wine

[DDAY JUNE 6]

Nice and easy do wine growers add anything to wine to make it taste, like when you read on a bottle it a hint of gooseberry ect

[winebuyer]

Nope.

Funnily enough, wine never really tastes of grapes.

As the grape vines grow, they take on the characteristics of their environment. In particular, the ground in which they are standing. The vines receive nourishment and water from the soil. It's like if you ate garlic all the time. You would become a bit "garlicky". So the plants, herbs, rocks, water etc in a wine growing area all give some character to the ground itself. Have you ever noticed what some countries smell like when you go there? When you get off the plane at Faro Airport, you can smell Portugal. It's wonderful. But when you've been there a day or two, you no longer notice it.

Environmental characteristics like come through in the vines, the grapes, the wines. The grape is a good fruit for turning into wine, but all the moisture in the grape carries all sorts of flavours with it.

Question is ... what are those tastes???

When you taste it, you think ... what's that? It's quite a crisp flavour? Melon? Lychee? Nope, those are too sweet. Grapefruit? Apple? Nope. Can't place it. No wait, it says gooseberry on the label. Yes, that's it.

The other factor is the grape variety. Different types of grapes develop different flavours in any given conditions. And some grape have particular characters, such as Cabernet Sauvignon. If your wine smells and tastes blackcurranty, there's a good chance it was made with Cabernet Sauvignon grapes.

The extraordinary variety of flavours that you get are part of the joy of wine. And nothing is added.

[winebuyer]

Sorry about the superfluous "like" in para 4 of the last post. I was going to give a few examples. Got distracted and wandered off for a glass of wine.

Mmm, speaking of gooseberry overtones ... !!!