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To provide or entertain with wine.
v.intr.To drink wine.
[Middle English, from Old English wīn, from Latin vīnum.]
Background
Wine is an alcoholic beverage produced through the partial or total fermentation of grapes. Other fruits and plants, such as berries, apples, cherries, dandelions, elder-berries, palm, and rice can also be fermented.
Grapes belong to the botanical family vitaceae, of which there are many species. The species that are most widely used in wine production are Vitis labrusca and, especially, Vitis vinifera, which has long been the most widely used wine grape throughout the world.
The theory that wine was discovered by accident is most likely correct because wine grapes contain all the necessary ingredients for wine, including pulp, juice, and seeds that possess all the acids, sugars, tannins, minerals, and vitamins that are found in wine. As a natural process, the frosty-looking skin of the grape, called "bloom," catches the airborne yeast and enzymes that ferment the juice of the grape into wine.
The cultivation of wine grapes for the production of wine is called "viticulture." Harvested during the fall, wine grapes may range in color from pale yellow to hearty green to ruby red.
Wine can be made in the home and in small-, medium- or large-sized wineries by using similar methods. Wine is made in a variety of flavors, with varying degrees of sweetness or dryness as well as alcoholic strength and quality. Generally, the strength, color, and flavor of the wine are controlled during the fermentation process.
Wine is characterized by color: white, pink or rose, and red, and it can range in alcohol content from 10 percent to 14 percent. Wine types can be divided into four broad categories: table wines, sparkling wines, fortified wines, and aromatic wines. Table wines include a range of red, white, and rose wines; sparkling wines include champagne and other "bubbly" wines; aromatic wines contain fruits, plants, and flowers; and fortified wines are table wines with brandy or other alcohol added.
The name of a wine almost invariably is derived from one of three sources: the name of the principal grape from which it was made, the geographical area from which it comes, or—in the case of the traditionally finest wines—from a particular vineyard or parcel of soil. The year in which a wine is made is only printed on bottles that have aged for two or more years; those aged less are not considered worthy of a date. Wine years are known as "vintages" or "vintage years." While certain wines are considered good or bad depending on the year they were produced, this can vary by locality.
In general, red wines are supposed to age from seven to ten years before being sold. Because white and rose wines are not enhanced by additional ageing, they are usually aged from only one to four years before being sold. And, since the quality of wine can depend on proper ageing, older wines are generally more expensive than younger ones. Other factors, however, can affect the quality of wine, and proper ageing does not always ensure quality. Other factors affecting quality include the grapes themselves, when the grapes are picked, proper care of the grapes, the fermentation process, as well as other aspects of wine production.
Most wineries bottle wine in different size bottles and have different product and graphic designs on their labels. The most common bottle sizes are the half bottle, the imperial pint, the standard bottle, and the gallon bottle or jug. Most red and rose wine bottles are colored to keep light from ageing the wine further after they are on the market.
While viticulture has remained much the same for centuries, new technology has helped increase the output and variety of wine.
History
Well documented in numerous Biblical references, evidence of wine can be traced back to Egypt as far as 5,000 B.C. Tomb wall paintings showing the use of wine as well as actual wine jars found in Egyptian tombs provide evidence of this fact. Because more northern climates and soil produce better wine, the growth of the wine industry can be traced from its emergence along the Nile River in Egypt and Persia northward into Europe and, eventually, to North America.
Though the wines of old were coarse and hard and had to be mixed with water, ancient Greek wine proved to be somewhat better than Egyptian wine. For this reason, Egyptians began importing it. Then Roman wines (from what would emerge to be Italy, Spain, and France) became notably superior. Eventually, French and German wines grew to be the most desirable, thereby shifting the center of wine production from the Mediterranean to central Europe. Some of the best wine in the world is still produced in southern France, particularly in the Bordeaux region, where wine has been made for more than 2,000 years.
The colonists brought wine production to the east coast of the New World by the mid-1600s. The earliest account of wine used in the New World may be when the Pilgrims fermented grapes to celebrate their first Thanksgiving in 1623. Settlers tried to grow imported grape cuttings they brought from Europe, but unfortunately the European cuttings had not developed immunities to the North American plant diseases that eventually killed them. By the middle of the nineteenth century (using the fruits of the abundant native Vitis labrusca grape plants) wineries were established in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and North Carolina.
