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42-472: Vintage: The Story of Wine , a book authored by British wine writer Hugh Johnson , presents several methods that have been used throughout history to sweeten wine. The most common way was to harvest the grapes as late as possible. This method was advocated by Virgil and Martial in Roman times. In contrast, the ancient Greeks would harvest the grapes early, to preserve some of their acidity, and then leave them in

84-578: A 1540 Steinwein from the German vineyard Würzburger Stein , is considered one of the oldest to have ever been tasted. He is also a keen gardener, who has written books and columns on gardening for many years. He was born the son of Guy F. Johnson CBE and Grace Kittel, educated at Rugby School and read English at King's College, Cambridge . Johnson became a member of the Cambridge University Wine and Food Society while an undergraduate in

126-408: A different composition of sugars in the wine in comparison to residual sugar from arrested fermentation. Grape must contains mainly the sugars glucose and fructose . When wine ferments, glucose is fermented at a faster rate than fructose. Thus, arresting fermentation after a significant portion of the sugars have fermented results in a wine where the residual sugar consists mainly of fructose, while

168-559: A high level of residual sugar, which is carefully balanced with additional acidity to produce a harmonious result. Süssreserve ( German : Süßreserve ; lit.   ' sweet reserve ' ) is a wine term referring to a portion of selected unfermented grape must , free of microorganisms, to be added to wine as a sweetening component. This technique was developed in Germany and is used with German-style wines such as semi-sweet Riesling or Müller–Thurgau . The technique not only raises

210-422: A minimum maturation period of 60 days, a group of expert technicians will test the resulting product analytically as well as organoleptically (via taste, aroma, the palette and other senses). This term is also used by meadmakers for the unfermented honey-water mixture that becomes mead . The analogous term in beer brewing is wort . In ancient Greece, must condensed by boiling was called siraion (σίραιον) and

252-419: A quantity of water equivalent to the juice removed, letting the mixture sit for 24 hours, and draining off the liquid. This wine may be used as a drink for the employees of the winemaker or as a basis for some pomace brandies . Grappa , however, must by law be produced only from the pomace solids, with no water added. The must is also an essential ingredient for the production of traditional balsamic vinegar ,

294-589: A small town in Baltimore County, Maryland. Must Must (from the Latin vinum mustum ; lit.   ' young wine ' ) is freshly crushed fruit juice (usually grape juice ) that contains the skins, seeds, and stems of the fruit. The solid portion of the must is called pomace and typically makes up 7–23% of the total weight of the must. Making must is the first step in winemaking. Because of its high glucose content, typically between 10 and 15%, must

336-464: A wine will taste is residual sugar. It is usually measured in grams of sugar per litre of wine, often abbreviated to g/L or g/L. Residual sugar typically refers to the sugar remaining after fermentation stops, or is stopped, but it can also result from the addition of unfermented must (a technique practiced in Germany and known as Süssreserve ) or ordinary table sugar. Even among the driest wines, it

378-415: Is also used as a sweetener in a variety of cuisines. Unlike commercially sold grape juice, which is filtered and pasteurized, must is thick with particulate matter, opaque, and comes in various shades of brown and purple. The length of time the pomace stays in the juice is critical for the final character of the wine. When the winemaker judges the time to be right, the juice is drained off the pomace, which

420-419: Is made by late harvesting grapes after they have frozen on the vine and not necessarily affected by noble rot, botrytis, which is the case with Beerenauslese) Trockenbeerenauslese – 150–154 °Oe (affected by botrytis) In Hungary, Tokaj wine region (also Tokaj-Hegyalja wine region or Tokaj–Hegyalja ) has a more graduated terminology to describe Tokaji Aszú dessert wines: In Spain, the rules applicable to

462-458: Is quoted in Thomas Aquinas 's Summa Theologica as having declared that in case of necessity, but only then, juice pressed from a grape could be used. Aquinas himself declared that it is forbidden to offer fresh must in the chalice, because this is unbecoming owing to the impurity of the must; but he added that in case of necessity it may be done. Aquinas himself declared: Must has already

