Vino novello, Italian for 'young wine', is a light, fruity, red wine produced throughout Italy. Novello is similar to its French cousin Beaujolais nouveau in taste, body and color, but is produced using several grape varieties with a more liberal fermentation process. While historically released for sale on November 6, Novello is since 2012 available on 30 October.
Vino novello is lightweight with low alcohol content (usually not more than 11%) and a light aroma.
Novello's literal Italian translation means 'young wine,' but it is also "the wine to be drunk young". What Vino novello does not have is tannins.
In some places in Italy, tradition says the last day to consume it is “I Giorni della Merla”, the days of the blackbird, said to be the coldest day of the year (29–31 January).
Vino novello is made from a different process to normal red wines. Novello is the result of a different procedure of processing the grapes, carbonic maceration, which involves accelerating the fermentation process. This method was developed in France in the 1930s.
The grapes are placed in large barrels or vats. They are then closed off and air is eliminated by pumping in CO2. The natural yeast migrate from the skin of the grapes into the pulp, looking for water and oxygen, and the fermentation takes place. The fermentation process lasts about 20 days.
The whole bunches are placed within a designated 50 to 70 hl (1,300 to 1,800 US gal ) tubs, in which after producing a vacuum of air is blown CO2 at 30 degrees Celsius for 7–14 days. The clusters that are located on the bottom of the tanks are crushed by the mass of grapes and release the juice. Yeasts indigenous to the pulp from the peel migrate in search of oxygen and water, triggering a process of intracellular fermentation. At the end of the cycle, the 'red wine' is slightly crushed and further fermented for 3-4 days. The minimum alcohol content is 11%, the deadline for bottling is 31 December of the same vintage year. [1]
Italy will produce approximately 9 million bottles of Vino novello in 2009, some 4% down over 2008, with 236 vineyards making the wine compared to 246 in 2008. [2] Over 400 vineyards were producing Vino novello in 2004 after its popularity peaked.[ citation needed ]
Almost half of Novello production comes from the northern Veneto region. It is followed by Trentino, Tuscany, Sardinia, Emilia Romagna, Puglia, and Friuli. [3]
Common grape varieties used in production of Vino novello are: Barbera, Cabernet Sauvignon, Canaiolo, Ciliegiolo, Dolcetto, Grignolino, Merlot, Nebbiolo, Pinot noir, Refosco, Sangiovese and Teroldego. [3]
Profits are expected to reach a value of more than 40 million euro (about $60 million) for 2009. [4]
The birth of 'young wine' comes from the Beaujolais wine region, a southern area of Burgundy. A novel wine making technique was developed by a Frenchman, M. Flanzy, in the 1930s. The main difference in making Vino novello wines is that the grapes are not crushed but are fermented using whole grapes, allowing for only a minimum percentage of sugar to be converted into alcohol, ensuring the wine has a smooth, fruity flavor. Italy first started making Vino novello in the 1970s. The first producers were Angelo Gaja (Vinot) and Marchesi Antinori (S. Giocondo). [5] Vino novello was officially recognized in Italy in 1987.
The two wines are very similar, but there are significant differences.
Beaujolais is a French Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC) wine generally made of the Gamay grape, which has a thin skin and is low in tannins. Like most AOC wines they are not labeled varietally. Whites from the region, which make up only 1% of its production, are made mostly with Chardonnay grapes though Aligoté is also permitted until 2024. Beaujolais tends to be a very light-bodied red wine, with relatively high amounts of acidity. In some vintages, Beaujolais produces more wine than the Burgundy wine regions of Chablis, Côte d'Or, Côte Chalonnaise and Mâconnais put together.
Barolo is a red denominazione di origine controllata e garantita (DOCG) wine produced in the northern Italian region of Piedmont. It is made from the nebbiolo grape and is often described as one of Italy's greatest wines.
Winemaking or vinification is the production of wine, starting with the selection of the fruit, its fermentation into alcohol, and the bottling of the finished liquid. The history of wine-making stretches over millennia. There is evidence that suggests that the earliest wine production took place in Georgia and Iran around 6000 to 5000 B.C. The science of wine and winemaking is known as oenology. A winemaker may also be called a vintner. The growing of grapes is viticulture and there are many varieties of grapes.
Carbonic maceration is a winemaking technique, often associated with the French wine region of Beaujolais, in which whole grapes are fermented in a carbon dioxide rich environment before crushing. Conventional alcoholic fermentation involves crushing the grapes to free the juice and pulp from the skin with yeast serving to convert sugar into ethanol. Carbonic maceration ferments most of the juice while it is still inside the grape, although grapes at the bottom of the vessel are crushed by gravity and undergo conventional fermentation. The resulting wine is fruity with very low tannins. It is ready to drink quickly but lacks the structure for long-term aging. In extreme cases such as Beaujolais nouveau, the period between picking and bottling can be less than six weeks.
Red wine is a type of wine made from dark-colored grape varieties. The color of the wine can range from intense violet, typical of young wines, through to brick red for mature wines and brown for older red wines. The juice from most purple grapes is greenish-white, the red color coming from anthocyan pigments present in the skin of the grape. Much of the red wine production process involves extraction of color and flavor components from the grape skin.
A rosé is a type of wine that incorporates some of the color from the grape skins, but not enough to qualify it as a red wine. It may be the oldest known type of wine, as it is the most straightforward to make with the skin contact method. The pink color can range from a pale "onionskin" orange to a vivid near-purple, depending on the grape varieties used and winemaking techniques. Usually, the wine is labelled rosé in French, Portuguese, and English-speaking countries, rosado in Spanish, or rosato in Italian.
