Understanding Wine Chemistry

Book excerpt: Understanding Wine Chemistry Understand the reactions behind the world’s most alluring beverages The immense variety of wines on the market is the product of multiple chemical processes – whether acting on components arising in the vineyard, during fermentation, or throughout storage. Winemaking decisions alter the chemistry of finished wines, affecting the flavor, color, stability, and other aspects of the final product. Knowledge of these chemical and biochemical processes is integral to the art and science of winemaking. Understanding Wine Chemistry has served as the definitive introduction to the chemical components of wine, their properties, and their reaction mechanisms. It equips the knowledgeable reader to interpret and predict the outcomes of physicochemical reactions involved with winemaking processes. Now updated to reflect recent research findings, most notably in relation to wine redox chemistry, along with new Special Topics chapters on emerging areas, it continues to set the standard in the subject. Readers of the second edition of Understanding Wine Chemistry will also find: Case studies throughout showing chemistry at work in creating different wine styles and avoiding common adverse chemical and sensory outcomes Detailed treatment of novel subjects like non-alcoholic wines, non-glass alternatives to wine packaging, synthetic wines, and more An authorial team with decades of combined experience in wine chemistry research and education Understanding Wine Chemistry is ideal for college and university students, winemakers at any stage in their practice, professionals in related fields such as suppliers or sommeliers, and chemists with an interest in wine.