Wine Arcana

Concept

Body and texture

Body is a wine's perceived weight or fullness in the mouth. Texture describes how it feels: smooth, rough, drying, viscous, prickly, or otherwise tactile. These impressions overlap with taste and aroma.

A deeply coloured wine can feel relatively light; a pale wine can have substantial weight. Likewise, a wine that dries the gums is not necessarily low in sugar. Several different sensations contribute to what is often described loosely as a wine's structure.

Separate the sensations first

Acidity supplies sourness and influences salivary response. Residual sugar supplies sweetness and can affect perceived fullness. Tannin contributes especially to astringency, the drying or rough sensation associated with changes in lubrication in the mouth. Bitterness is a taste and can accompany astringency without being the same sensation.

Alcohol contributes its own sensory effects, including warmth. Dissolved carbon dioxide can give a prickling sensation and alter the impression of freshness. A wine's aroma can be intense while it remains light in body.

Composition and interaction

There is no single laboratory value for body. Ethanol, sugars, phenolics, polysaccharides, acids, and dissolved gas interact within the wine and with the taster. Physical viscosity is measurable, but it does not capture every sensation included in a judgement of fullness.

A review of white-wine mouthfeel by Gawel and colleagues identifies alcohol and pH as important parts of the sensory framework, with other constituents modifying the response. Glycerol has not consistently increased perceived viscosity within the range normally found in white wine.1. Gawel et al. (2018), abstract consulted; white-wine mouthfeel.

The vocabulary itself needs care. Paissoni and colleagues' review finds body to be widely used but incompletely defined across the research literature. A term such as silky may communicate an impression, while a comparison such as “less drying than the other wine” gives a clearer account of the observed difference.2. Paissoni et al. (2023), review of mouthfeel terminology and sensory and instrumental methods.

What winemaking changes

Maceration and pressing determine which skin and seed components enter the liquid. A white grape fermented on its skins can therefore acquire a drying texture that a rapidly pressed wine from the same variety lacks. The effect depends on the fruit and extraction conditions.

Lees aging introduces yeast-derived material and can modify mouthfeel. Oak contact and oxygen exposure change phenolics and other constituents during maturation. Fining can remove or alter some components, with trials needed to assess the result in the particular wine.

Adding a small proportion of another lot during blending may change texture more or less than its volume alone would suggest. The mixture needs tasting as a whole.

Comparing wines usefully

Compare at similar serving temperatures, and notice when the sensation occurs. Astringency can build over repeated sips; alcoholic warmth may be clearer after swallowing or spitting. Carbonation and temperature can change as a wine stands in the glass.

Sources