Wine Making Terms Part 3

Wine Making Terms Part 3

 Welcome to Vine to Wine this is your host Linda Moran. The past few days we have explored terms used to describe the wine making.  Today we will continue by identifying some of the different types of acids which make up wine.

Every field of study seems to have its’ own vocabulary, and the wine industry is no different. When it comes to all of the different acids in wine it can be confusing. But today I will attempt to explain at least a few of them. I have often told you about wine diamonds these are the result of tartaric acids, which occur naturally, it solidifies and begins crystallizing in the bottle into tartrate crystals. This can be prohibited by chilling the wine way done before it is bottled. This process is termed cold stabilization.  Another term used to describe a characteristic of wine resulting from acid is volatile acidity. This comes from an over abundance of acetic acid which smells like acetone or nail polish remover. As you can imagine this is not a desirable characteristic in wine. Malic acid is an acid we hear most about for being converted to lactic acid as in malolactic fermentation. Malic acid is a crisp green acid much like that in a granny smith apple. It is attractive in many white wines, but not so much in reds. When it doesn’t work for the wine profile the malic acid is then converted to the softer lactic acid. Remember to send your wine questions to Linda at ag info dot net and thanks for joining me on today’s Vine to Wine.

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