In 1697, European cuttings of Vitis vinifera grapes were successfully introduced to California by Franciscan priests at the Mission San Francisco Xavier. They soon became the dominant grape species in California wine making. A great boost to California wine making came from Colonel Agoston Haraszthy, a Hungarian nobleman, who introduced more high-quality European cuttings during the 1850s. His knowledge made him the founder of California's modern wine industry.
Today, California and New York state are by far the largest American producers of wine, and California is one of the largest wine producers in the world. Though many of its table wines are known for their quality, the enormous wineries of central and southern California produce gigantic quantities of neutral, bulk wines that they ship elsewhere to make specific wines, such as dessert wines, or to blend with other wines. They also make grape concentrates to fortify weaker wines and brandies that use large quantities of grapes.
Raw Materials
As mentioned above, the wine grape itself contains all the necessary ingredients for wine: pulp, juice, sugars, acids, tannins, and minerals. However, some manufacturers add yeast to increase strength and cane or beet sugar to increase alcoholic content. During fermentation, winemakers also usually add sulfur dioxide to control the growth of wild yeasts.
The Manufacturing
Process
The process of wine production has remained much the same throughout the ages, but new sophisticated machinery and technology have helped streamline and increase the output of wine. Whether such advances have enhanced the quality of wine is, however, a subject of debate. These advances include a variety of mechanical harvesters, grape crushers, temperature-controlled tanks, and centrifuges.
The procedures involved in creating wine are often times dictated by the grape and the amount and type of wine being produced. Recipes for certain types of wine require the winemaker (the vintner) to monitor and regulate the amount of yeast, the fermentation process, and other steps of the process. While the manufacturing process is highly automated in medium- to large-sized wineries, small wineries still use hand operated presses and store wine in musty wine cellars.
A universal factor in the production of fine wine is timing. This includes picking grapes at the right time, removing the must at the right time, monitoring and regulating fermentation, and storing the wine long enough.
The wine-making process can be divided into four distinct steps: harvesting and crushing grapes; fermenting must; ageing the wine; and packaging.
Harvesting and crushing grapes
Mechanical harvesters, or, in some cases, robots, are now used in most medium to large vineyards, thereby eliminating the need for hand-picking. First used in California vineyards in 1968, mechanical harvesters have significantly decreased the time it takes to gather grapes. The harvesters have also allowed grapes to be gathered at night when they are cool, fresh, and ripe.
The grapes are crushed and the stems are removed, leaving liquid must that flows either into a stainless steel fermentation tank or a wooden vat (for fine wines).
Fermenting the must
Ageing the wine
After fermentation, certain wines (mainly red wine) will be crushed again and pumped into another fermentation tank where the wine will ferment again for approximately three to seven days. This is done not only to extend the wine's shelf life but also to ensure clarity and color stability.
The wine is then pumped into settling ("racking") tanks or vats. The wine will remain in the tank for one to two months. Typically, racking is done at 50 to 60 degrees Fahrenheit (10 to 16 degrees Celsius) for red wine, and 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius) for white wine.
The wine is now ready to be bottled, corked, sealed, crated, labeled, and shipped to distributors.
Packaging
Quality Control
All facets of wine production must be carefully controlled to create a quality wine. Such variables as the speed with which harvested grapes are crushed; the temperature and timing during both fermentation and ageing; the percent of sugar and acid in the harvested grapes; and the amount of sulfur dioxide added during fermentation all have a tremendous impact on the quality of the finished wine.
Where To Learn More
Books
Adams, Leon. The Wines of America. McGraw Hill, 1978.
Anderson, Stanley F. Winemaking. Harcourt Brace & Company, 1989.
Churchill, Creighton. The World of Wines. Collier Books, 1980.
Farkas, J. The Technology & Biochemistry of Wine. Gordon & Breach Science Publishers, Inc., 1988.
Hazelton, Nika. American Wines. Grosset Good Life Books, 1976.
Johnson, Hugh. The Vintner's Art: How Great Wines are Made. Simon & Schuster Trade, 1992.
McGee, Harold. On Food and Cooking. Collier Books, 1984.
Ough, Cornelius S. Winemaking Basics. Haworth Press, Inc., 1992.
Rainbird, George. An Illustrated Guide to Wine. Harmony Books, 1983.
Zaneilli, Leo. Beer and Wine Making Illustrated Dictionary. A. S. Barnes & Company, 1978.
Periodicals
Asimov, Isaac. "The Legacy of Wine," The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. July, 1991, p. 81.
Merline, John W. "What's in Wine? (Calling All Consumers)," Consumers' Research Magazine. November 1986, p. 38.
