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.
French term for punching down, the winemaking operation of breaking up and submerging the cap of skins and other solids during red wine fermentation to stop the cap from drying out.
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.
Before concrete, stainless steel, and other inert materials replaced wood as the most common material for wine fermentation vessels and storage containers in the 1960s, each wine region had ist own legion of barrel types. Even today such terms as feuillette, tonneau, and fudre may be used to measure volumes of wine long after the actual containers themselves have been abandoned.
Long, loosely defined strip of tuskan coastline south of Livorno extending southwards through the province of Grosseto. Production of bottled wine is consequently a recent phenomenon and quality wine can be said to date from the first bottles of Sassicaia in the 1970s, although the zone of Morellino di Scansano, enjoyed a certain reputation in the past.
Is French for "old vines". The term is used widely on wine labels-as is vinhas velhas (Portugal), alte Reben (Germany)-in the hope that potential buyers are aware that wine quality is often associated with senior vine age.
Red-brown loam or clay directly over well-drained limestone found typically in regions with a mediterranean climate. Such soils are found in southern Europe, North Africa and parts of Australia.
German term for sweet reserve, the unfermented or part-fermented must much used in the 1970s and 1980s to sweeten all but the finest or driest German wines.
