1. It is not possible to explain everything about wine in a few hours… Indeed some people study
wines all their life.
Wine is basically a fermented grape juice. Saying this, it looses all its magic. Wine is not part
of the Asian culture. It came here and some are produced in Dalat for example. It was
cultivated long before JC in the Mediterranean area. It then spread with the roman expansion
all over Europe and especially in France. In burgundy, people have been growing grapes for
wine for at least 15 centuries. The grapes growing developed in some special places where
summers are dry in order to let the grape develop a lot of sugar. The ground is most of the
time very poor as it is the way grapes are better (the roots have to be longer in the ground).
There are many kinds of wines, but in order to make it simple, we will only consider a few of
them:
-White
-Red
-Rose
-Sparkling
All of them are done with grapes and sometimes with the same grapes; the difference in their
aspect or taste comes from the way the wine maker makes his wine.
Fermentation
Each time, if you let some fruits in a special recipient at a nice temperature, they will start to
ferment. The fermentation is due to the action of bacteria that attack all the cells of the fruit
using the sugar of them and producing: -Gas
-Alcohol
-Aromas
To stop the fermentation, you have to kill the bacteria (temperature), the bacteria can run out
of sugar as well and then can not continue, when the alcohol level reaches 15%, the reaction
will stop.
The way the fermentation will be controlled and done will make the wine specification.
RED WINE
All red wines are done with grapes that have red skins. In fact the grape skin gives the colour
to the wine.
-Once the grapes are collected, they are placed in the maceration tank where they start to
ferment a bit and also were they are pretty packed together so some liquid is going out of the
grain and is getting coloured by the skins. The maceration can last a few days to a few weeks
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LES CELLIERS D'ASIE
WINE KNOWLEDGE

2. (depending if you want to have a wine with a strong colour and smell or if you want to push
forward the quality of the juice).
-Once the maceration is completed, the grapes are squeezed in a press to keep the liquid only.
At this time, the liquid has already alcohol in it but the fermentation will continue as this first
wine is placed in a big container where the temperature is controlled.
-Once the fermentation is completed, the wine is transferred into barrels for a certain period
where it will gain more aromas; It is then bottled and stored before to be sold.
WHITE WINE
Basically, it is the same process. One step is just avoid: The maceration. White wine is
squeezed just after being picked-up. The fermentation comes immediately after the
collection. Everybody understands now that it is possible to make white wine out of red
grapes, as the liquid will not have time to gain the colours of the grapes skin.
The maceration takes place in a tank and afterwards people can put it in a barrel or just bottle
it (white wine is much more acid than red so the barrel step is sometimes very complicated).
ROSE WINE
Rosé wine is between red and white, in fact the rosé is a red wine with a short maceration.
The wine does not gain the colour of the skin too much (it doesn’t get the full aromas as
well…).
Fermentation / Barrel &/or bottle…
SPARKLING WINES
There are many sparkling wines but only those produced in Champagne can be called so.
Many people think that to make Champagne, you just have to had gas to white wine but it is
not true…
As we said over, the fermentation produces alcohol, aromas and gas. To do champagne the
persons in charge squeezes the grapes and bottles the wine when the fermentation is not
finished. The bottles is closed firmly so the gas produced by the fermentation stay in the
bottle and remains in the wine.
Then comes the difficult part, get rid of the remains of the bacteria that stays in the liquid
after the fermentation. This operation is called “degorgeage” and requires lots of skills.
Nowadays people are turning the bottles upside down and freeze the content at the top of the
bottle, they open the bottle and the gas will blow the frozen part. People add just after a small
amount of liqueur (which will make the difference between brut and demi-sec) to have a full
bottle and the cork is replaced quickly. All these operation should be done in the shortest time
possible.
Champagne can be white and rose. A few red sparkling wines are available but they are not
very popular.
The champagne technique was discovered by mistake by a monk called DON PERIGNON,
he was producing white wine in the Champagne area in France and he forgot to wait until the
fermentation was over in the tank and bottled is wine straight away. The pressure broke most
of the bottles after a few days, but some of them resists and the result was very good (it is
indeed the best way to drink this wine as it is already produced in the north of France where
the climate is not very good.
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