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504-456: Is rare to find wines with a level of less than 1 g/L, due to the unfermentability of certain types of sugars, such as pentose . By contrast, any wine with over 45 g/L would be considered sweet, though many of the great sweet wines have levels much higher than this. For example, the great vintages of Château d'Yquem contain between 100 and 150 g/L of residual sugar. The sweetest form of the Tokaji ,

546-572: Is said by the same Pope Julius, in the passage quoted in the argument: "If necessary, let the grape be pressed into the chalice." The latest document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on the matter, issued on 24 July 2003, gave the following norms, which simplify those previously in force: The ordinary is competent to give permission for an individual priest or layperson to use mustum for

588-409: Is then pressed to extract the juice retained by the matrix. Yeast is added to the juice to begin the fermentation, while the pomace is often returned to the vineyard or orchard for use as fertilizer . A portion of selected unfermented must may be kept as Süssreserve , to be added as a sweetening component before bottling. Some winemakers create a second batch of wine from the used pomace by adding

630-570: Is used in Greek, other Balkan countries, French and Middle Eastern cookery as a syrup known as petimezi, pekmez or dibis . In Greece, petimezi is a basic ingredient for a must-custard known as moustalevria , and a sweet-meal known as soutzoukos , churchkhela . The Moustokoúloura or "must cookies" are also popular Greek cookies, which are based on a sweet dough made by kneading flour, olive oil, spice, and must. They are made in various shapes and sizes, and they are dark brown in color because of

672-561: The Normalizovaný Moštoměr (°NM) scale is used. The scale measures kg of sugar in 100 L of must. In France, the Baumé scale is occasionally used. Sélection de Grains Nobles (SGN) is French for "selection of noble berries" and refers to wines made from grapes affected by noble rot . SGN wines are sweet dessert wines with rich, concentrated flavours. Alsace wines were the first to be described as Sélection de Grains Nobles , with

714-475: The acidity and alcohol levels, the amount of tannin present, and whether the wine is sparkling or not. A sweet wine such as a Vouvray can actually taste dry due to the high level of acidity. A dry wine can taste sweet if the alcohol level is elevated. Medium and sweet wines have a perception among many consumers of being of lower quality than dry wines. However, many of the world's great wines, such as those from Sauternes (including Barsac ) or Tokaj , have

756-542: The amphorae in cold water till winter. Wine can also be sweetened by the addition of sugar in some form, after fermentation is completed – the German method like the Süssreserve . In Roman times, this was done in preparing mulsum , wine freshly sweetened with honey and flavored with spices, used as an apéritif, and also in the manufacture of conditum , which had similar ingredients but was matured and stored before drinking. It

798-513: The 1950s. On describing his introduction to wine-tasting Johnson has recalled: ...my room-mate Adrian Cowell, committee member of the University Wine & Food Society came in after dinner with two glasses and said, "Come on, Hugh, are they the same? Or different?" Both were, I am sure, red Burgundy, but one was magic and one was ordinary. This caught my imagination. It was my Damascene moment . Johnson has been writing about wine since 1960,

840-484: The Eszencia, contains over 450 g/L, with exceptional vintages registering 900 g/L. Such wines are balanced, keeping them from becoming cloyingly sweet, by carefully developed use of acidity . This means that the finest sweet wines are made with grape varieties that keep their acidity even at very high ripeness levels , such as Riesling and Chenin blanc . How sweet a wine will taste is also controlled by factors such as

882-583: The Klosterneuburger Mostwaage (KMW) scale is used. The scale is divided into Klosterneuburger Zuckergrade (°KMW), and very similar to the Oechsle scale (1 °KMW =~ 5 °Oe). However, the KMW measures the exact sugar content of the must. In Canada, the wine industry measures wine sweetness as grams of sucrose in 100 grams of grape juice or grape must at 20 °C in degrees Brix . In Czech Republic and Slovakia,

