You know the deal; the more some folks learn about a topic, the more shortcuts/slang/acronyms/initials/technical jargon can be tossed around.  I’m here to help you understand those sometimes mysterious words and phrases, thus – Wine Words Demystified!

This week’s word/phrase is Fermentation

According to Karen MacNeil‘s The Wine Bible:

 The process during grape fermentation whereby yeasts convert the natural sugar in the grapes to ALCOHOL and CARBON DIOXIDE.  The alcohol will remain a constituent  of the wine that results, but in most cases the carbon dioxide will be allowed to escape as a by-product. 

In other words, it’s how grapes juice gets turned into wine. Essentially yeast, either naturally occurring in the vineyards and the grapes themselves, or cultured yeasts, interact with the sugars present in the grape juice and consume the sugar.  The byproduct of that consumption is ethyl alcohol and carbon dioxide.

Yeast are naturally little suicide organisms, and will gorge themselves on sugar until they die.  If the yeast consumes virtually all of the sugar, the result will be a dry wine.  On the other hand, if a sweeter wine (more residual sugar) is desired, the winemaker may elect to stop fermentation by either adding more alcohol to kill off the yeast (e.g. dessert wines like Port, or Madeira), or adding certain chemicals to the fermenting wine.

Still wines undergo one fermentation, while some sparkling wines, including Champagne, and others undergo a secondary fermentation.

Related articles

• Wine Words Demystified: Autolysis (enofylzwineblog.com)
• Wine Words Demystified: Malolactic Fermentation (enofylzwineblog.com)