I remember my first encounter with Red Wine Sediment
Confused and had a mouthful of what seemed like sand. I looked around to see if anyone else was experiencing the same thing I was. As I noticed no they were not. A gravely sand type substance and why did it come form this wonderful bottle of wine?
Huddled around a beautiful bottle of Mollydooker Carnival of Love! This was my first experience with this vintage that I had heard so much about. Although I was familiar with wine I was not familiar with the sediment. The wine was a 2007 Shiraz that tasted like no other wine I had had up to that point even minus the sediment.
What I found out was that this sediment was a normal thing. Even more normal for this particular vineyard and the process that they used while bottling their wines. When referring to the process I’m talking about how this famous vineyard uses nitrogen in their bottling process. This is a tactic to cut down on the amount of sulfates that they have in the finished product. The sulfates have been known to be allergic to some, and therefore making the dehydration process greater which results in a worse hangover.
Now that we know Sediment isn’t a bad thing we can enjoy
If you’re an avid wine drinker like you may receive wine of the month club shipments, you’ve experienced the sensation mentioned above at least a handful of times. This is common in wine shipments. If you’ve only recently encountered sediment in your glass, don’t worry, there is nothing wrong with your wine! In fact sediment is a completely natural occurrence in red and white wine. When this happens it’s actually be a sign that you’ve gotten yourself a high quality bottle! But we’ll get to that.
Dregs
Technically speaking, sediment is also called “wine dregs” . Before you judge your bottle of wine by this unfortunate double-entendre, sediment can also be referred to as ‘wine crystals’ or ‘wine diamonds’. Sounds a bit better than ‘dregs’, right?
Sediment can come in two forms: tartrate and colloids. Tartrates are the larger ‘crystals’ you may find on the end of a cork or clinging to the sides of the bottle or your wine glass. These jagged, burgundy-colored, diamond-like structures are formed when tartaric acid (a natural element in grapes) binds with potassium while exposed to cold conditions. Under these circumstances they form beautiful crystalline salt formations. Colloids, on the other hand, are the smaller and finer-grained sediment which are made of polysaccharides and protein, or can simply be leftover remnants of grape skins, stems or seeds. And yes, both forms of sediment are harmless!
Polysaccharides, for those of us who somehow missed that day of chemistry class…are carbohydrates made up of multiple sugar molecules bonded together. They also contribute to the overall mouthfeel of a wine.
But we’re getting off track.
Although they are usually more prevalent in red wines, they can occur in white wines too! Winemakers will sometimes intentionally leave tartaric sediment in the barrel while the wine ages. This is called ‘sur lie’ aging, which translates to ‘on the lees’ and can supplement and intensify flavor in the finished wine.
Finally, these crystals, diamonds and gritty-goodness can indicate you have a high quality bottle of wine! The best winemakers know that, oftentimes, less is more when it comes to intervening with methods like filtering. When wines are filtered, it not only takes the sediment out but it also strips. The wine of quality features such as mouthfeel and even palate flavor expression.
So the next time you see wine sediment at the bottom of your glass, rejoice! You could be in for a real treat.
Below I have a short video of a couple tricks that I have found over the years as to how you can detect if you have sediment, and if you do how to make sure that you are able to still enjoy the wine to the fullest so that you still have a wonderful experience with such an amazing bottle of wine!
Enjoy!!!
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