Oliver, Laure. "Fermenting Wine the Natural Way," The Wine Spectator. October 31, 1992, p. 9.
Robinson, Jancis. "Spreading the Gospel of Oak," The Wine Spectator. August 31, 1991, p. 20.
Roby, Norm. "Getting Back to Nature," The Wine Spectator. October 15, 1990, p. 22.
[Article by: Greg Ling]
Alcoholic beverages made by fermentation of the juice of fruits or berries, essentially grape juice. Wines from other materials are always required to show their source on the label, for example, apple wine, berry wine, and cherry wine. California produces the largest percentage of the grape wine made in the United States, and well over a hundred varieties of the cultivated grape (Vitis vinifera) are used.
Classification of wine depends on the color, relative sweetness, alcoholic content, presence of carbon dioxide, the variety of grape, and the region where the grapes are grown. Wines may be red or white. The terms dry and sweet refer to the relative sugar content of a wine. Table wines contain less than 14% alcohol by volume, and dessert wines contain over 14%, usually 20%, alcohol. The higher alcohol content of dessert wines is obtained by the addition of brandy, which is called fortification. Sparkling wines such as champagne and sparkling Burgundy contain carbon dioxide.
Grapes are harvested and go through a crusher-stemmer, which crushes the berries, but not the seeds, and removes the stems. The must, still containing seeds and skins, is pumped to fermentation tanks where it receives sulfur dioxide gas. This controls, to a large extent, the growth of bacteria and wild yeasts, whereas the various strains of wine yeast are adapted to this amount of SO2. A pure yeast starter is then added. In the production of white wines, the juice is separated from the skins and seeds at an early stage of fermentation. See also Fermentation.
After the initial fermentation, the wine is transferred to the storage cellar for completion of fermentation, clarification, aging, stabilization, and bottling. These operations are called cellar practices. The sediment of yeast and other insoluble matter is called lees. The new wine is drawn off, or racked, from the lees to avoid picking up undesirable flavors from the lees. Aging is then continued. Wines are often chilled to precipitate excess cream of tartar, the potassium acid tartrate from the grape, which otherwise might precipitate upon chilling of bottled wine. Champagne is made by allowing a secondary fermentation to occur with a special flocculating type of yeast. either in bottles, by the original French procedure, or in bulk, using pressure tanks followed by bottling. The carbon dioxide, CO2, of sparkling wines is produced by yeast fermentation.
Fermented juice from grapes (varieties of Vitis vinifera). Red wines are made by fermenting the juice together with the skins at 21-29°C; white wines normally from white grapes by fermenting the juice alone at 15-17°C; rosé by removing the skins after 12-36 hours, or by mixing red and white wines.
Beverages made by fermenting other fruit juices and sugar in the presence of vegetables, leaves, or roots are also called wines (elderberry, elderflower, parsnip, peapod, rhubarb, etc.), although the legal definition may be restricted to the fermented grape. See also alcoholic beverages.
White wines are graded as dry (0.6% sugars), to sweet (6% sugars), on a scale of 1 to 9. Red wines are graded from A (light and dry) to E (full-bodied and heavy). Wines generally contain 9-14% alcohol, dry wines 70 kcal (290 kJ), sweet wines 120 kcal (500 kJ), and about 1 mg of iron per 100 mL; there are only traces of vitamins.
Unless otherwise specified, wine refers to the naturally fermented juice of grapes. More broadly, the term can include alcoholic beverages created from other fruits and even vegetables. Wine has a rich history that has evolved along with that of humankind. Its historical roots reach back almost 12,000 years. As various cultures spread out into new parts of the world, so did the grapevine and the art of winemaking. Today there are vineyards throughout the world with good wine being produced in far-ranging locations from the United States to South Africa to Australia to South America to Europe. Wine is broadly classified in the following categories: 1. still (nonsparkling) wines-including red, white and rosé-which can be dry (nonsweet), semisweet and sweet; 2. sparkling wines, including French champagnes as well as effervescent wines from other parts of the world; 3. fortified wines, such as sherry and port, which have been augmented with a dose of brandy or other spirit; and 4. aromatic wines, such as vermouth, which have been flavored with ingredients like herbs or spices. Vintage wine is that which is made with 95 percent of the grapes harvested in a specific year; the year or "vintage" is indicated on the wine label. Nonvintage wine is made from the juice of grapes harvested from several years; there's no year noted on the label of such wine. blush wines are made with red grapes, but the juice has had a very brief contact with the grape skins, which produces pale pink wines. Wine storage locations should be dark, vibration free and at an even temperature. The ideal temperature is 55°F, however, anywhere from 45° to 70°F is acceptable, providing the temperature is consistent. The higher the temperature, the faster a wine will age. Wine bottles should be stored on their sides to prevent the cork from drying and shrinking, which would allow air to enter the bottle and disrupt the wine's flavor. Serving temperatures: White wine should be served at a range of between 50° and 55°F; red wine at around 65°F. Refrigerating white wine for more than 2 hours before serving can dull its flavor and aroma. Avoid drips when pouring wine by giving the bottle a slight twist just as you finish pouring. See also acetic acid; alsatian wines; appellation; asti spumante; auslese; bardolino; barolo; beaujolais; beerenauslese; blanc de blancs; blanc de noirs; botrytis cinerea; bouquet; brunello di montalcino; burgundy; byrrh; cabernet franc; cabernet sauvignon; chablis; character; chardonnay;
For more information on wine, visit Britannica.com.
