Muscat Question

There are several varieties of the Muscat grape grown around the world that can be made in styles from dry to very sweet and from low alcohol to fortified. So you might like to experiment. I have a few bottles of Quady Muscats, and they all give 15% alcohol on the label. Quady is located at San Joaquin in Madera California. I don't know exacty where the vineyards are located for the Muscat grapes they use. However that area is plenty hot to allow very ripe grapes that can produce very full wines.

Elysium is made from the black muscat grape. Quady also makes Essencia from the "orange blossom" muscat and Electra. You might try these other two to see if you like them better. They are consideraby different in taste. Also the wine you had was quite young. It is possible that it might become more smooth with a little more age. Some Muscats are ready soon and then decline fairly fast. Others have been known to last well over 100 years.

Most wine growing countries produce Muscats. Portugal and Italy have some that are famous. You will even find some Muscats made into a light sparkling wine, especially from Italy. Most of these Muscats are not very expensive, so go to a store, ask someone there what Muscats they have, and try a few. If the store is not helpful, try another one. The spelling of Muscat will of course vary for different languages, but it often is close enough to English to understand - Moscato, Moscatel, etc.

Reply to snipped-for-privacy@cwdjr.net .

I've had this wine recently and I don't remember it being so hot, that being said it should be a fortified wine at 15% alc- the type of brandy used to stop fermentation can vary widely. Unaged brandy can taste more hot than aged brandy, and if the wine is too light in body or flavor it wont mask the alc flavor too well. You might have the same impression of other fortified muscats, try some and see.

I bought a Powers 2004 Muscat Canelli the other day (Columbia Valley Washington) , the alcohol content is 12%. It's very light and fruity (apples). I can see how something ike this would be similar to a sparkling wine flavor. I tried the Essencia a few years ago because I do like sweeter wines...it's strength put me off too. I think it got some good reviews though from some places. ::shrug::

Melinda

Try looking for Moscato D'asti, from various producers- they are usually around 5-7% alc and very fruity.

I wouldn't guess that it should have been so HOT that all caps were required!

I can suggest a couple of Austrian wines from the Muscat-Ottonel grape, which is in the Muscat family:

Velich Muscat-Ottonel Beerenauslese 2001. This dessert wine (115 g/l residual sugar) has 14.5% alcohol, but I would never describe it as being hot. I dug up this review of the wine from Wine Enthusiast magazine, which gave it 93 points & made it an "Editors Choice": Rich and viscous in the mouth, this is a sweet wine with some intriguing notes. Hints of thyme join orange marmalade scents on the nose, while the flavors bring in nuances of chocolate and herbs. Lasts a long time on the finish.

Feiler-Artinger does a Spatlese with 50 g/l residual sugar, which is part of their Quartet wines. This is off-dry, not dessert, with 12% alcohol & it comes in a 750 ml bottle. Again, I wouldn't describe it as hot, but this one certainly drinks more like a "regular wine" than a half-bottle of sticky.

e.

in article snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3255.bay.webtv.net, kenneth mccoy at snipped-for-privacy@webtv.net wrote on 3/8/05 9:16 AM:

My thought exactly. Our favorite is "Nivole" from Michele Chiarlo, an Italian producer. It's 100% Muscato Bianco. Around US$9 for 375ml, here in California. Very light, fruity and refreshing. Maybe too refreshing ;o).

I do have a question though, about it's alcohol content, for anyone who might be knowledgeable of labeling. The fact sheet for Nivole says "MINIMUM ALCOHOL: potential 12%; developed 5.5%". What does that mean exactly? That same fact sheet says the fermentation is stopped at 5.5% by "a sterile filtration which removes any remaining live yeasts". If the wine in the bottle is 5.5% alcohol, why do they reference the "potential" number???

This might be something of an oversimplification, but essentially "potential alcohol" refers to the amount of sugar in the grapes. It's the amount of alcohol you would get if all that sugar were to be fermented into alcohol. To make a sweet wine, some of that sugar is left unfermented, so the actual alcohol is lower than the potential.

At one time BATF, the folks who gave us WACO, had a minimum alcohol level of

5%; which meant that if you had a wine with less than 5% alcohol, they'd not approve the wine. Technically it was no longer wine and was treated as a food product. There were several moscato producers whose wine challenged this parameter. If for some reason US customs seized or inspected the container and found that the wine was more than 1% over or under what it said on the BATF approved label or under 5%, action would be taken against the importer.

Is this still happening? I always advised putting at least 7% on the label to avoid inspection problems.

I remember at least one wine- a Hungarian Eszencia that claimed only 3% alc, that I almost purchased in S.F. about 6 years ago. At $250 U.S. it would have been my most expensive wine ever.

I just did a google search for another wine I almost bought, it was a Zind-Humbrecht pinot gris Clos Jebsal s.g.n. Trie Speciale 1994- this one is listed at only 4% alc. I should have paid the $250 when I had the chance.