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Temperature of red wine

I have been drinking a 2006 Regent( a European hybrid developed for early ripening in cool climates ) red wine recently and have been amazed at the difference temperature makes.My mini vineyard is in Herefordshire,in southern England,and whereas I have been making some excellent dry white wines(as judged by others),I am new to red wine making.

The year 2006 was very good in England,with all grapes ripening very well,and earlier than usual.I fermented the grapes on the skins and with the grapes natural yeast,and achieved full fermentation after 2 to 3 weeks-the grapes were pressed after 6 days maceration.The wine was matured in gallon glass demijohns for three years,and bottled recently.I tried the wine in my cool pantry (it has been pretty cold in England this winter),and was a little disappointed.It had a very nice fruity nose but seemed a little tannic.We compared it with a commercial Australian Cabernet ,and was not convinced that mine was that much inferior.We decided to serve it to our friends at a dinner party,as English red wine made from English grapes is quite unusual.

The surprise came when I warmed up the wine to about 65For room temperature.The wine had lost its tannic nature and was very good,with absolutely no comparison to drinking the wine at 50F.I am well aware that red wine should be drunk at room temperature,but had no idea that its character should change so much;it makes it difficult to assess wine being stored in a cooler place. I would welcome comments Michael

Reply to
michael
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Yes indeed. Red wine will taste different at the temperature ranges you mentioned. I belive most people will find that red wines in the 50 - 55 temperature range taste better to them for red wines. I am not sure how temperature relates to taste of tannins but even with whites, the cooler the temperature, the more acidic the wine will taste and the more "fruity".

"Room Temperature" has a different meaning today than it did in the old days without the modern heating systems we have today. Try some of your whites at different temperatures and see if you can tell the difference also.

Reply to
Paul E. Lehmann
Reply to
Paul E. Lehmann

Try this:

Next time you open a bottle, pour out a glass and drink it and save the rest in the opened bottle until the next day. Test to see how the remaining wine in the bottle taste the next day - or two days. If it is a lot better taste to you, then your wine will improve with age - it just needs more time.

Have you checked out the site:

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There are a LOT of us there and it is very active with a lot of good topics and opinions. I am known as PEL on the site. You can also post pictures which sometimes help a lot in the conversations. They have been having problems with their server but it has been fairly stable recently.

Paul

Reply to
Paul E. Lehmann

,

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Here is some information I have found:

The California Wine Institute proposes an upper limit of 175 ppm for reds and 225 ppm for whites

The FDA allows up to 350 ppm

I believe they are referring to Total SO2

From what I have read, depending on pH of course, up to about 60 - 70 ppm, about half will be bound. Beyond that the bound becomes less - maybe about a third or less will become bound.

Reply to
Paul E. Lehmann

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