Acidification: The addition of acid (usually tartaric) during fermentation, frequently necessary in hot climates where grapes tend to over ripen and become deficient in acidity, thereby losing freshness.

Acidity: The acids in a wine (principally tartaric, malic, citric and lactic) provide liveliness, longevity and balance.

Aging: Wine is one of the few foodstuffs that can improve with age, and this is also one of its key fascinations. The longevity of different types of wine is a complex and inexact science.

Appellation Contrôlée: The French are great bureaucrats, and a wine with Appellation Contrôlée (AOC) on the label will have had to have met a whole host of regulations regarding grape variety, maximum yield, minimum ageing and so on. However, this doesn’t mean that what is in the bottle will necessarily be of any interest.

Balanced: A wine is balanced when all the component parts, such as tannins, fruits, acidity and sweetness, are correctly matched and in harmony, and none stands out inappropriately. It’s a bit of a subjective call.

Balthazar: A huge bottle that contains 12 liters of Champagne, which is the equivalent of 16 bottles.

Barrel fermentation: The process of fermenting grape juice in small oak barrels. Especially when the barrels are new, this can add complexity and oak-derived flavors to the finished wine.

Barrique: The standard Bordeaux barrel, holding 225 liters or the equivalent of about 300 bottles of wine.

Blanc de Blanc: “White of Whites”, meaning a white wine made of white grapes, such as Champagne made of Chardonnay.

Blanc de Noirs: White wine made of red or black grapes, where the juice is squeezed from the grapes and fermented without skin contact. These wines can have a pale pink hue.

Botrytis Cinerea: Called the “Noble Rot”. A beneficial and often highly desirable mold or fungus that attacks grapes under certain climatic conditions and causes them to shrivel, deeply concentrating the flavors, sugar, and acid.

Bouquet: A wine-buff term for the smell of a wine. Some old-school tasters reserve use of this term for the special aromas that develop with bottle age.

Brettanomyces: A wild yeast strain that occurs naturally in wineries and vineyards. Low levels of infection can add complexity to a wine. High levels are perceived by most as a fault.

Brut: A general term used to designate a relatively dry-finished Champagne or sparkling wine, often the driest wine made by the producer.

Buttery: Tasting term used to describe the rich, creamy characters often found in barrel fermented Chardonnay that has undergone malolactic fermentation.

Carbonic Maceration: A form of anaerobic fermentation, practiced extensively in Beaujolais that produces a bright, fruity style of wine.

Cava: Spanish bubbles made using the traditional champagne method.

Cepage: The finished product of a blend, e.g. Cabernet/Merlot; Syrah/Grenache.

Chaptalization: The addition of sugar during fermentation to increase a wine’s alcoholic strength.

Claret: Old-fashioned English term for red wines from the Bordeaux region.

Classed growth: A literal translation from the French term, cru classé, that describes a property or Château included in the famous 1855 classification of Bordeaux, and the subsequent reclassifications

Corked: Have you ever opened a bottle, and instead of clean, fruity aromas found that it smells of moldy cellars and damp cardboard? This is what a corked wine smells like. This is a wine that has been contaminated by a chemical called trichloranisole (TCA). The human nose is extremely sensitive to this contaminant. It is a major problem, spoiling between 2% and 7% of all wines, depending on who you listen to. This is why artificial corks are increasingly being used, especially on inexpensive wines not destined for ageing. The degree of cork-taint can vary, but you’ll find that almost all retailers will replace a corked bottle without question if you return it.

Cru: French term for vineyard, often translated as growth.

Cuvee: A blend or special lot of wine.

Demi-Sec: In the language of Champagne, a term relating to sweetness; although demi-sec means half-dry, demi-sec sparkling wines are usually slightly sweet to medium sweet.

Dosage: Champagne making is a complex process. First the wine is fermented, and then a secondary fermentation takes place in the bottle. After this, the plug of dead yeast cells is removed, and the wine is topped up with wine and sugar syrup¾the dosage. The sweetness of the final Champagne is determined by the dosage used.

Dry: Opposite of sweet; having no perceptible taste of sugar.

Ester: Volatile flavor compound naturally created in fermentation. Often fruity, flowery, or spicy.

Extra Dry: A common Champagne term not to be taken literally. Most “extra-dry” Champagnes are sweet.

Fermentation: The conversion of grape juice into wine through the action of yeasts present in the juice or added to the juice, which turn sugar into alcohol. This alcoholic fermentation is also known as primary fermentation.

Filtration: A method of clarifying and stabilizing wine to give it a pleasingly lucid color and to remove yeasts, bacteria or other solid matter that might otherwise spoil the wine after it has been bottled. Excessive filtration, like excessive fining, can strip a wine of aroma, body, texture and length.

Fining: A method of clarifying wine by pouring a coagulant (such as egg whites) on top and letting it settle to the bottom. In general, a fining agent is allowed to fall through the wine, while in filtration; the wine is passed through a filter.

Fino: A dry, light style of sherry that has a distinctive salty, tangy flavor that comes from being aged under a layer of yeast cells, called a ‘flor’. Although these are usually 15% alcohol or above, they make quite good food wines due to their dry, savory character.

First growths: The five elite properties of the Medoc and Graves regions of Bordeaux: Latour, Lafite, Haut-Brion, Mouton-Rothschild and Margaux, which were picked out as ‘Premier Cru Classé’ in the 1855 Bordeaux Classification (actually, Mouton Rothschild was promoted from a second growth in the 1970s). These wines have an iconic status, and they are very expensive.

Flabby: A word used to describe a wine that doesn’t have enough acidity to balance the other elements. Buttery Chardonnays with rich tropical fruit flavors from warm-climate regions are most likely to show this sort of character, especially if they are a few years old.

Flinty: Bang two pieces of flint together hard, and take a sniff: this is the smell that in wines is referred to as ‘flinty’, and it’s often used to describe young Chablis.

Fortify: To raise the alcohol content of a wine by the addition of brandy or neutral spirits.

Fruity: Technically, grapes are a fruit. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that some wines are described as fruity. Modern winemaking techniques help bring out the fruit character in wines that previously would have been much less attractive.