Fermented grape juice prepared as an alcoholic drink and of considerable antiquity in the Old World. Grape seeds have been found in archaeological contexts from the onwards, although it is uncertain whether these early finds relate to the production of alcoholic drinks or were simply a food source. The earliest certain remains of wine recorded to date is the sediment in an amphora dated to about 3500 bc from Godin Tepe in Iran. Ceramic vessels developed for the storage and consumption of wine appear from Bronze Age times onwards in the eastern and central Mediterranean. The wild vine (Vitis vinifera sylvestris) was once widely distributed around the Mediterranean and between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. It was in this last-mentioned area, in Armenia and southern Georgia, for example, that vines were probably first domesticated in the 4th millennium bc (Vitis vinifera sativa). Trade in wine developed rapidly from the mid 3rd millennium onwards, and it is the containers used to transport wine (mainly amphorae but later barrels as well) that allow reconstructions of the process to be made from archaeological evidence.
In the early nineteenth century Nicholas Longworth, an optimistic and eccentric settler of Cincinnati, raised eyebrows when he planted grapes on his farmlands in southwestern Ohio. On occasion, easterners had tried making wine but had disliked the taste; Longworth's wine, however, seemed palatable. Like many wine makers in the nineteenth century, including Thomas Jefferson, Longworth championed wine as a beverage of temperance, arguing that it was more civilized than distilled spirits. But the wine industry faced formidable challenges. For most of the nineteenth century, wine making was a small-scale, agrarian undertaking concentrated in eastern states. Demand was largely local and most Americans preferred spirits or beer, which were much cheaper, to wine. Until the late twentieth century, wine consumption was very low in the United States. The industry has always been composed of growers and vintners, although many industry members have engaged in both supplying and processing. The production of wine has proved land and labor intensive and therefore unattractive to farmers seeking easier profits. Wine making in the 1800s, furthermore, was hampered by crop diseases and insects. By the end of the century, however, the development of fungicides and other scientific advances fostered an increase in grape growing and wine making.
California Wine
Another important development was the rise of the wine industry in California, particularly northern California, in the late 1800s, when it became the country's leading wine-producing state. As did many other industries, the wine industry experienced consolidation during this period. The California Wine Association (CWA), founded in 1894, organized the industry in that state, and in what is sometimes referred to as the "wine war," aggressively cut prices to put its competitors out of business. The leaders of the wine industry became financiers instead of farmers and wine merchants. During this period, demand for wine moved from the country to the city, and because of the CWA's push for a standardized product, the public favored sweet, fortified wines at cheap prices. By the advent of Prohibition in 1919, most Americans viewed wine just as they did distilled spirits: as a mass-produced, intemperate beverage. Moreover, they regarded American wine as inferior to European wine. Wine, earlier respected as a beverage of moderation, now became an easy target for the Temperance Movement.
Prohibition and Afterward
Prohibition had a devastating impact on the wine industry. Growers converted vineyards to other crops and most wineries were abandoned. Over 1,000 commercial wineries existed before Prohibition, but at Repeal in 1933, only 150 remained. The industry had a much more difficult time recovering from Prohibition than did the Brewing and distilling industries. In the several decades after Prohibition, American wine still had the reputation of being a cheap drink that "belonged in paper bags on skid row" (Lukacs, American Vintage, p. 94). The association between wine and spirits was strengthened during World War II when several large distillers aggressively entered the wine business. The distillers exited by the end of the 1940s, but the connection was cemented in the minds of many.
