How Is Sparkling Wine Made?
How to tell apart sparkling wine from a regular one? Are there bubbles in it after opening it? If yes, that’s sparkling! Different regions and countries use slightly different grape varieties and techniques to make sparkling wines. Here we explain a few standard sparkling wine production methods,
What types of grapes are used to manufacture sparkling wine?
Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier, and Chardonnay are the three most popular grapes used to make conventional sparkling wines (including Champagne). Semillon, Chenin Blanc, Riesling, Crouched, Trebbia, and Muscat Gordo Blanco are other white grapes that can be used.
Why do we combine the red grapes Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier to create white sparkling wine? Well, using different types of grapes helps achieve richness and harmony of flavors. In addition, the wine doesn’t change color from its original clear state because just the grape juice is used (the skins are swiftly discarded before fermentation). Therefore, although most white wines use white grapes, a large percentage are made from red grapes.
Sparkling red wines from Australia are world-famous, particularly those made from Shiraz grapes and Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Durif.
The process of making sparkling wine:
Creating sparkling wine requires more involvement than making still wine since it requires two fermentations.
The most exciting aspect of sparkling wine is that the bottle contents do not reflect the final product. Carbonation, as well as many of the wine’s flavors and textures, develop after bottling. Therefore, a great deal of intrigue is involved.
It all begins with picking the perfect grapes in the vineyard. Next, winemakers use a gentle pressing process to preserve the red grapes’ color and tannins. After fermenting the juice into dry base wine, it is blended with other wines to create a final sparkling wine blend known as a “cuvee.” Different methods of wine finishing provide distinctive flavors and aromas after the cuvee has been produced. A few of Australia’s preferred techniques are detailed below.
- Traditional method
As the most widely used technique, it must be used for all Champagne production. However, it is also the most convoluted. Making a cuvee is the first step (the blended base wine). The second is the fermentation of the wine in the bottles after adding sugar and yeast. Typically, this procedure takes around 4-6 weeks. The bubbles inside the bottle are caused by the carbon dioxide that has been trapped inside.
A minimum of nine months, and frequently several years, are required for the wines to age with the ‘lees’ (the dead yeast cells following fermentation), which builds structure and flavor. Bottles are ‘riddled,’ or turned upside down, to allow lees to settle in the bottleneck. It is then submerged in a freezing liquid to freeze the lees. The process of disgorging involves releasing the frozen lees plug by removing the cap. Machines often perform riddling and disgorging now.
Last but not least, the bottles are filled with a wine and sugar mixture before being corked, wired, and labeled.
- Transfer method
Following the second fermentation and lees aging, the wine is transferred from the bottle to a tank. Then, the liquid is filtered in large vats when the yeast is gone and rebottled. This technique is used to make several famous sparkling wines in Australia since it is less labor-intensive while yielding excellent results.
- Tank method
It is a common practice that is often less expensive. It’s the key process in producing Prosecco and other light, fruity sparkling wines. It is similar to wines produced in bottles, but the wine is transferred to a tank when the first fermentation is complete.
When the winemaker wants to add bubbles, they start the second fermentation by adding sugar and yeast and then sealing the tank to trap the carbon dioxide. After the wine has been filtered and bottled, it is not aged.
- Additional Methods of Sparkling Wine Production
No matter which method or style it is made by, Australian sparkling wine is always delicious and in demand. There are alternative methods for manufacturing sparkling wine, but they’re not widely used. Such methods include secondary bottle fermentation; the transfer method involves emptying the bottles into a pressurized tank, filtering the wine, and rebottling it. Standard carbonation, in which CO2 is added to a still wine before bottling, is used only to make inexpensive sparkling wines.
How to serve sparkling wine?
Sparkling shiraz should be served between 6 and 8 degrees when you’re ready to pop the cork and toast to the good times. Then, you can chill the bottle in an ice bucket filled up to three-quarters with water and ice. The water is crucial because it acts as a heat conductor, allowing the ice to melt as the wine bottle cools.
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