Wine is a learned taste. <> Wine Color. <> Price vs Quality.
Letting wine breathe? <> Sulfites in wine. <> Wine serving and storage temperatures.
Wine, The Bible and a Mormon. <> The invention of champagne. <> Danny's Favorite Wines.

Wine COLOR

Where does the color of wine come from? Most people think that the color of the wine is the same as the color of the juice of the grape the wine came from. The juice in a green grape is clear and the juice in a dark red or black grape is also clear. Surprised? The color of the wine comes from the color pigment that is in the skin of the grape. White Zinfandel is a very sweet wine that is sort of lightly clear pink in color and is made from the Zinfandel grape. The Zinfandel grape is almost black in color. From the same grape, you can also get a dark red hearty non-sweet wine. How does this happen? In the white zinfaldel making process, the skin of the grape is seperated from the rest of the grape and then the juice is squeezed out. The result is that you eventually have a clear or pinkish wine because very little of the color pigment from the grape gets into the juice.

The dark red hearty wines like a full Zinfandel wine, a Cabernet Sauvignon or a Merlot get their color from the skin of the grape being allowed to remain on the grape when it is pressed. The skins are also present when the juice goes to the fermentation process. The interaction of the skins and the juice causes the color pigment from the skins to saturate the juice with the color pigment. The juice is sweet and the skins are not. The skins of the grape and everything that makes up the grape skin we will call for now "Tannins". The tannins in the wine cause the wine to not be sweet but bitter. This does however, have a positive affect. The tannins in the wine will help stabitize the wine giving it a longer shelf life.