As did most other agriculturally based enterprises, wine making became a big business during the postwar years. The industry once again experienced consolidation, going from around 1,300 commercial wineries in 1936 to only 271 in 1960. In the East, the largest wineries could be found in the Finger Lakes region of New York. In California two companies, E. and J. Gallo and United Vinters, dominated the industry and in 1967 Gallo claimed its place, which it still holds, as the world's largest winery.
The Turn Toward Wine
The ascendance of the wine industry began in the 1960s when prosperous and well-traveled Americans developed a taste for table wines, which transported wine consumption from the gutter into sophisticated and affluent homes. The Gallos participated in this shift when they began to plant premium grapes and strove for excellence in their wine making. Also influential was Robert Mondavi, another California wine producer, who designed his wines to taste like those of France. Mondavi and others were able to manipulate grapes and wines to achieve desired tastes. Unlike the European wine industry, which was built on craft and tradition, the post-Repeal wine industry in America was based on technology and science after Prohibition severed American wine makers' association with the past. In the 1960s and after, the industry relied on research and experimentation and was closely associated with agricultural researchers at several land-grant universities. Also, big corporations such as Coca-Cola, Nestlé, and Schlitz Brewing entered the industry in hopes of earning large profits from a rising enterprise. Nestle succeeded in turning Beringer into an industry leader, but others, such as Coca-Cola, failed and deserted their effort. Although the wine industry established strong footholds in Oregon and Washington, the state of California, with over nine-hundred wineries, remained the leading wine-producing state in the nation, accounting for 90 percent (444 million gallons) of all U.S. wine production at the end of the twentieth century. The industry in California organized itself into the Wine Institute, while wineries across the nation are represented by another trade association, the Association of American Vintners.
The trend toward superior table wines meant that during the 1980s and 1990s America saw a rise in small premium wineries that produced wines scoring higher than French wines in international competitions. American wine makers, moreover, no longer copied European wines; instead, they developed exceptional qualities of their own. Despite the blossoming of the American wine industry during the last quarter of the twentieth century, wine consumption failed to soar. This was partly attributable to the new temperance movement of the 1980s, which focused on drunk driving, alcohol-related birth defects, and alcohol advertising abuses. But another reason for sagging consumption rates was that Americans ceased drinking generous amounts of cheap wines and were drinking less, but more expensive, premium wines. Some wine producers, however, did experience a boom in another wine product during the 1980s when the wine cooler enjoyed a brief vogue. In the 1990s, scientific reports linking moderate wine consumption to good health bolstered a rising popularity for wine in America.
Bibliography
Barr, Andrew. Drink: A Social History of America. New York: Carroll and Graf, 1999.
Lukacs, Paul. American Vintage: The Rise of American Wine. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000.
Pinney, Thomas. A History of Wine in America from the Beginnings to Prohibition. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.
Wine Institute: The Voice for California Wine. Available at http://www.wineinstitute.org.
Characteristics
Wines are distinguished by color, flavor, bouquet or aroma, and alcoholic content. Wine is also divided into three main types: still or natural, fortified, and sparkling. Wines are red, white, or rosé (depending on the grape used and the amount of time the skins have been left to ferment in the juice). For red wines the entire crushed grape is utilized; for white wines, the juice only. In rosé wines, the skins are removed after fermentation has begun, thus producing a light pink color. Wines are also classified as dry or sweet, according to whether the grape sugar is allowed to ferment completely into alcohol (dry), or whether some residual sugar has been left (sweet).
In a natural wine all the alcohol present has been produced by fermentation. Fortified wines, such as sherry, port, Madeira, and Malaga, are wines to which brandy or other spirits have been added. These wines contain a higher alcohol content (from 16% to 35%) than the still wines (from 7% to 15%). Sparkling wines, of which champagne is the finest example, are produced by the process of secondary fermentation in the bottle.
Highly publicized studies of the French, particularly in Lyons, claim that a moderate consumption of red wine might help reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. Such findings were judged worthy of further investigation by the American Medical Association.
Production
In natural-wine making the grapes are gathered when fully ripe (sometimes, as for Sauternes, when overripe). Mechanical extraction of the juice, called must, has almost entirely replaced treading, the traditional method. For red wines the must is fermented with the skins and pips, from which the newly formed alcohol extracts coloring matter and tannin. Fermentation starts when wine yeasts (Saccharomyces ellipsoideus), existing on the skins of ripe grapes, come in contact with the must. It may take from a few days to several weeks, according to the temperature and the amount of yeast present or introduced. When the new wine has become still and fairly clear, it is run off into large casks, where it undergoes a complicated series of chemical processes including oxidation, precipitation of proteids, and formation of esters that create a characteristic bouquet. The wine is periodically fined (clarified), then racked into smaller casks. After some months, or for certain wines several years, the wine is ripe for bottling.