Malolactic conversion is a process in winemaking in which tart-tasting malic acid, naturally present in grape must, is converted to softer-tasting lactic acid. Malolactic fermentation is most often performed as a secondary fermentation shortly after the end of the primary fermentation, but can sometimes run concurrently with it. The process is standard for most red wine production and common for some white grape varieties such as Chardonnay, where it can impart a "buttery" flavor from diacetyl, a byproduct of the reaction.
Ethanol fermentation, also called alcoholic fermentation, is a biological process which converts sugars such as glucose, fructose, and sucrose into cellular energy, producing ethanol and carbon dioxide as by-products. Because yeasts perform this conversion in the absence of oxygen, alcoholic fermentation is considered an anaerobic process. It also takes place in some species of fish where it provides energy when oxygen is scarce.
Maury is an Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC) for fortified vin doux naturel wines made in the Roussillon wine region of France. Almost all wines are red, made from at least 75% Grenache noir (Garnacha). Other permitted grapes are Grenache blanc, Grenache gris, Macabeu (Macabeo), Malvoisie du Roussillon (Tourbat), Syrah, Muscat and other local varieties. Although the grapes are different, they are used and marketed very much like port. It is made in the communes of Maury, Saint-Paul-de-Fenouillet, Lesquerde, Tautavel and Rasiguères. The AOC was granted in 1936.
Beaujolais nouveau is a red wine made from Gamay grapes produced in the Beaujolais region of France. It is a vin de primeur, fermented for just a few weeks before being released for sale on the third Thursday of November. Distributors famously race to get the first bottles to different global markets.
Maceration is the winemaking process where the phenolic materials of the grape—tannins, coloring agents (anthocyanins) and flavor compounds—are leached from the grape skins, seeds and stems into the must. To macerate is to soften by soaking, and maceration is the process by which the red wine receives its red color, since raw grape juice is clear-grayish in color. In the production of white wines, maceration is either avoided or allowed only in very limited manner in the form of a short amount of skin contact with the juice prior to pressing. This is more common in the production of varietals with less natural flavor and body structure like Sauvignon blanc and Sémillon. For Rosé, red wine grapes are allowed some maceration between the skins and must, but not to the extent of red wine production.
Asti is a sparkling white Italian wine that is produced throughout southeastern Piedmont, but is particularly focused around the towns of Asti and Alba. Since 1993 the wine has been classified as a denominazione di origine controllata e garantita (DOCG) and as of 2004 was Italy's largest producing appellation. On an average vintage more than ten times as much Asti is produced in Piedmont than the more well-known Piedmontese red wine Barolo.
The glossary of wine terms lists the definitions of many general terms used within the wine industry. For terms specific to viticulture, winemaking, grape varieties, and wine tasting, see the topic specific list in the "See also" section below.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to wine:
The process of fermentation in winemaking turns grape juice into an alcoholic beverage. During fermentation, yeasts transform sugars present in the juice into ethanol and carbon dioxide. In winemaking, the temperature and speed of fermentation are important considerations as well as the levels of oxygen present in the must at the start of the fermentation. The risk of stuck fermentation and the development of several wine faults can also occur during this stage, which can last anywhere from 5 to 14 days for primary fermentation and potentially another 5 to 10 days for a secondary fermentation. Fermentation may be done in stainless steel tanks, which is common with many white wines like Riesling, in an open wooden vat, inside a wine barrel and inside the wine bottle itself as in the production of many sparkling wines.
A nouveau, or vin (de) primeur, is a wine which may be sold in the same year in which it was harvested.
This glossary of winemaking terms lists some of terms and definitions involved in making wine, fruit wine, and mead.
The history of Chianti dates back to at least the 13th century with the earliest incarnations of Chianti as a white wine. Today this Tuscan wine is one of Italy's most well known and recognizable wines. In the Middle Ages, the villages of Gaiole, Castellina and Radda located near Florence formed as a Lega del Chianti creating an area that would become the spiritual and historical "heart" of the Chianti region and today is located within the Chianti Classico Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita (DOCG). As the wines of Chianti grew in popularity other villages in Tuscany wanted their lands to be called Chianti. The boundaries of the region have seen many expansions and sub-divisions over the centuries. The variable terroir of these different macroclimates contributed to diverging range of quality on the market and by the late 20th century consumer perception of Chianti was often associated with basic mass-market Chianti sold in a squat bottle enclosed in a straw basket, called fiasco.
The role of yeast in winemaking is the most important element that distinguishes wine from fruit juice. In the absence of oxygen, yeast converts the sugars of the fruit into alcohol and carbon dioxide through the process of fermentation. The more sugars in the grapes, the higher the potential alcohol level of the wine if the yeast are allowed to carry out fermentation to dryness. Sometimes winemakers will stop fermentation early in order to leave some residual sugars and sweetness in the wine such as with dessert wines. This can be achieved by dropping fermentation temperatures to the point where the yeast are inactive, sterile filtering the wine to remove the yeast or fortification with brandy or neutral spirits to kill off the yeast cells. If fermentation is unintentionally stopped, such as when the yeasts become exhausted of available nutrients and the wine has not yet reached dryness, this is considered a stuck fermentation.
Abruzzo is an Italian wine region located in the mountainous central Italian region of Abruzzo, along the Adriatic Sea. It is bordered by the Molise wine region to the south, Marche to the north and Lazio to the west. Abruzzo's rugged terrain, 65% of which is mountainous, help to isolate the region from the winemaking influence of the ancient Romans and Etruscans in Tuscany, but the area has had a long history of wine production.
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