Solving the mystery of the “phantom” of sweetness in dry wines, apparently – in the wood barrels. But as the wine may be sweet to the taste with no residual sugar? It turned out, the reason is not where it was customary to think.

Have you ever tasted a dry white wine, which seemed sweet in taste, despite the assurances of the winemaker is that it is completely dry. And You’re not alone in this. This phenomenon has long forced tasters to throw up eyebrows in surprise and doubt their own feelings that seemed to contradict the facts.

“The idea of sweetness without sugar seems a paradox,” says Axel Marchal from the University of Bordeaux. At the end of zero he started the study in which this issue was the main.

There is a perception that ethanol and glycerol cause a sense of sweetness in a dry wine, but research, including ongoing, However, did not give evidence of that claim. It turned out that oak barrels have a much greater effect on the taste sensation a glass of Chardonnay.

“We found a whole family of substances that previously did not pay much attention. They are free to get into wine from wood barrels and give a sense of sweetness in the absence of sugars. At the same time, they are 8,000 times sweeter than sucrose”.

Without thinking, the researchers gave them easy-to-remember name circuitterminating (from lat. Quercus, oak).
The next step Marsala, in collaboration with the renowned oenologist Denis dyuborde (Denis Dubourdieu), was the joint publication of a study showing the dependence of the degree of sweetness imparted by the tree the guilt from the type of oak from which the barrel is made.

“It became clear that sessile oak contains significantly more of these sweet compounds than oak, so more suitable for the purpose of winemaking,” says Marchal.

Sessile oak (lat. Quercus petraea) is native to Europe species of white oak growing on shallow rocky soils, which gave it a name: petraea means “rocky land”. Its wood is used in construction and manufacturing of the barrels. But pedunculate oak (Quercus robur), prefer joiners Cabinet makers.

They give us these scientific calculations?

Development of methods for identification of wood species, lending more sweetness dry wine, will add another important tool in the winemakers Arsenal. Now they will require a certain material is not from forests, but from a type of oak.

But not too deep we got into science, and do not lose the romance surrounding the birth of wine? Mr. Marchal believes that there is: “the science of wine gives us the freedom of creativity.”