to the sediments to finish on the neck of the bottle, that after will be frozen to made a plug of murky ice that will be shoots out when the bottle is degorged. To reintegrate the small quantity of wine lost, every maisons add the liqueur d’expédition, or dosage, a mixture of wine and sugars that will give the style printing to the final champagne. The nowadays trend is to reduce the amount of sugars in that, or perhaps to add non at all (pas dosé champagne).
What is it chaptalization?
Who invent this winemaking technique?
Which are synonymous of that term throughout Europe?
Common winemaking practice, named after its French promulgator Jean-Antoine Chaptal, whereby the final alcoholic strength of a wine is increased by the addition of sugar to the grape juice or must, before and/or during fermentation, although if it is added before, the higher sugar level will make it harder for the yeast to multiply.
Contrary to popular belief, Chaptal did not invent the process, which had been the subject of common experiment, not least by the innovative French chemist Pierre-Joseph Macquer.
Amelioration is a common English euphemism for chaptalization. The French sometimes call it amélioration; the Germans, who were introduced to the technique by the chemist Ludwig Gall in the mid 19th century, call it Verbesserung; while most southern Europeans consider it an appalling practice, chiefly because, thanks to their warmer climate, they have no need of it.
Why champagne is traditionally a wine blend (of all, grapes, villages, vintages)?
As a result of the region’s exposure to the cold northern winter, which inevitably makes grape-growing a precarious operation, with the quality of the wines varying from year to year.
Vintage wines, indeed are produced only in the better vintages.
What is it a marc? What are coquards?
Nowadays, which other press typologies are permitted?
The traditional champagne press was a vertical basket press, holding 4,000 kg/8,800 lb of grapes, a quantity known as a marc and a standard unit of measurement in the region. These presses are also called Coquard presses after the name of the manufacturer.
A number of other types of press have since been introduced and the CIVC allows both hydraulic and pneumatic horizontal presses.
What are the volume (l) of the pressing, following INAO regulations, in Champagne?
(Respect the 1990, the total yield has now been reduced by 116 l) to 2,550 l per 4,000 kg -marc- (or 102 l per 160 kg, as the INAO regulations express it) and the deuxièmes tailles abolished (so, classification still remains the first 2,050 l are the cuvée, the next 410 l the premières tailles).
What is it vin claire?
Immediately after the first fermentation, most, but by no means all, champagnes now undergo malolactic conversion. The result is called vin clair.
How are produce Rosé champagnes?
- Blend of white and red still wines (legally possible only in Champagne);
- Rosé de Saignée: french term meaning ‘bled’ for a winemaking technique which results in a rosé wine made by running off, or ‘bleeding’, a certain amount of free-run juice from just-crushed dark-skinned grapes after a short, prefermentation maceration. The aim of this may be primarily to produce a lightly pink wine, or to increase the proportion of phenolics and flavour compounds to juice, thereby effecting a form of concentration of the red wine which results from fermentation of the rest of the juice with the skins. The second operation has often been undertaken by ambitious producers of both red bordeaux and red burgundy;
- Short skin contact.
What is it the méthode ancestrale?
Is the ancient winemaking technique by which is possible to produce sparkling wines which re-ferment in the bottle, but for which yeasts are not remove after the end of the second fermentation, resulting in a cloudy wine.
This method is still use in some part of France, such as Limoux and Gaillac.
Until when champagne producers did not remove the lees from the bottle after the second fermentation?
Who solved this problem? When?
Until the early 19th century, champagne producers did not remove the lees from the bottle. While this preserved all the sparkle, it could make for a cloudy and unpleasant wine. The veuve (‘widow’) Cliquot and her cellar master solved the problem by developing the process of riddling, which involves gradually moving the lees into the neck of the bottle and then ejecting it under the pressure of the wine.
Explain the differences between:
A. Traditional method (so called Champenoise);
B. Méthode Ancestral (Pet Nat -Pétillant Naturelle);
C. Transfer method;
D. Tank method (also called Martinotti, Cuvée Close, Charmat);
E. Asti method;
F. Carbonation.
A. In the traditional method, the second fermentation happened inside the bottle in which the wine is later sold. After the finish of the second fermentation, bottles are riddled and disgorged in order to eliminate the deposit of dead yeasts. The liqueur d’expedition which will be added sign the style of the final wine, in term of sweetness level.
