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Dessert Wine

A dessert wine is often enjoyed after a meal, served with a dessert, or alone as the desert. They are often more alcoholic than regular red and white wines which is achieved in a few different ways. The goal for a sweet wine is high alcohol content in combination with a sugary sweet taste. The problem is that during fermentation the yeast consumes the sugar to make alcohol.

To make a dessert wine, the grapes have to be very sweet. This can be achieved by letting the grapes ripen as much as possible on the vine before making them into wine. Another way to get super sweet grapes is to pick them when they are frozen after a hard frost and separate the extra water before allowing them to ferment. Another method is to let the fungus known as noble rot decimate the grapes enough to sweeten them.

Some dessert wine is made by adding sugar to the overall mix either before fermentation with honey, or after as unfermented must. Alcohol can also be added after fermentation is over. Brandy is usually added, being a grape spirit itself, in a process known as fortification. This is also done to port wines.

 

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