Q: What are tannins and how are they described?
A: The technical answer is that tannins are phenolic (mildly acidic crystalline solid) compounds that are found in red grape skins, seeds and oak barrels (especially new ones). Tannins are essential for long term aging of red wine.
Tannins are often used in tasting notes to describe how they affect the potential of a wine. Hard, dry tannins are often described as astringent: results in that puckering feeling in your mouth. Too much tannins will make the wine unpleasant. Furthermore, hard tannins are typically the result of two factors: unripe grapes and mishandling of the fruit in the winery. While the weather can foil everything, in normal conditions a vintner can ensure ripe fruit with proper vineyard management. In terms of mishandling, overly rough treatment of the fruit can result in the crushing of too many seeds, a primary source of astringent tannins.
Paradoxically, to make wines for long-term aging, firm tannins are extracted from the skins and new oak. It is important for these long-term aging wines to have ample concentration of fruit to match these "integrated" tannins and to enable the wine to evolve as the tannins soften.
Soft, round and even sweet are adjectives used to describe tannins in wines that are ready for drinking or short term aging. In summary, tannins are very important to the development, structure, balance and weight of red wines.
Q: What does the size of the bubbles tell you about a sparkling wine? Is it associated with price?
A: There are three basic ways to make a wine "sparkle".
The first: simple carbonation of a still wine, results in large, short-lived bubbles and wines of little or no distinction. The second: the Charmat process, involves a secondary fermentation in a closed tank, trapping the resultant carbon dioxide gas in the wine, resulting in medium sized bubbles that are quite persistent. Henkell Trocken (Germany) and Veuve de Vernay (France) are good examples of the kind of quality that can be achieved by this method. The third method involves secondary fermentation within the bottle itself. This is the way traditional Champagne is made. It is a painstaking and expensive process that results in tiny, very long lasting bubbles and it is easy to see why the French so jealously guard the name Champagne. Try some Pol Roger White Foil Brut or Louis Roederer Brut Premier to taste the difference.
The million dollar question is whether or not the tiny bubbles are always indicative of price? The answer is: not necessarily. There are many producers of sparkling wine who use the same methode champenoise to make their sparkling wines. The lovely Cavas from Spain have the kind of bubbles that hint of quality and, in fact, these wines are usually good value. Also, California, Australia and British Columbia (try Sumac Ridge and Hawthorne Mountain) are producing good quality sparkling wines. As a general rule, however, the finer the bubbles, the higher the price.
Q: What is the proper way to open a bottle of champagne?
A. Champagne (and all other quality sparkling wines) have three atmospheres of pressure pushing on the cork. Due to this, there are some simple steps to follow to ensure no wasting of wine and safety.
- Remove the foil from a properly chilled (7° C) bottle of sparkling wine or Champagne.
- Pointing the bottle in a safe direction and keeping a thumb firmly on the cork, remove the foil. You may anchor the bottom of the bottle against your body for leverage.
- Keeping your thumb in place, remove the cage. (Covering the cork with a towel at this step is optional.)
- Holding the cork with one hand and the bottle the other, slowly turn the bottle until the cork eases out with a slight or gentle poof.
