We often hear comments from people that the alcohol content of today’s wines is much higher than it used to be.
Today, there are techniques that can reduce the alcohol content of a wine or remove the alcohol all together. This means that a wine with a natural alcohol of 14.5 or 15% could have this level reduced to, say 12-13%. This is not something that is done a lot in France today. But in the UK, the US and in Australia they use these techniques more and more. One example is Jacob’s Creek Lighter Alcohol at 11%.
Membrane techniques such as electro dialysis and reverse osmosis are used to reduce the alcohol and in the US they also use a so called spinning cone. Another possibility is to use a yeast that consumes more sugar than normal for each alcohol percentage it produces.
But is an alcohol level of 14-15 % really a problem if the wine is balanced? Read more: mon-viti.com.
