Wine 'body'
Background
The terms 'body' and fullness' are frequently used to describe the in-mouth impression of both red and white table wines. Wines are routinely categorised as being light-, medium- or full-bodied - presumably as wines of different style appeal to different market segment and are consumed in different social and culinary context. However, despite its widespread use and application, there appears to be a lack of common understanding within the wine trade regarding what sensory aspects contribute to wine body. In addition, although ethanol and glycerol are considered to be major contributors to wine body, the real effects they have on fullness and on other wine attributes at wine realistic levels in white wines were not clearly described in the literature.
Progress
The interpretation of what sensory attributes contribute to white wine body was found to be idiosyncratic. Half of the tasters associated increased flavour and perceived viscosity with body. Perceived hotness was not viewed as an important component of body by any taster while the role of acidity in defining body was taster dependent.
Generally, in our study, alcohol and to a lesser extent glycerol had a positive effect on both white wine body and perceived viscosity. However, the effects were surprisingly small and were wine dependent. In a follow up study, whereby the natural sweetness of glycerol was first blocked by a prior mouth rinse with an extract of the anti-saccharine herb Gymnema sylvestre, tasters could not detect any change in palate viscosity resulting from a large increase in glycerol concentration. This result further suggests that glycerol does not significantly affect perceived viscosity in dry white wines. Furthermore, elevated levels of ethanol or glycerol did not consistently affect aroma, flavour or sweetness perception.
Future work will involve further investigations into the interactions between wine polysaccharides and other white wine components and their effect on white wine body and palate hotness. We have been successful in extracting polysaccharides from white wine using multilayer counter current chromatography using food grade methods for use in these future studies.
Highlights
- The term ‘body’ in white wines is related to wines perceived flavour and viscosity.
- Alcohol generally increases perceived body
- Glycerol appears to play a minor role, at the range of concentrations present in table wines.
Project leader: Dr Liz Waters
Project team members:
Publications:
964 Gawel, R.; van Sluyter, S.; Waters, E.J. The effects of ethanol and glycerol on the body and other sensory characteristics of Riesling wines. Aust. J. Grape Wine Res. 13 (1); 38-45: 2007 (click here to order).