Wine is simply the fermented juice of the grape as yeasts turn the natural sugars into alcohol – but we’ve come a long way from the crude liquid our ancestors stumbled upon. For the wine professional, it can become immensely complicated with all kinds of factors coming into play such as soil composition and climate. You may hear these factors referred to as Terrior.

The role of viticulture is to ensure that these factors are taken into consideration, and that the vineyards are properly managed. This includes the management of watering, nutritional ‘feeding’ of the vines, ensuring the leaf canopy is consistent to protect the berries from sunburn and keeping away the bugs that like to eat the berries before they can become the wine we all enjoy.

Fortunately for us, the Australian climate ensures that poor vintages (where fruit does not fully ripen causing hard tannic wines) are extremely rare and the drinkers of Australian wine all benefit as a result with soft, flavoursome wines that continue to provide excellent quality, value and consistency.

Once mother nature and the viticulturists have done their work, the skill of the winemaker then begins.

The skill of the winemaker is crucial to the quality of the wine we all enjoy. The soil, climate and grape type are all important, but in the hands of the wrong winemaker, even great grapes on brilliant soil in a good season can make mediocre wine.

It’s the winemaker who’ll decide when the grapes are best for picking - after tasting them off the vine – and then oversee every aspect of their development. Many Australian wines are also blended from different areas or grape varieties to ensure consistency of style and flavour. Blending is an art of winemaking in itself.

Like tea, grape juice has its own natural tannins (woody flavours that come from the skins, stems and pips) as well as acids that are present in all fruit. These elements all need to be brought into balance. At every stage, from checking the grapes in the vineyard for ripeness and flavour to deciding when the wine is ready for bottling after fermentation, maturation and clarification (as required) the winemaker is the person who says when to do what.

A graphical representation of the process is shown to the left.

Now that you've read the wine making process, learn the art of assessing and evaluating wine using sight, smell and taste in Australian Wine Evaluation and Tasting.

 
Australian Wine topics:

» Australian Wine Growing Regions
» Australian Red Wine Varieties
» Australian White Wine Varieties
» Making Australian Wine
» Australian Wine Evaluation and Tasting
» Serving and Storing Wine
» Matching Australian Wine with Food
» Australian Wine and Health
» Glossary of Australian Wine Terms