French word for various systems of pumping over. In winemaking terms it is the pumping of the liquid in the fermentation tank over the cap of skins and solids during the red wine fermentation.
French for "white of whites", may justifiably be used to describe white wines made from pale-skinned grapes. As the great majority of them are. A real significance only when used for white sparkling wines.
The higher, southern part of the Médoc district of Bordeaux which includes the world-famous communes of Margaux, Pauillac, St-Estèphe and St-Julien, as well as the less glamorous ones of Listrac and Moulis.
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.
Is used in much the same way as the word cave in French, for any sort of wine-producing premises wheather above or below ground. A German wine specifying a Keller rather than a Weingut on the label is usually the produce of a merchant rather than an estate. In Alto Adige, the Italian Tyrol, Kellereigenossenschaft is a common name for one of the many wine co-operatives.
The connection of two pieces of living plant tissue so that they unite and grow as one plant, has been a particularly important element in growing vines since the end of the 19th century.
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.
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.
Prosperous village in Burgundy producing the most powerful red wines of the Côte de Beaune district of the côte d'Or, from the usual Pinot Noir grapes.
Very large group of highly reactive chemical compounds of which phenol is the basic building block. These include many natural colour pigments such as the anthocyanins of fruit and dark-skinned grapes, most natural vegetable tannins such as occur in grapes, and many flavour compounds.
The practice of adding spirits, usually grape spirit, to wine to ensure microbiological stability, thereby adding alcoholic strength and precluding any further fermentation.
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.
Distinctive category of north-east Italian dried-grape wines, a historic speciality of Veneto. The most common forms of Recioto are sweet red Recioto della Valpolicella and the rare sweet white Recioto di Soave and Recioto di Gambellara.
