Sweet or Dry?

Greetings Friend!

Why are "Wine People" so snotty about dry wine?

It’s true, "Wine People" can’t stand it when someone says, “I like sweet wine.” And then they go and winesplain it.

I’ll try not to winesplain.

Briefly, to make wine, grape juice is fermented with yeast. Yeast eats the sugar in the juice and makes alcohol.

99% of the wine in this wine shop has no residual sugar, so it is “dry.” The yeast has eaten all the sugar.

Wine is “Sweet” when there is still left over sugar in the wine. Why and when that happens is a WHOLE nother topic. 

Many times, when one thinks a wine is “Sweet” it’s because it has flavors of things that actually have sugar, like an apple. Or a grape or any kind of fruit that hasn’t had the sugar fermented out of it. Some wines seem chocolatey or caramelly. 

This is one of the great things about wine. It can have flavors or aromas that have absolutely nothing to do with the grapes it’s made from. The taste and smell can bring out sense memories of places or experiences that you’ve had. It can smell like “cat pee” (believe it or not, that’s a good thing) or smell like the rose you gave to your sweetheart. It can taste like river stones or red clay or blueberries or the crème brûlée you had on that special trip.

But really, when you get down to it, the most important thing is to simply enjoy your wine. Let the snobs be snobs.

Be well,
Mike Mraz