Cellar goodies
- Thread starter Florida Jim
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Florida Jim
Florida Jim
Just so I'm clear here; you're not saying the term "physiological ripeness" is inaccuarate, just its use by certain leftcoast denizens, et al - correct?
Best, Jim
Jonathan Loesberg
Jonathan Loesberg
The English language would be my explanation. The connection is inherent in the meaning of the word ripeness. The question of course is at what point ripeness occurs, not whether it's good that it occurs.
Men endure their going hence even as their coming hither;
Ripeness is all.
Zachary Ross
Zachary Ross
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
My understanding is that there are at least two kinds of grape maturity - sugar and seed - which may or may not coincide. Sometimes sugar maturity - the point where sugar stops accumulating through cellular multiplication and begins to concentrate through water evaporation - is called "technological," while seed maturity - where the seeds, skins and stems become fully ripe - is called "phenolic."
I've seen "physiological" used to mean the first and the second (see http://www.gangofpour.com/putnam/jargon_busting.html and http://www.wineanorak.com/ripeness.htm).
I've read a bit about this because of my (unrequited and almost extinct) interest in Argentinean and Chilean wines. Hot and elevated desert climates like the Andes have proportionately more heat than light compared to traditional European wine-growing regions, so sugar maturity comes faster (earlier) than seed maturity. In Europe, summer days are longer, generating proportionately more light, and the angle of solar incidence is more oblique, generating proportionately less heat. There's a greater chance of both maturities peaking at around the same time, so European growers tend to pick based on Babo sugar levels, when seeds are usually mature enough (not so in 2003, but that is another story).
If hot climate growers (and here perhaps some of California qualifies) pick based on sugar, the tannins would still be green, so they have to wait until the seeds are mature. But, by that point, sugar will have accumulated beyond the traditional European point (technological maturity), generating jammy wines with tons of alcohol that have to be acidified. These wines are what they are not so much because of stylistic preference but because their climate imposes it (and Brewer-Clifton, which I had never heard of before this thread, may be an example). Moral of the story: if you make wine where you shouldn't, you have to develop a public that will like them.
I've seen "physiological" used to mean the first and the second (see http://www.gangofpour.com/putnam/jargon_busting.html and http://www.wineanorak.com/ripeness.htm).
I've read a bit about this because of my (unrequited and almost extinct) interest in Argentinean and Chilean wines. Hot and elevated desert climates like the Andes have proportionately more heat than light compared to traditional European wine-growing regions, so sugar maturity comes faster (earlier) than seed maturity. In Europe, summer days are longer, generating proportionately more light, and the angle of solar incidence is more oblique, generating proportionately less heat. There's a greater chance of both maturities peaking at around the same time, so European growers tend to pick based on Babo sugar levels, when seeds are usually mature enough (not so in 2003, but that is another story).
If hot climate growers (and here perhaps some of California qualifies) pick based on sugar, the tannins would still be green, so they have to wait until the seeds are mature. But, by that point, sugar will have accumulated beyond the traditional European point (technological maturity), generating jammy wines with tons of alcohol that have to be acidified. These wines are what they are not so much because of stylistic preference but because their climate imposes it (and Brewer-Clifton, which I had never heard of before this thread, may be an example). Moral of the story: if you make wine where you shouldn't, you have to develop a public that will like them.
Lou Kessler
Lou Kessler
Jim, some of the right coast denizens are sorely in need of some basic wine making knowledge. If you volunteer for this task remember patience, patience.
Florida Jim
Florida Jim
All things being equal, I agree with your analysis.
However, farming techniques can be the great equalizer, at least to a point.
And as for developing a market, most of the U.S. was raised on soda pop - a ready made market if there ever was one.
Best, Jim
Florida Jim
Florida Jim
I am at grasshopper status - which means I prefer to listen.
Best, Jim
This is the red-herring. Why do seeds need to be brown(or whatever) before you pick? Just to throw in some anecdotal evidence, I've had wine from California, Napa even, with alcohol under 13% and no residual sugar that were perfectly lovely, albeit with some age on them.
The ripe seeds thing might have a grain of truth to it, but it isn't a unique indicator or the sufficient condition.
Phenological ripeness starts after veraison, from there on it's just degrees.
What are green tannin?
Vines cultivated at the wrong latitude is causally related, to be sure (Beaune has a latitude somewhere around Vancouver, for example).
In a recent experience, terroir equates to altitude in Argentina, not to anything in the soil (at least that was what I took from the presentation).
Lou Kessler
Lou Kessler
Knowledgeable rather than just opinionated, but you'll be in the minority.
(apologies to GBS)
Lou Kessler
Lou Kessler
Knowledgeable rather than just opinionated, but you'll be in the minority.
(apologies to GBS)
There's no question that tannin size is related to organoleptic properties, nor that tannin length tends to increase as grape skins and seeds (as with any fruit) get more light and (maybe) heat. Where we are on the same page is that judgment of sufficient tannin "ripeness" will always be a subjective call.
Mark Lipton
Claude Kolm
Claude Kolm
I was using it as a shorthand to compare sugar levels in the grapes at harvest, not endorsing riper as better. In fact, Frdy Mugnier once described one of my favorite vintages in Burgundy, 1993, as a year of phenolic ripeness without physiological ripeness. He contrasted it with 1997, which he described as physiological ripeness without phenolic ripeness.
Florida Jim
Florida Jim
Well then, would you agree that, regardless of sugar levels, flavors must seem ripe (or appropriate to variety, if you prefer) before its a good idea to pick?
Best, Jim
Florida Jim
Florida Jim
FWIW, there is a lot of new data coming from Australia that suggests that the old models we have had about tannin length are simplistic at best and wrong, at worst.
Suffice to say that tannin chemistry is the rabbit hole.
Best, Jim
Well, absent some kind of formal analysis, I guess.
The whole idea of someone tasting grapes and deciding when to harvest is a nice romantic ideal, but maybe grapes that taste good aren't good for making wine.
Australia puts a good bit of money into this kind of research. A lot of good olfaction research is out of Oz.
Florida Jim
Florida Jim
Here is where we will part company.
Use the chemistry, hygrometer or whatever else is available to aid the decision - absolutely - but no one picks a grape for me without me tasting them.
Best, Jim
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
I think that's true, vinifera grapes don't taste very good, or else they'd be used as table grapes, at least sometimes. But when winemakers taste their grapes, they're not looking for them to taste good, they just bite the seeds to see if they are ripe.
The issue of seed maturity would be a red herring if hot climate winemakers had a choice of when to pick, and COULD make wines with European levels of acidity and alcohol. If they really had that choice, then we could, indeed, say that picking later is just a red herring to justify getting the over the top flavors that they know the general coca-cola public craves. But, in many of these climates, the poor geezers simply don't have a choice. If they pick at European levels of sugar maturity, the wines will just taste green and herbaceous - bad to everyone. Between bad to everyone and bad to just us wine geeks, they choose the latter. They have no choice. So they have to pretend that it's on purpose, like Brewer-Clifton did with Aaron.