Concepts in Wine Technology

Following the enormous, decade-long success of his best-selling Winery Technology and Operations, physical chemist and winemaker Yair Margalit comes out with the successive, Concepts in Wine Technology, fully updated and revised to meet the advances of modern winemaking. Among the extended topics are fermentation, skin contact, acid balance, phenolics, bottling, the use of oak and quality control. He begins in the vineyard discussing proper maturation, soil and climate, bunch health, vineyard disease states and grape varieties. Next he tackles the pre-harvest with a careful look at vineyard management and preparing the winery for harvest. Dr. Margalit then outlines the entire process of harvesting, from destemming, crushing and skin contact as it applies to both red and white grapes to pressing, must correction and temperature control. Fermentation is examined fully and includes a lengthy look at the factors affecting malo-lactic fermentation and its pros and cons. There is a huge chapter on cellar operations that deals with racking, stabilization, fining, filtration, blending and maintaining winery hardware, followed by sections on barrelling and bottling. The final chapter pulls together the more general aspects of wine technology, covering sulphur-dioxides, different forms of wine spoilage and ways to ward them off, legal regulations and, one of the most important and enigmatic compounds in wine, phenolics.

The companion book to the author's best selling Concepts In Wine Chemistry and the successor to his Winery Technology & Operations. Since his first book in 1990, he has shifted much of his time from research and teaching to operating his own small winery. Thus, this new text has a practical and applied science character. There have been significant discoveries and technological advances in winemaking since the original text. The enlarged sections on fermentation, skin contact, acid balance, the use of oak, phenolics and quality control reflect and expand upon the original text. This is a how-to book, organised in the sequence of the processes a winemaker faces when confronted with the rapid challenge of converting fresh grapes into good wine. Don't make wine without it!