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Distinguishing Red Wine Varietals

© Alan Boehmer

It's a lot harder than you might think. My first glimmer of the truth of that statement came years ago when I mistook a full-bodied, fruity California Zinfandel for Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon. And I've been fooled many times since. If this is a common experience among knowledgeable wine drinkers, why pay two or three times the cost of a good red wine for one that is only marginally different?

The flavor and aroma perceptions of wines have a set of central features which we call varietal characteristics. These are most easily discerned by tasting the fruit itself or wine made from that fruit in stainless steel fermenters and aged in neutral oak. When other factors are introduced - barrel fermentation, new oak, the malolactic process, blending, and ageing - we trade some of the wines's inherent varietal characteristics for other flavors, textures, and aromas which are preferred. And that is, precisely, why it is so hard to distinguish red wine varietals in their finished state.

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Further, certain varietals are subjected to consistent styles. Fine Cabernet Sauvignon, for example, is never made without at least some time spent in oak, typically new oak. The flavors contributed by the oak become associated with what we expect to find in Cabernet Sauvignon, even though these flavors are not really varietal characteristics.

Wine writers have given us lists of descriptors to look for in every kind of wine. Syrahs which display strong varietal character are said to be "meaty." Zinfandels are "jammy." Pinot Noir tastes of ripe cherries. Cabernet Sauvignon, of blackberries, tea, and tobacco. You may agree with all these descriptors when you taste these wines. You might also find a few of your own, especially if the wine does not occupy a central position with respect to its varietal character. Maybe nuances of a special "terroir" or climate have brought out unusual characteristics. Maybe the use of wild yeasts have skewed the flavor spectrum. Perhaps cellar techniques, such as whole cluster fermentation or special methods of punching down or pumping over have given the wine special, nontypical characteristics.

Wine is rather like an artist's palette. When a painter uses primary and secondary colors, it's easy to tell the colors apart. But in the real world of art - and wine - red is often blended with yellow to warm it up, or with blue to cool it down. We have "Forest Green" and "Kelly Green." And in the world of red wine, we have Cabernet Sauvignons that could easily pass for Syrahs... or Zinfandels

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