The very rare, superfine natural wines made in good vintage years from perfect grapes of the better varieties and possessing the unaccountable quality that vintners call breed are produced in the Bordeaux, Burgundy, and Rhône regions of France, in the Rhine valley of Germany, in California's Napa and Sonoma valleys and other parts of the United States, and in other regions of the world. The fine sherry of Spain and port of Portugal are superior fortified wines. Champagne is the best-known fine sparkling wine, but superior sparkling wines are also produced elsewhere in the world.
French Wine
France is the most influential wine-producing area in the world and has developed superfine natural still wines and the finest sparkling wine—champagne. The Bordeaux region furnishes red wine known as claret (or simply Bordeaux) and white wine, both dry except for Sauternes. The best-known Bordeaux wines are those of Médoc (red), classified and known by the vineyard names, as Château Lafite-Rothschild, Château Margaux, and Château Latour; Graves (red or white); Sauternes (white), sweet, made from overripe grapes and including the noted Château d'Yquem; and St.-Emilion and Pomerol.
Burgundy wines, red and white, are somewhat lighter in body than the Bordeaux. Connoisseurs prize the Burgundies of the Côte d'Or, especially the white Montrachet, and red Clos Vougeot and Romanée. The Chablis area produces fine, white Burgundy. Good wines are made in the Loire valley (Vouvray), the Rhône valley (Hermitage and Châteauneuf-du-Pape), Alsace, and the Jura Mts. A great quantity of wine is produced in S France, some of it made into vermouth, distilled into brandy, or used for blending, and some of it of superior quality.
German Wine
Fine German wines are generally light, dry, white wines made from the Riesling grape and characterized by a fresh, flowery bouquet. Hock, derived from the town of Hochheim, is an English term sometimes applied to all Rhine wines. The best white Rhines traditionally are from the Rheingau. They include Johannisberger, Rüdesheimer, and Steinberger. Rheinhessen wines are milder and lighter in taste. The third Rhine district, Pfalz (the Palatinate), also produces distinguished wines. Liebfraumilch, although well known, is typically an undistinguished semisweet Rhine wine. Rhine wines were formerly matured for many years in huge casks like the classic Heidelberg Tun, but are now aged in small casks for not more than three years. One of the most northerly viticultural areas in the world, situated along the Moselle (Mosel) River and its tributaries the Saar and the Ruwer, furnishes extremely light, delicate wines. Moselle wines are drawn off into green bottles, Rhine wines into brown. Other good wines are made in Baden, and in Franconia in Bavaria, noted for Stein wine.
Italian Wine
Italy is the largest and one of the oldest wine-producing countries in the world. Italian wines are frequently named for the grape rather than for the region of origin; hence a wine excellent in one locality may be inferior in another. The best known is Chianti, red or white, and properly a Tuscan wine; Tuscany also produces the esteemed red blends known as Super-Tuscans. From Piedmont come the red Barolo, Barbera, and Barbaresco wines; from Campania come the well-known Lacrima Cristi, and Falerno, descendant of Horace's Falernian; from Veneto comes Valpolicella, dark red with a rich texture. Sicily makes Marsala, a sweet, amber-colored, usually fortified wine, but both that island and Sardinia are increasing important for quality wines.
American Wine
Although in the past American vintners largely were satisfied with quantity production and imitations—largely in name only—of foreign wines, since the mid-1960s the quality domestic wine industry has grown, and many excellent and some superb wines have been made in the United States. Wine is produced in many states; California is the nation's richest wine-producing state, followed by New York and the Pacific Northwest states. In California and the Northwest, grapes of the Old World species, Vitis vinifera, are grown, and some of the varieties produced from these grapes have come to rival the finest French wines. Some of the best wines come from the Napa Valley area north of San Francisco. Distinguished wines from that region include cabernet sauvignon, chardonnay, and zinfandel. Eastern wines, most of them from New York state—especially the Finger Lakes region—were long made mainly from native grapes such as Concords, Catawbas, and the southern scuppernong, but many are now produced from the Old World species and hybrids.
