The Wine Bible

Tempranillo is usually well structured and well balanced. Its significant amount of tannin allows it to age for long periods, although the wine is generally not as firm on the palate as cabernet sauvignon.

GRANITE A hard, mineral-rich soil that is composed of 40 percent to 60 percent quartz. The soil warms quickly and retains heat well. Thus, granite soils are ideal with acidic grapes like gamay. Granite is found in Beaujolais, as well as in the Cornas region of the northern Rhône Valley.

GREYWACKE Sedimentary soil formed by rivers depositing quartz, mudstone, and feldspar. It is found in vineyards of Germany, New Zealand, and South Africa.

Cabernet sauvignon’s aromas and flavors are well known and easy to indentify: blackberry, black currant, cassis, mint, cedar, graphite, licorice, leather, green tobacco, cigar, black plums, dark chocolate, sandalwood, and so on.

Another concern: Wines that lack acidity do not age well and may be susceptible to spoilage. The vast majority of California and Australian chardonnays, for example, are not candidates for long keeping precisely because of their fairly low acidity. In fact, in warm wine regions where grapes quickly lose their natural acidity, winemakers commonly “a

in making an off-dry wine, fermentation is stopped, usually by giving the wine a small dose of SO2 (sulfur dioxide), which kills the yeasts before they have converted all the sugar to alcohol.

When the grapes are unripe (and it’s a challenge to ripen cabernet franc), the wine has a distinct green bell pepper character—the result of compounds in the wine known as pyrazines. But in warmer years, when sugars are high and pyrazines fall, cabernet franc can be fantastic, with its violet or irislike aromas and minerally, dark chocolaty flavors

NEBBIOLO

TEMPRANILLO