Aroma of Wine

During a seminar that I attended recently Saba Açıkgöz said something, probably without noticing how important it was for me to know, that practically lead to a flash of lightening in the sky for me. My mind achieved a clarity escaping the darkness within which it had been struggling for a while.

Let's confess that you have been wondering how come there are different aromas such as the aroma of carnation, orange, minerals, spices etc. in a wine which is made of grapes only. I have been definitely wondering and could not come close to an answer. I can explain the conclusion that I computed from the words of Saba Açıkgöz as follows: Certain mollecules come into being in the process of fermentation and maturation of the wine. The structure of these mollecules can be so close to other mollecules that are already existing in the nature, that we identify the smell of these new arising mollecules with the smells of those already existing mollecules. In this way, it becomes possible to sense the aroma of something, that has never been close to the wine, from the wine itself. This is what I learned at that day. It makes sense to me, why could not I discover this before?

That short expression that I heard led me to deeper research (googling) and as a result of extensive reserch that I made, I managed to reach more detailed information which support that expression. Those detailed information suggest as follows: Human tongue has a limited capacity to taste and we can only taste certain basic tastes such as bitterness, saltiness, sweetness etc through our tongue. However, if this was all that we could sense from wine, I probably would not create this blog.

In addition to the tastes, there are also smells that we sense when we drink wine. These can be described as aroma in general. Some attentive and knowledgeable persons can distinguish what they smell as aroma or bouquet. In this case, the term "aroma" refers to the smells of rather younger wines that are unique to the grape variety, whereas the term "bouquet" refers to the smells that can rather be sensed in old wines and that arise from the chemical reactions that emerge during fermentation, or emerge as the wine ages or as the wine rests in oak barrels. These could be named as secondary and tertiary aromas.

The volatile and non-volatile compounds that exist in the wine contribute to the formation of the aromas of the wine. During the fermentation process, the smell of the wine changes quickly as chemical reactions create different compounds all the time. As the wine ages and matures, the creation of those compouns slows down and consequently less frequent changes occur in the smell of the wine.

As the researches in this area continue, the possibility of manipulating the wine through the illegal use of additives revolves in the minds. Is it possible that the wine producer is sniggering while we think that we discover the unique and surprising aromas of the wines that we taste?