Other Countries
Until recently, sherry was the major Spanish wine sold. Today, Rioja, a leading table wine, is Spain's most widely exported wine, and Ribera del Duero, Priorato, Navarre, and other regions also produce fine wines. Portugal, best known for port and Madeira, also produces some excellent table wines. Greek wines, mainly whites and rosés, are sometimes treated with pine resin (retsina). Australian wines have sold well since the mid-1980s, when first-class examples of chardonnay and cabernet sauvignon became available abroad; New Zealand is especially noted for its sauvignon blanc. The best wines from South America come from Chile, which produces both fortified and table wines; Argentina is another significant producer. French planting has made Algeria one of the largest wine-producing countries, but the wines are not notable. Other wine-producing countries include Austria, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and South Africa.
Bibliography
See E. Peynaud, Knowing and Making Wine (1984); H. Johnson, Vintage (1989) and Modern Encyclopedia of Wine (4th ed. 1998); S. Spurrier and M. Dovaz, Wine Course (1990); J. Robinson, Oxford Companion to Wine (1994); R. Phillips, A Short History of Wine (2001).
This entry includes five subentries:
Overview
Wine in the Ancient World
Wine from Classical Times to the Nineteenth Century
Wine in the Modern World
Wine, Nongrape
The naturally fermented juice of grapes, unless otherwise specified. More broadly, the term can include alcoholic beverages created from other fruits and even vegetables and grains. Such potables are usually specified with the name of the fruit, as in "apricot wine." Wine has a rich history that has evolved along with that of man. Its historical roots reach back almost 12,000 years. As various cultures spread out into new parts of the world, so did the grapevine and the art of winemaking. Today there are vineyards throughout the world with good wine being produced in far-ranging locations from the United States to South Africa to Australia to South America to Europe. Wine is broadly classified in the following categories: 1. still (nonsparkling) wines-including red, white, and rosé-which can be dry (nonsweet), semisweet, and sweet; 2. sparkling wines including French champagnes as well as effervescent wines from other parts of the world; 3. fortified wines (such as sherry, port and some dessert wines), which have been augmented with brandy or other spirit; and 4. Aromatic Wines, like vermouth which have been flavored with ingredients like herbs or spices. See also dealcoholized wines.
| Description | Quantity | Energy (calories) |
Carbs (grams) |
Protein (grams) |
Cholesterol (milligrams) |
Weight (grams) |
Fat (grams) |
Saturated Fat (grams) |
| dessert | 3.5 F oz | 140 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 103 | 0 | 0 |
| table, red | 3.5 F oz | 75 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 102 | 0 | 0 |
| table, white | 3.5 F oz | 80 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 102 | 0 | 0 |
| Meaning | Category |
| GourmetMarket.Com, Inc. | Business->NASDAQ Symbols |
| Wine Is Not an Emulator | Computing->General |
Click here to submit an acronym.
n.
Fermented grape-juice known to the Women's Christian Union as "liquor," sometimes as "rum." Wine, madam, is God's next best gift to man.
One of the disadvantages of wine is that it makes a man mistake words for thoughts.
— Samuel Johnson
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Quotes:
"Wine is a part of society because it provides a basis not only for a morality but also for an environment; it is an ornament in the slightest ceremonials of French daily life, from the snack to the feast, from the conversation at the local caf? to the speech at a formal dinner."
- Roland Barthes
"I may not here omit those two main plagues, and common dotages of human kind, wine and women, which have infatuated and besotted myriads of people. They go commonly together."
- Robert Burton
"It is a maudlin and indecent verity that comes out through the strength of wine."
- Joseph Conrad
"This wine is too good for toast-drinking, my dear. You don't want to mix emotions up with a wine like that. You lose the taste."
- Ernest Hemingway
"Wine gives a man nothing. It neither gives him knowledge nor wit; it only animates a man, and enables him to bring out what a dread of the company has repressed. It only puts in motion what had been locked up in frost."
- Samuel Johnson
"Wine makes a man better pleased with himself. I do not say that it makes him more pleasing to others... This is one of the disadvantages of wine, it makes a man mistake words for thoughts."
