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| The Bartles & James uys - Dick Maugg (left) & Dave Rufkahr |
Well folks Christmas and New Years are now over and it's time to start off a new year. For many of us that means
working on some changes that we think will benefit us and / or our
families. This is a time when we all have hopes for a better future. From The Desert Wine Guy Family to yours we wish you good luck
in whatever changes or ventures you decide to undertake this year. As for The
Desert Wine Guy, this year I am going to attempt to start a YouTube wine
review series on my current YouTube channel (
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgCUb3w1n2S_UGU2yYRkFYQ/videos). I haven't quite decided on how I will format it but that is in the works. I also plan this year to get into some form of sales of wine accessories. Although I do have an Etsy page (
https://www.etsy.com/shop/Desertwineguy) currently I plan to pick it up a little, so to speak. I think that that should occupy my year and if I can get those thing started and moving along I will be happy.
To start off this year I want to talk about those over the top, overly sweet wines. I don't know about you but I am getting kind of tired of those very "fruit forward", overly sweet wines that attempt to (for instance) pass themselves off as the king of the Red grape, Cabernet Sauvignon. It seems that there are so very many of these reds floating around and from every vineyard and winery at that.
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| Common Table Sugar |
To begin with let me clarify something. The wines that I am definitely NOT
referring to are the reds that are slightly on the sweeter side or
"jammy" but are complimented by the other notes in the wine. These wines
are fine and I have no problem with them. Sometimes a little sweetness
just adds to the complexity of a red wine and further enhances it. As I
said, these are not the Cabernet Sauvignons that I am referring to. I am
talking about the Cabernet's that are sugar dominate or "sugar bombs"
as I have begun calling them. If you check the wines that I have
reviewed on this blog you will see that I actually prefer a slightly
sweet or fruit forward wine. As I said, if they are combined with other
notes that are at similar levels they are fine. To me they can even in
some cases reach the 90 point rating on The Desert Wine Guy Rating
Scale. While this is outstanding in itself they very seldom reach beyond
that although there are a couple that have provided they had near
matching of the jammy level as compared to other notes in the wine. I
grew up with religious ceremony with wines such as Manischewitz and
Mogan David were the norm and I don't need so called Cabernet Sauvignons
that attempt to lower themselves to that status. If I want a sweet wine
there is always the good old Bartles & James to reach for and when I
am in the mood I do indeed reach for them. I don't even like a Riesling
that is over the top with sweetness. Why or how do varietals that
should not be sweet end up sweet? Lets take a look.
One of the aspects of a sweet wine that I want to briefly discuss is something is called Residual Sugar. What is Residual Sugar? Residual Sugar typically refers to the sugar remaining after
fermentation stops, or is stopped. It can also result from the
addition of unfermented must. Residual Sugar is measured in grams per Liter (g/l) of wine. Any wine that is 45 g/l is considered sweet. Sugar is need in wine in order to feed the Yeast needed for wine. Residual Sugar sometimes happens simply because common table sugar is added in inexpensive wines. The sweetness taste in a wine can also be from the level of acidity or Alcohol levels in the wine. Sometimes what our Palette detects as sweetness is because of what our other sense (that of smell) detects. There are all kinds of formulas that can show you how this sugar to wine ration is figured out but I won't bore you with all that stuff. There are varietals of wine that I DO expect to be on the sweeter side such as a Port, Moscato or an Asti Spumante and when you purposely go out and buy those wines you are expecting a much higher level of sweetness than should you buy a Brut or a Cabernet Sauvignon. To me here lyes the issue that I have with a sweet wine. When I do go buy a Cabernet Sauvignon or a Merlot I do not expect to taste a sugary wine that tastes like sugar mixed with fruit juice. I expect to taste what the varietal is supposed to be famous for, what makes it (in this case) a Cabernet Sauvignon, the king of Red wine. I expect to taste Black currant, Tobacco, Licorice, Oak, Black cherry. It would be nice if there were also some Tannins but if the wine is meant to be drank in a relativity near future (same 2-3 years) I can forgive the lack of them being present. BUT when I taste a Cabernet Sauvignon or a Merlot and I taste a heavy, sweet fruity sugar that dominates or over powers the other notes of this great varietal.... I get upset. To me and I think to others, there are certain varietals of wine that are simply not meant to be sweet and others that are meant to be sweet....period.
So there you have it folks, let's go ahead and finish this up. I must
admit something to you guys at this point. Believe it or not this
article didn't start off as my Thesis on sweet, sugary tasting wines.
This article actually started off as a review of the 2013 Dominican Oaks
Cabernet Sauvignon and kind of morphed into what you just read. A
little over half way thru writing this I realized that I had hardly
mentioned the actual wine I was supposed to be writing about so I erased
the little that I had on it and kept the rest of the article and simply
carried on with with what I was ranting about. I guess you could say
that I was led or inspired by the wine gods to write this piece. When
all was said and done I was happy that I deviated from the original
topic.
The Desert Wine Guy
www.desertwineguy.blogspot.com/
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https://twitter.com/DesertWineGuyLV
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgCUb3w1n2S_UGU2yYRkFYQ/videos
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