Italian term applied to DOC wines which are deemed superior because of their higher minimum alcoholic strength, usually by a half or one per cent, a longer period of ageing before commercial release, or a lower maximum permited yield, or all three.
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.
Named after the principal town of Nuits-St-Georges, this is the northern half of the escarpment of the Côte d'Or, producing the greatest red wines of Burgundy, from the Pinot Noir grape, and very occasional white wines.
Widely used in filtration, is a naturally occuring, highly porous, chalky textured sedimentary rock made mainly of silica and consisting of fossilized remains of diatoms, a type of hard-shelled algae.
Town north of Perpignan in southern France that gives ist name to two of the biggest appellations of Roussillon, Rivesaltes and Muscat de Rivesaltes, both of them vins doux naturels.
Occasionally madeirization, is the process by which a wine is made to taste like Madeira, involving mild oxidation over a long period and, usually, heat.
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.
An accumulation of clay and silt particles that have been deposited by the wind. Loess is typically pale-coloured, unstratified, and loosely cemented by calcium carbonate. Favoured for viticulture because it is porous, permeable, readily warmed and easily penetrated by roots.
Commonly used term for controlled origin and quality designations for wine, often following the example of the French Appellation Contrôlée (AC). They are always based on a geographical definition.
Important commercial centre on the River Saône and capital of the Mâconnais dynamic district of Burgundy which produces considerable quantities of white wine and some red.
French wine term derived from cuve, with many different meanings in different contexts. In general terms it can be used to mean any containerful, or even any lot, of wine.
Sometimes simply as botrytis, is the benevolent form of botrytis bunch rot, in which the Botrytis cinerea fungus attacks ripe, undamaged white wine grapes and, given the right weather, can result in extremely sweet grapes.