- Samuel Johnson
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Wine is an alcoholic beverage made from the fermentation of grape juice.[1] The natural chemical balance of grapes is such that they can ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes or other nutrients.[2] Although other fruits like apples and berries can also be fermented, the resultant "wines" are normally named after the fruit from which they are produced (for example, apple wine or elderberry wine) and are generically known as fruit or country wine. Others, such as barley wine and rice wine (e.g. sake), are made from starch-based materials and resemble beer more than wine, while ginger wine is fortified with brandy. In these cases, the use of the term "wine" is a reference to the higher alcohol content, rather than production process.[3] The commercial use of the English word "wine" (and its equivalent in other languages) is protected by law in many jurisdictions.[4] Wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast which consume the sugars found in the grapes and convert them into alcohol. Various varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are used depending on the types of wine produced.[5]
Wine has a long history dating back about 8,000 years and is thought to have originated in present day Georgia or Iran.[6][7] Wine is thought to have appeared in Europe about 6,500 years ago in the today's territories of Bulgaria and Greece and was very common in classical Greece and Rome. Wine has also played an important role in religion since ancient times. The Greek God Dionysos and the Roman God Bacchus represented wine. Wine has also played an important role in ceremonies in the Christian religion such as mass.
The word "wine" derives from the Proto-Germanic *winam, an early borrowing from the Latin vinum, "wine" or "(grape) vine", itself derived from the Proto-Indo-European stem *win-o- (cf. Ancient Greek οῖνος oînos).[8] Similar words for wine or grapes are found in the Semitic languages (cf. Arabic ﻭﻳﻦ wayn) and in Georgian (ğvino), and the term is considered an ancient wanderwort.[9]
Archaeological evidence suggests that the earliest wine production came from sites in Armenia, Georgia and Iran, dating from 6000 to 5000 BC.[10][11] The archaeological evidence becomes clearer, and points to domestication of grapevine, in Early Bronze Age sites of the Near East, Sumer and Egypt from around the third millennium BC.[12]
The very oldest known evidence suggesting wine production in Europe and second oldest in the world comes from archaeological sites in Greece and is dated to 6,500 years ago.[13][14][15] The same archaeological sites in Greece also contain remnants of the world’s earliest evidence of crushed grapes.[16] In fact, several Greek sources as well as Pliny the Elder describe how the ancient Greeks used partly dehydrated gypsum before fermentation and some type of lime after fermentation to reduce acidity. The Greek writer Theophrastus is actually the oldest known source to describe this aspect of Greek wine making.[17][18]
In Egypt, wine became a part of recorded history, playing an important role in ancient ceremonial life. Wine was possibly introduced into Egypt by the Ancient Greeks.[19] Traces of wine were also found in China, dating from the second and first millennium BC[20].
Wine was common in classical Greece and Rome.[21] The Ancient Greeks introduced vines such as Vitis vinifera[22] and made wine in their numerous colonies in Italy,[23] Sicily,[24] southern France,[25] and Spain.[22] Dionysus was the Greek god of wine and revelry, and wine was frequently referred to in the works of Homer and Aesop. Many of the major wine producing regions of Western Europe today were established by the Romans.[26] Wine making technology improved considerably during the time of the Roman Empire. Many grape varieties and cultivation techniques were known. Barrels were developed for storing and shipping wine.[26]
Since Roman times, wine (potentially mixed with herbs and minerals) was assumed to serve medicinal purposes as well. During Roman times it was not uncommon to dissolve pearls in wine for better health. Cleopatra created her own legend by promising Marc Anthony she would "drink the value of a province" in one cup of wine, after which she drank an expensive pearl with a cup of wine.[18] Another medieval application was the use of snake-stones (banded Agate resembling the figural rings on a snake) dissolved in wine against snake bites, which shows an early understanding of the effects of alcohol on the central nervous system in such situations.[18]
In medieval Europe, the Christian Church was a staunch supporter of wine which was necessary for the celebration of the Catholic Mass. In places such as Germany, beer was banned and considered pagan and barbaric while wine consumption was viewed as civilized and a sign of conversion.[27] Wine was also forbidden in the Islamic civilization, but after Geber and other Muslim chemists pioneered the distillation of wine, it was used for other purposes, including cosmetic and medical uses.[28] In fact the 10th century Persian philosopher and scientist Al Biruni described a number of recipes where herbs, minerals and even gemstones are mixed with wine for medicinal purposes. Wine was so revered and its effect so feared that elaborate theories were developed which gemstone-cups would best counteract its negative side effects.[18]
Wine is usually made from one or more varieties of the European species, Vitis vinifera. When one of these varieties, such as Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, or Merlot, for example, is used as the predominant grape (usually defined by law as a minimum of 75 or 85%) the result is a varietal, as opposed to a blended wine. Blended wines are in no way inferior to varietal wines; some of the world's most valued and expensive wines from the Bordeaux,