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924-849: The Shade (2021). He was selected Decanter Man of the Year in 1995, and was promoted Officer in the French Order Nationale du Mérite in 2004 and Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2007 "for services to wine-making and horticulture". He was awarded the Veitch Memorial Medal of the Royal Horticultural Society in 2000. Johnson is known as one of the wine world's most vocal opponents to awarding numerical scores to wine. In

966-557: The autobiography A Life Uncorked , he also expressed regret over the wine critic Robert Parker 's influence on the world of wine, which has in his view moved winemaking in many regions towards a more uniform, bigger and richer style. In 2005 Johnson stated, "Imperial hegemony lives in Washington and the dictator of taste in Baltimore". a.   Robert Parker resides in Monkton,

1008-500: The benefit of a priest or lay person who should not, usually because of alcoholism , ingest wine; but in normal circumstances it may not be used in place of wine. Official Catholic documents define must ( mustum in Latin ) precisely as "grape juice that is either fresh or preserved by methods that suspend its fermentation without altering its nature (for example, freezing)", and it excludes pasteurized grape juice. This teaching goes back at least to Pope Julius I (337–352), who

1050-462: The celebration of the Eucharist. Permission can be granted habitually, for as long as the situation that occasioned the granting of permission continues (e.g., the priest is an alcoholic). When the principal celebrant at a concelebration has permission to use mustum, a chalice of normal wine is to be prepared for the concelebrants. Given the centrality of the celebration of the Eucharist in the life of

1092-581: The journal of the Royal Horticultural Society ( The Garden ) and its columnist, "Tradescant". "Trad's Diary", now in its 44th year, appears online and in Hortus magazine. In 1979 he published The Principles of Gardening and in 2010 a new rewritten edition of Trees . "Trad's Diary" has been anthologised three times, as Hugh Johnson on Gardening (1993), Hugh Johnson in the Garden (2009) and Sitting in

1134-451: The legal definition introduced in 1984. The term is also used in some other wine regions of France, such as Loire . In Germany, sweetness of must and wine is measured with the Oechsle scale , and below are ranges of minimum must weights for Riesling, depending on the region. Kabinett – 67–82 °Oe Spätlese – 76–90 °Oe Auslese – 83–100 °Oe Beerenauslese and Eiswein – 110–128 °Oe (Eiswein

1176-667: The must and the spice in them. In the wine making areas of South Africa must is used to make a sweet bun known as mosbolletjies . The term petimezi is a Hellenized word of the Armenian/Trebizond term petmez. Petmez was a type of syrup that was made with berries of the White Mulberry tree; petmez was used in Byzantium (Trebizond was part of the Byzantine Empire), where White Mulberries grew in abundance, for their berries and for

1218-437: The product label", so there is some leeway. For example, a sparkling wine with 9 grams per litre of residual sugar may be labelled as either the drier, less sweet, classification of Extra Brut (because 9 - 3 = 6 grams per litre), or the slightly sweeter classification of Brut or even Extra Dry/Extra Sec/Extra Seco (because 9 + 3 = 12 grams per litre). The rules applicable to labellings before 14 July 2009 were: In Austria,

1260-510: The publication of Wine in 1966. The World Atlas of Wine (1971) was considered the first serious attempt to map the world's wine regions, described by the director of the INAO as "a major event in wine literature". Since its launch in 1973 Johnson has been President of the Sunday Times Wine Club, part of Laithwaites, now the world's largest mail-order wine merchant. From 1986 to 2001 he

1302-495: The silk worms that feed exclusively on Mulberry leaves. Geochemist Jerome Nriagu published an article in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1983 hypothesizing that defrutum and sapa may have contained enough lead acetate to be toxic to those who consumed them regularly. In Catholic Eucharistic liturgy , must may be substituted for sacramental wine , on condition that the ordinary has granted permission for

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1344-583: The special aged vinegar from the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, protected under the European protected designation of origin system. Selected bacterial colonies or the lenta in superficie (slow surface) or lenta a truciolo (slow wood shavings) methods are used for acetification, and then there is a maturation phase. Both the acetification and the maturation take place in precious sessile oak ( Quercus petraea ), chestnut, oak, mulberry, and juniper barrels. After

