A rosé (From French: rosé, ‘pinkish’, also known as rosado in Spanish-speaking countries or rosato in Italy) is a type of wine that has some of the color typical of a red wine, but only enough to turn it pink. The pink color can range from a pale orange to a vivid near-purple, depending on the grapes and wine making techniques.
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There are three major ways to produce rosé wine: skin contact, saignée and blending.
When rosé wine is the primary product, it's produced with the skin contact method. Black-skinned grapes are crushed and the skins are allowed to remain in contact with the juice for a short period, typically one to three days.[1] The must is then pressed, and the skins are discarded rather than left in contact throughout fermentation (as with red wine making). The skins contain much of the astringent tannin and other compounds, thereby leaving the structure more similar to a white wine.[2] The longer that the skins are left in contact with the juice, the more intense the color of the final wine.
Rosé wine can be produced as a by-product of red wine fermentation using a technique known as Saignée (from French bleeding). When a winemaker desires to impart more tannin and color to a red wine, some of the pink juice from the must can be removed at an early stage. The red wine remaining in the vats is intensified as a result of the bleeding, because the volume of juice in the must is reduced, and the must involved in the maceration is concentrated. The pink juice that is removed can be fermented separately to produce rosé.[3]
In other parts of the world, blending, the simple mixing of red wine to a white to impart color, is uncommon. This method is discouraged in most wine growing regions, especially in France, where it is forbidden by law, except for Champagne. Even in Champagne, several high-end producers do not use this method but rather the saignée method.[4]
Rosé wines can be made still, semi-sparkling or sparkling.
After the Second World War, there was a fashion for medium-sweet rosés for mass-market consumption, the classic examples being the Portuguese Mateus Rosé and the American "blush" wines of the 1970s (see below). The pendulum now seems to be swinging back towards a drier, 'bigger' style.
These wines are made from Rhone grapes like Syrah, Grenache and Carignan in hotter regions such as Provence, the Languedoc and Australia.
In the early 1970s, demand for white wine exceeded the availability of white wine grapes, so many California producers made "white" wine from red grapes, in a form of saignée production with minimal skin contact, the "whiter" the better.[5] In 1975, Sutter Home's "White Zinfandel" wine experienced a stuck fermentation, a problem in which the yeast dies off before all the sugar is turned to alcohol.[6] Winemaker Bob Trinchero put it aside for two weeks, then upon tasting it he decided to sell this pinker, sweeter wine.[7]
In 1976, wine writer Jerry D. Mead visited Mill Creek Vineyards in Sonoma County, California.[5] Charlie Kreck had been one of the first to plant Cabernet Sauvignon vines in California, and offered Mead a wine made from Cabernet that was a pale pink and as yet unnamed.[5] Kreck would not call it "White Cabernet" as it was much darker in colour than red grape "white" wines of the time, yet it was not as dark as the rosés he had known.[5] Mead jokingly suggested the name "Cabernet Blush", then that evening phoned Kreck to say that he no longer thought the name a joke.[8] In 1978 Kreck trademarked the word "Blush".[9] The name caught on as a marketing name for the semi-sweet wines from producers such as Sutter Home and Beringer. In 2010 Mill Creek produced a rosé wine for the first time in years.[10]
The term "blush" is generally restricted to wines sold in North America, although it is sometimes used in Australia and by Italian Primitivo wines hoping to cash in on the recently discovered genetic links between Primitivo and Zinfandel. Although "blush" originally referred to a colour (pale pink), it now tends to indicate a relatively sweet pink wine, typically with 2.5% residual sugar;[11] in North America dry pink wines are usually marketed as rosé but sometimes as blush. In Europe, almost all pink wines are referred to as rosé regardless of sugar levels, even semi-sweet ones from California.
In the United States a record 2005 California crop has resulted in an increased production and proliferation of varietals used for rosés, as winemakers chose to make rosé rather than leave their reds unsold.[2]
Schilcher is a wine produced solely in the Austrian region of Western Styria.
In France, the current commercial trend of rosé wine market is oriented toward a light (i.e not tannic, rather light-colored), happy, fresh (summer-related) and young (less than a year) wine. The main region of production of rosé wine is Provence but following the fashion for this kind of easy-selling wines, other wine-growing regions produced their own rosé to get their share of the market.
Rosé has now exceeded white wines in sales[2] and is unrelated with the degree of alcohol, so that this latter can be relatively high for a wine.
Vin gris is a French name for pale rosés made with pinot noir. In Alsace, rosé is made out of pinot noir d'Alsace.
Historically rosé was quite a delicate, dry wine, exemplified by Anjou rosé from the Loire. In fact the original claret was a pale ('clairet') wine from Bordeaux that would probably now be described as a rosé.[1]
Marsannay rosé is produced in the communes of Marsannay-la-Côte, Couchey and Chenôve in the Côte de Nuits subregion of Burgundy.
Champagnes can be made rosé by blending a small amount of red wine into the must or alternatively using the saignée technique.
According to Conseil Interprofessionnel des Vins de Provence[12] in France, Rosés in Provence display one of the different colors above:
Weißherbst is a type of German rosé made from only one variety of grape (Rotling).[13]
Mateus is a brand of medium-sweet frizzante rosé wine produced in Portugal.
Garnacha (Grenache) is also used in the pale colored rosados of Rioja. Rosado wines tend to be more colored than rosés wines made in France.
Cava rosado also exists.
Oeil de Perdrix is a rosé wine produced in Switzerland also made of Pinot noir grapes. It is made from free run must obtained without pressing.
An orange wine, also commonly known as amber wine, is a type of wine made from white wine grape varieties that have spent some maceration time in contact with the grape skins. Orange wines get their name from the darker, slightly orange tinge that the white wines receive due to their contact with the coloring pigments of the grape skins. This winemaking style is essentially the opposite of rosé production which involves getting red wine grapes quickly off their skins, leaving the wine with a slightly pinkish hue.[14] The tradition of amber wine production is kept alive especially in the Caucasian republic of Georgia. Common grape varieties used for amber wine are Mtsvane and Rkatsiteli.
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