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7 days to die acid barrel7/1/2023 ![]() ![]() If a wine is low in acidity, tartaric acid is the addition of choice to ‘try’ bring more balance to the wine. If a malolactic fermentation takes place, much of the malic acid is converted to lactic acid. When measured in terms of ‘total acidity’ the higher the number, the higher the acidity, when measured in terms of pH, the higher the number the lower the acidity! Prior to any malolactic fermentation, the acids are typically acetic, malic and tartaric acids. Acidity is described as the concentration of acid in the wine or must. As a grape ripens, the level of acidity reduces. A wine can be incredibly sweet, but given enough acidity to balance the sugar and everything is just fine. If the acidity is too high, you might find the wine becoming too tart or sour, whereas if it’s too low the wine can seem, for want of a better word, ‘flabby’ or cloying. When in balance you will only really note the presence of acid in a wine by the mouth-watering effect the wine has once you swallow. Outside the wine world, acetobater is exactly what is needed to produce wine vinegar. Grapes that have been punctured by insects (such as wasps) may also be a source so are discarded during triage – for instance in 2014 parts of the Côte d’Or saw infestations of drosophila fruit flies – in particular a Japanese ‘import’ called drosophilla suzukii was responsible. Improperly stored (empty) barrels are a common source of the bacteria, mouldy grapes can also be a ‘good’ source. It seems history will regard him in a very positive light, unlike the domaines where he consulted up to the early 1990s…Ī bacteria activated in the presence of oxygen which is often responsible for spoiling wine by oxidising the ethanol (alcohol), producing volatile acetic acid (ethanoic acid) and ethyl acetate (ethyl ethanoate). Today those wines are coming out of their shells and seem very much more interesting, and many facets of his ideas are now in general use too. Eventually Accad was slowly discredited and left the region. Yet the wines that followed all his advice(s) seemed to lack delicacy, ‘pinosity’ even. He was also one of the pioneering voices that wanted to wait for ‘phenolic ripeness’ rather than pick as soon as there was 11.5°. He was maybe the first to really champion the use of a cold pre-fermentation maceration for (red) fruit. He recommended the treatment of soils with fertiliser only after analysis, rather than by rote. Lebanese-born, Guy Accad worked as a consultant to many domaines in the Côte de Nuits in the 1980s and was even wine-maker at the Hospices de Beaune for 1 year – 1978. ![]() A labour intensive process to be sure, but slowly this page will ‘evolve’. ![]()
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