1386-454: The species of wine, for its sweetness ["Aut dulcis musti Vulcano decoquit humorem"; Virgil , Georg. i, 295] indicates fermentation, which is "the result of its natural heat" ( Meteor. iv); consequently this sacrament can be made from must. ... It is forbidden to offer must in the chalice, as soon as it has been squeezed from the grape, since this is unbecoming owing to the impurity of the must. But in case of necessity it may be done: for it

1428-413: The sugar level of the wine, but also lowers the amount of alcohol . Under German law, no more than fifteen percent of the final wine's volume may be the reserved juice. This practice is allowed also for Prädikatswein , the highest level in the German wine classification . It is often used for semi-sweet Kabinett and Spätlese , but more rarely for Auslese and upward. The use of Süssreserve results in

1470-410: The sun for a few days to allow them to shrivel and concentrate the sugar. In Crete , a similar effect was achieved by twisting the stalks of the grape to deprive them of sap and letting them dry on the vine—a method that produced passum and the modern Italian equivalent, passito . Stopping the fermentation also enhanced a wine's potential sweetness. In ancient times, this was achieved by submerging

1512-550: The sweet and fortified Denominations of Origen Montilla-Moriles and Jerez-Xérès- Sherry are: In the United States, the wine industry measures the sweetness of must and wine in degrees Brix . Hugh Johnson (wine) Hugh Eric Allan Johnson OBE (born 10 March 1939, in London ) is an English journalist, author, editor, and expert on wine. He is considered the world's best-selling wine writer. A wine he tasted in 1964,

1554-449: The use of Süssreserve will result in a wine where the sweetness comes from a mixture of glucose and fructose. According to EU regulation 753/2002, the following terms may be used on the labels of table wines and quality wines . Sparkling wines have ratings according to Commission Regulation (EC) No 607/2009 of 14 July 2009. Article 58 points out "the sugar content may not differ by more than 3 grams per litre from what appears on

1596-780: Was a Director of the Bordeaux First Growth Chateau Latour and in 1990 was a co-founder of the Royal Tokaji Wine Company in an attempt to rebuild the foundering Tokaji industry after Communism. In 1986 he started the Hugh Johnson Collection, which sold (until 2010) wine glasses and other artefacts related to wine, mainly in the Far East, with a shop in St James's Street , London. His book Vintage: The Story of Wine , an authoritative 500-page compendium,

1638-413: Was also common from the Roman era until quite recently to sweeten wine with sugar of lead , a toxic substance that increases the apparent sweetness of wines and other beverages. The practice continued well into the 19th century, although the leading was mostly restricted to very cheap wines after the harmful nature of lead was demonstrated in the 17th century. Among the components influencing how sweet

1680-478: Was first published in 1989 by Octopus, and re-edited in 2004 as a fully illustrated edition published by Mitchell Beazley. It also was made into a 13-part TV series for Channel 4 and WGBH in Boston, first airing in 1989. Since 1977 he has compiled his annual Pocket Wine Book , selling many million copies in up to 14 languages. In 1973 Johnson wrote The International Book of Trees . In 1975 he became Editorial Director of

1722-425: Was taken on as a feature writer for Condé Nast Publications upon graduation, and started work on Vogue and House & Garden , becoming in 1962 editor of Wine & Food and in the same year wine correspondent of The Sunday Times , of which in 1967 he became Travel Editor. From 1968 to 1970 he edited Queen magazine in succession to Jocelyn Stevens . He has published a wide array of books, starting with

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1764-538: Was used as a sweetener in the kitchen in various recipes (and as a syrup over teganitai (pancakes)). From the Greeks, the Romans in ancient Rome also used the condensed must in cooking, as a sweetener. Must was boiled in lead or bronze kettles into a milder concentrate called defrutum or a stronger concentrate called sapa. It was often used as a souring agent and preservative, especially in fruit dishes. Currently, reduced must

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