Is the new trend low-alcohol wines? This is what many producers believe in New Zealand. And a great deal of effort is now made to produce sauvignon blanc wines with alcohol contents of around 10%. Concours Mondial du Sauvignon (which is organised by the big Concours Mondial de Bruxelles) reports on the latest research.
The good thing with this project is that they make the low alcohol wines in a completely natural way, i.e. without dealcoholizing the wines. With canopy management, finding the right locations to plant the vines and using special yeast strains, they can ensure that the finished wines, although completely dry, have alcohol contents of only between 9 and 10%. The quality must not suffer. The consumer must still feel that they are drinking a sauvignon blanc from Marlborough.
Researchers have now discovered that the degree of sugar accumulation in the grapes can be adjusted by removing leaves from the vines at specific times. And this without affecting the taste or the phenolic maturity. This is very interesting indeed. It should be useful research also for other regions.
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Travel: Go on a wine tour to New Zealand.
