Aroma of leather, resembling the smell of certain animals (game, hide). It can be found in wines that were kept in bottle for too long.

 

Dry extract, diminished from total sugars exceeding 1g/l, from potassium sulphate that exceeds 1g/l, from mannitol, if there's room for it; as well as from certain substances eventually added to the wine.

 

Conditions that favour the reduction or loss of oxygen. The opposite of oxidation. However, if a wine (usually red) lacks oxygen, it may get unpleasant smells of mercaptans or sulphite.

 

Sugar that stays in wine after fermentation (sugar that yeasts haven't transformed into alcohol). One may choose to interrupt fermentation at a certain point, producing a wine with high sugar content. Such is the case with Port and other fortified wines, in which fermentation is interrupted adding spirit. In other types of wine fermentation is interrupted adding sulphurous anhydride.

 

Bottle ageing process in which the wine only consumes the oxygen contained in the recipient and slowly matures without air.

 

Action of refermenting some wines that still have sugar and that one wants to convert in less sweet or totally dry wines. This word is also used to refer to an already bottled sweet wine that referments due to little stabilisation.

 

To regularly fill (a cask) with wine of the same kind in order to compensate for the loss of wine due to racking, evaporation or absorption by wood. This is done to maintain the best preservation techniques in the absence of air.

 

Very elegant, refined, well produced wine of great varietal lineage.

 

Homogeneisation, blending of spirits to obtain high quality products. It is a finishing operation that is performed in brandies, cognacs, etc.

 

Light spot reflected in a wine's colour.