Steve Edmunds
Steve Edmunds
Fun read, thanks! My mouth is watering.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
Tasting in Beaujolais 2010
- Thread starter SFJoe
- Start date
U
Unknown
Guest
originally posted by SFJoe:
The Tardive (a bit of a joke on Beaujolais Nouveau) is one parcel. In 2009 the wine is less aromatically effusive than the regular, but it shows perfect ripeness, intensity, and my notes say, Jesus what a finish. Great richness, balance, lovely acidity, great fine-textured tannic balance and structure. I asked him to bottle some for me in 3L format.
sfjoe - the people's plutocrat.
i guess the least we plebs can do is schlep the jeroboams of muscadet back up the peninsula in your service.
fb.
I am nothing without my loyal retainers.originally posted by fatboy:
originally posted by SFJoe:
The Tardive (a bit of a joke on Beaujolais Nouveau) is one parcel. In 2009 the wine is less aromatically effusive than the regular, but it shows perfect ripeness, intensity, and my notes say, Jesus what a finish. Great richness, balance, lovely acidity, great fine-textured tannic balance and structure. I asked him to bottle some for me in 3L format.
sfjoe - the people's plutocrat.
i guess the least we plebs can do is schlep the jeroboams of muscadet back up the peninsula in your service.
fb.
Joe, Great write up, hated to miss this myself. Now, did they not have the same misery as in Burgundy---pH too high and acidity too low? From the Rhone to the Loire with every place in between, this seems to have been problematic for plenty of people --especially those who waited to pick. Any buzz on that?
It's a good question, alice. The '09s I had in Beaujolais are not as zippy as, say, '07s, but they weren't flabby to my taste. I suppose there are a couple of answers to the question.originally posted by Alice F.:
acidity & pHJoe, Great write up, hated to miss this myself. Now, did they not have the same misery as in Burgundy---pH too high and acidity too low? From the Rhone to the Loire with every place in between, this seems to have been problematic for plenty of people --especially those who waited to pick. Any buzz on that?
Structurally in the wines, it's a ripe vintage for sure, but not OTT in Beaujolais. Nor are the whites in the Loire like '06, say.
But as I tasted through the wider regions, I thought '09 did impose a hardship on the hipster winemakers. The grapes particularly disadvantaged people with very low-SO2 regimes who are not neatniks. Brett likes higher pH, as do other things. I still have a bunch of notes I haven't written up, Noodle knows when I'll get to them. As one example, if you were wary of overextraction and didn't punch down your cap very often, did you wind up with more va from local hot spots and bacteria in the cap? That answer was 'yes' pretty often IME.
But there are plenty of people who made wines clean enough for me to be very, very happy with. Also plenty on the other side.
Did you taste at Baudry, for instance? Woo, woo.
originally posted by Alice F.:
actually didn't taste at Baudry.
I think there are people who did great work --but it is definitely a vintage where experience matters.
John Livingstone-Learmonth is a very reliable guy, and he reportsvery high sugars for some growers in the South, doubtless the late pickers you mention, alice.
"... but in the southern Rhne, some vats have started to take their time, so loaded with sugar have they been. The malolactic fermentations have been remarkably quick to occur this year - the drought and hot summer meant there were low levels of malic acidity, with some "malos" taking place before the primary, alocoholic fermentation had finished - something very rarely experienced."
Our own Brezeme had mentioned this as a vintage in the Rhone where it was possible to pick to very different degrees of ripeness.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
originally posted by Alice F.:
pH too high and acidity too low?
Aren't these synonymous? Or am I missin sumtin...
Ian Fitzsimmons
Ian Fitzsimmons
PH is defined as negative log of acid (hydrogen ion) concentration (activity) in a solution. So 'low-acidity' and 'high-pH' mean exactly the same thing.
It's discussed some here:
I'm still sick and busy both, so don't have time for a long lecture. pH is an important measure for winemaking and bottle stability. Possibly also for aging. But it is less interesting when the wine hits your mouth, because your mouth has acids and bases and it buffers the wine, raising its pH as it swishes around. How much change your mouth makes to the wine (and vice versa) depend on how strongly the wine resists changes in pH, which is another way of describing the buffering capacity of the wine. This is captured imperfectly by the measure of total acidity, and not at all by starting pH. TA omits some complexity by assuming that all the acids in wine are the same, and they're not, as anyone who's tasted a range of Vouvray from 2008 can tell you. But it gets much closer to the organoleptic reality than pH does. pH can be rapidly mutable if your fluid is not well buffered.
It is quite possible to have a wine that is higher in both pH and in TA than another. It's not a fluke, they are different measurements.
