Do you have any sweet wine?

People in China prefer sweet taste to sour taste. When they first came into contact with dry red wine, it was difficult for them to accept the dry taste. And liqueur (in this paper, it refers to liqueur) has a strong floral fragrance and sweetness, which is really irresistible. When it comes to liqueur, many people will think of expensive rot and iced wine, because these are the two most famous liqueurs. In fact, there are many kinds of liqueur, far more than these two. Today, let's take stock of the world's most classic sweet wine and feast your eyes on the sweet dregs party.

A, sweet wine sugar content division standard

What is the sugar content of wine before it can be called sweet wine? Among them, the criteria for dividing the sugar content of still wine and sparkling wine are not completely consistent, which will be discussed separately below.

1, or wine

According to the sugar content, distilled liquor can be divided into four types: dry type, semi-dry type, semi-sweet type and sweet type, in which the sugar content is more than 45g/L. Generally, distilled liquor can only be called sweet wine if the sugar content exceeds this value.

2, sparkling wine

According to the content of 50g/L, sparkling wine is generally divided into natural sparkling wine, super-grade sparkling wine, dry sparkling wine, semi-dry sparkling wine and sweet sparkling wine, among which sweet sparkling wine refers to.

Second, the main types of sweet wine

There are many kinds of liqueur, but there are three main production types: late ripening, strengthening and sweetening.

1. Post-harvest: Usually, grapes are not harvested and brewed immediately after ripening, but are left for a period of time, and then the grapes are concentrated after losing water. This kind of wine usually includes: late pick wine, noble wine, ice wine and air-dried wine. Different countries have different varieties and brewing methods, so the names of wines will be different. Here are some introductions.

2. Intensification: add grape distilled wine to stop fermentation during fermentation, so that the wine has residual sugar and presents a sweet shape. The fortified liqueurs are mainly sherry, port and madeira.

3. Sweetening: Different from the conventional late harvest, sweet substances such as grape juice concentrate are artificially added during or after fermentation to sweeten the wine.

Third, late-maturing liqueur.

Conventional late picking wine, noble wine, iced wine and air-dried wine all belong to "late harvest".

1, regular late wine picking

In general, natural concentration method is used to pick sweet wine late, that is, grapes are concentrated on vines before picking and brewing. Naturally concentrated grapes accumulate high sugar, so the sweet wine picked late will have a mature fruit flavor (dried fruit, tropical fruit, etc.). ) and rich taste. There are many late-picked wines, the most representative of which are: German late-picked wines (Spatlese and Auslese), Italian late-picked wines (Vendemmia Tradiva), French late-picked wines (Vendage Tardive) and South African late-picked wines (Vin de Constance). 2. Noble wine

Noble wine is a kind of sweet wine infected with expensive rot fungi (a fungus that will wither and concentrate grapes). It can only be brewed under a few special weather conditions: fog is needed to provide certain humidity in the morning to promote the growth and spread of expensive rot fungi; At noon, dry weather is needed to evaporate the water in the grapes and accumulate sugar. On the whole, the aroma of noble wine is mellow, and honey and preserved apricots are mixed with rich floral and fruity aromas, and the taste is rich and full. Balanced acidity makes wine rich but not greasy, with a long aftertaste and strong aging potential. 3. iced wine

Ice wine refers to wine made from grapes that have been naturally frozen (or frosted). Of course, different countries have different definitions of iced wine. According to the definition of China's national standard "Ice Wine" (GB/T 25504-20 10), ice wine refers to: delaying the harvest of grapes, keeping the grapes on the vines for a certain period of time, freezing, harvesting and refrigerating when the temperature is below MINUS 7℃ (the regulation of EU is MINUS 8℃).

Step 4 air-dry wine

Air-dried wine, as its name implies, is made of air-dried grapes. Usually, in the process of air-drying, the water content of grape fruit will decrease and the sugar content will increase, so the wines brewed are very rich in flavor, especially French rice straw wine (Vin de Paille), Italian Passito and Greek wine (Vinsanto). Air-dried wine needs more time and cost in the production process, so the price is generally not cheap.

Fortified liqueur

Fortified wine refers to the wine obtained by adding grape distilled wine, such as brandy, in the brewing process and then strengthening it. After adding alcohol to stop fermentation, if there is residual sugar in the wine, then this wine is called fortified liqueur. Generally, the alcohol content of fortified liqueur is about 16%-20%, which is higher than that of ordinary liqueur. Fortified liqueur is divided into oxidized fortified liqueur and non-oxidized fortified liqueur according to whether it is oxidized or not.

2. Non-oxidized fortified liqueur

(1) wine

Porter wines are mostly non-oxidized fortified sweet wines, such as vintage porter, ruby porter, late vintage porter, hard shell porter, white porter and rose porter.

Bannus natural liqueur: Bannus is located in the southernmost part of languedoc-Roussillon. It consists of four villages with vineyards on steep terraces. Bannas sweet red wine is mainly brewed by Heigouhenna, which is the most exquisite sweet red wine in France, comparable to the top port wine. Banyuls Grand cru is only produced in good years and aged in oak barrels for 30 months, with a long aging capacity. (3) Musk fortified liqueur

Muscat grape is the darling of languedoc-Lu Shirong fortified liqueur. The fortified liqueur includes Rivesaltes Musk Wine, Frontignan Musk Wine, Saint-Jean-de-Minerva Musk Wine, Lunel Musk Wine and Mireval Musk Wine. This musk liqueur is non-oxidizing, very fresh, fruity and delicate, and a little honey gives the wine a unique fullness and depth.