B. In this method partly fermented must is put into bottles and the remaining sugar is converted into alcohol and CO2, providing the effervescence. Sugar levels in the partly fermented must can be measured accurately and therefore the final level of pressure can be estimated. The phase of fermentation in the bottle will throw a deposit of dead yeast. It is a winemaker’s choice whether to disgorge and fill up the bottles or, more commonly, to keep the light sediment as part of the wine’s style. Typically, no dosage is added in either case.
However, because there is no intervention in the fermentation
process once the bottle has been sealed, the outcome can vary.
Fermentation will often slow down and stop altogether after a few
months because the yeast becomes unviable after this time and due
to a lack of yeast nutrients, resulting in an off-dry wine. However,
fermentation may start up again later in some bottles. These bottles will have higher pressure and less residual sugar.
While ancestral method was typical of certain areas of France, this method has been revived in small-scale production around the world. It is often called Pet Nat, the abbreviation of Pétillant naturel, and there are no set regulations. The wines are often low in alcohol, slightly cloudy, dry to off-dry with unconventional flavours sometimes compared to cider. They are bottled without additional SO2 and intended for early drinking.
C. The production of the wine up to riddling is essentially the same as the Traditional Method, with second fermentation taking place in bottles. However, because riddling does
not take place, fining agents to aid flocculation do not need to be added within the liqueur de tirage. After lees ageing in bottle, the wine is chilled to 0 ̊C before discharge. The bottles are opened by a transfer machine and the wine is poured into pressurized receiving tanks. The wine is usually sweetened, SO2 is added, and sterile filtering is carried out just prior to bottling. The back labels of such wines may state ‘Fermented in bottle’ rather than ‘Fermented in this bottle’. The transfer method was developed in the 1940s to avoid the cost of manual riddling while retaining the bready, biscuit notes attained through yeast autolysis in bottle. It also has the benefit of reducing bottle-to-bottle variation given that the wine from individual bottles is blended together in a tank before final bottling. Transfer method is used in Champagne (and other regions) to fill bottles smaller than 37.5 cL and larger than 300 cL, as these sizes are difficult to riddle.
D. After the first cool (16-18°C, in order to preserve primary fresh aromas of semi-aromatic -like Glera for Prosecco- or aromatic -such as Moscato- grapes usually employed for this typology of sparkling wines) fermentation sugar and yeasts are added inside the tank, and a rapid second fermentation takes place in pressurised tanks (also known as reinforced tanks), with the wine remaining in the tank for as little as one month. There is no riddling or disgorgement, and typically no dosage or long period on the lees during second fermentation; however, occasionally, the wine may be aged on the lees, for example, for nine months if a lees- matured attribute is desired. Instead, if removed from the yeast lees immediately, quite almost as usual, the sparkling wines will retain the fruity aromas and flavours.
E. The Asti method is a variation of the tank method that produces a sparkling wine in a single fermentation. The sugar, which is converted into CO2 (and hence gives the bubbles in the final wine), comes from the sugar in the original must, not through later tirage. The must is fermented in reinforced tanks. During the first stages of fermentation, the carbon dioxide is allowed to escape through a valve in the tank. Part way through the fermentation, the valve
is closed and the carbon dioxide is retained. The timing of this will depend on the level of pressure and amount of sugar desired in the final wine. The wine continues to ferment during which time the sugar levels continue to fall and pressure in the tank increases. Once the desired residual sugar levels and pressure is obtained, the fermentation is stopped by rapidly chilling the wine and filtering it under pressure to remove the yeast.
F. The least expensive (and least prestigious) method of sparkling wine production is injection with carbon dioxide under pressure. Although the bubbles may die quickly in a fully sparkling wine, carbonation can be used successfully for pétillant, lower pressure wines. Carbonation also has the advantage of leaving the aroma and flavour characteristics of the base wine intact and thus it is suitable for aromatic or fruity sparkling wines. The base wine ideally needs to be of good quality, as any faults will be accentuated by bubbles.
Which were the 3 main solutions in XVII century to contrast bottles blast?
(1) In 1662, Christopher Merret presented a paper in which he correctly maintained that any wine could be made sparkling by the addition of sugar prior to bottling. (2) English glassmakers of the 17th century used coal- rather than woodfire ovens that yielded stronger glass and stronger bottles. (3) The English rediscovered the use of cork stoppers (lost after the fall of the Western Roman Empire), which provided an airtight closure to seal in the sparkle.
Apart the traditional Coquard, which other presses can be used in Champagne?
Notably the Vaslin press and more delicate Wilmes press, are also used.