Loading…
winedisorder.com
It is quite possible to have a wine that is higher in both pH and in TA than another. It's not a fluke, they are different measurements.
Ian Fitzsimmons
Ian Fitzsimmons
My understanding of a buffering system is that it reduces the rate at which pH changes as hydrogen ions are added to solution, but that pH change still equates to acidity change, in a chemistry sense. But it occurred to me after posting that, when talking about wine, we mostly use the word acidity in a different sense, denoting flavor effects, rather than relative ion concentrations. As you point out there are many variables in the wine solution and its interaction with the human physiological system that may bear on the acidity, in this sense, independently of the solution's pH. Personally, I'd like to understand these chemical elements and interactions better, and so look forward to the lecture, when you get around to delivering it.
There is a link in the other thread to the titration Wiki, which captures the math at least.
Formally and strictly speaking, we are talking about equilibria here, rather than rates. Proton transfers in water are extremely fast, much faster than perception, and are limited by macroscopic mixing.
Ultimate pH in your mouth probably matters a lot in your perception. It's just that mouth pH is probably more influenced by total acid than by wine pH. The variables of the differing acids with their different pKas and so on are very well understood on a chemical level, although it definitely gets more complicated when you pile in all the other things in wine.
I have just resurrected an old Wt post on the currency question, it is now here:
Formally and strictly speaking, we are talking about equilibria here, rather than rates. Proton transfers in water are extremely fast, much faster than perception, and are limited by macroscopic mixing.
Ultimate pH in your mouth probably matters a lot in your perception. It's just that mouth pH is probably more influenced by total acid than by wine pH. The variables of the differing acids with their different pKas and so on are very well understood on a chemical level, although it definitely gets more complicated when you pile in all the other things in wine.
I have just resurrected an old Wt post on the currency question, it is now here:
Loading…
winedisorder.com
Ian Fitzsimmons
Ian Fitzsimmons
I'll try to work through these references after I get done with this week's stats and eco-modeling assignments.
Hope you feel better soon.
Hope you feel better soon.
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
PH is defined as negative log of acid (hydrogen ion) concentration (activity) in a solution. So 'low-acidity' and 'high-pH' mean exactly the same thing.
No. Different acidities have different strengths and different taste impressions. Acidity as measured in the wine world is definitely not the same as pH, though the two obviously have a relationship. Ask any winemaker who's had to deal with high acid low pH wines...
originally posted by Josh Beck:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
PH is defined as negative log of acid (hydrogen ion) concentration (activity) in a solution. So 'low-acidity' and 'high-pH' mean exactly the same thing.
No. Different acidities have different strengths and different taste impressions. Acidity as measured in the wine world is definitely not the same as pH, though the two obviously have a relationship. Ask any winemaker who's had to deal with high acid low pH wines...
I know what you're trying to say, but highly acidic and low pH are synonymous. What you meant, I think, is "high acid, high pH" wines. For the more quantitatively minded, the explanation for this seeming paradox can be found in the Henderson-Hasselbalch equation.
Mark Lipton
Ian Fitzsimmons
Ian Fitzsimmons
originally posted by Josh Beck:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
PH is defined as negative log of acid (hydrogen ion) concentration (activity) in a solution. So 'low-acidity' and 'high-pH' mean exactly the same thing.
No. Different acidities have different strengths and different taste impressions. Acidity as measured in the wine world is definitely not the same as pH, though the two obviously have a relationship. Ask any winemaker who's had to deal with high acid low pH wines...
If you read down a couple of posts farther, you'll have seen that I distinguished between acidity in a technical sense and the meaning this word has in the context of discussing a wine's taste and texture. However, I wouldn't call this a difference in measurement; in the latter case it's more of a qualitative assessment.
Tom Glasgow
Thomas W Glasgow
Futurist!originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
originally posted by Josh Beck:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
PH is defined as negative log of acid (hydrogen ion) concentration (activity) in a solution. So 'low-acidity' and 'high-pH' mean exactly the same thing.
No. Different acidities have different strengths and different taste impressions. Acidity as measured in the wine world is definitely not the same as pH, though the two obviously have a relationship. Ask any winemaker who's had to deal with high acid low pH wines...
If you read down a couple of posts farther, you'll have seen that I distinguished between acidity in a technical sense and the meaning this word has in the context of discussing a wine's taste and texture. However, I wouldn't call this a difference in measurement; in the latter case it's more of a qualitative assessment.
Ian Fitzsimmons
Ian Fitzsimmons
I meant, of course, a couple of posts in the thread past the one Josh quoted.