Acolon is a type of grape variety. It is a cross between a 'Blauer Lemberger' (Blaufränkisch) and 'Dornfelder'. It was created in 1971 at the Staatliche Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt für Wein- und Obstbau in Weinsberg (nr. Württemberg), Germany. The variety was officially recognised in 2002. It ri...

Agiorgitiko (Greek: Αγιωργίτικο; also known as Aghiorghitiko, Mavro Nemeas and St. George) is one of the two widely-grown heat-resistant Greek wine-making grape varieties, the other being Xynomavro. It is a red variety that has traditionally been grown in the Nemea region of the Peloponne...

Aglianico (pronounced "ah-LYAH-nee-koe") is a black grape grown in the Campania and Basilicata regions of Italy. The vine originated in Greece and was brought to Campania by Greek settlers. The name may be a corruption of Vitis hellenica, Italian for "Greek vine".[1] Another etymology derives the na...

Alexandrouli is a red grape variety grown in Georgia. It is also called Alexsandrouli and Alexandriuli. It is reputed to be one of the oldest and greatest of the Georgian varieties, but is also reported by the Geilweilerhof database as a selected seedling of Muscat of Alexandria. This may reflect...

Alicante Bouschet is a wine grape variety that has been widely cultivated since 1866. It is a cross of Grenache with Petit Bouschet (itself a cross of the very old variety Teinturier du Cher and Aramon). Alicante is a teinturier, a grape with red flesh. It is the only teinturier grape that belongs t...

Alvarelhão is a red wine grape grown in northern Portugal. Alvarelhão must have originated in northern Portugal, but little is known of its ancestry. DNA studies have shown some similarity to Esgana Cão. In Portugal there are 470 hectares of either Alvarelhão or the grape called Brancelho....

Ancellotta is a wine grape variety mainly grown in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, but also in some other parts of north Italy, and in south Switzerland. Synonyms include Ancelotta di Massenzatico, Ancelotti, Balsamina Nera, Lancelotta, Rossissimo, Uino and Uvino. In Emilia Romagna it is used m...

Barbaroux is the French name for a red wine grape variety, known as Barbarossa in Italian. It is used in the Cassis AOC in France, and in Provence and Corsica, and in Bertinoro in Emilia-Romagna....

Barbera is a red wine grape variety that is the second most-planted variety in Italy (the first is Sangiovese).[1] It gives good yields and can impart deep colour, low tannins and (unusually for a warm-climate red grape) high levels of acid. Century-old vines still exist in many regional vineyards ...

Bastardo (Trousseau Noir, Tressot) is an old variety of red wine grape. It is grown in small amounts in many parts of Western Europe; most famously it is used in Portuguese port wine. It makes deep cherry red wines with high alcohol and flavours of red berry fruits. DNA fingerprinting has shown t...

Blatina is red wine grape variety autochthonous of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It has a functional female flower (auto-sterile), and for that reason it is always cultivated in plantations with other varieties such as Allicante bouschet (Kambuša), Merlot, and Trnjak, which at the same time pollinate Bla...

Blauer Portugieser is a red Austrian and German wine grape found primarily in the Rheinhessen, Pfalz and wine regions of Lower Austria. It is also one of the permitted grapes in the Hungarian wine Egri Bikavér (Bull's blood). The cultivated area in Germany (as of 1 March 2004) covers 4,980 hectare...

Blaufränkisch (German for blue "Frankish") is a dark-skinned variety of grape used for red wine. Blaufränkisch, which is a late-ripening variety gives red wines which are typically rich in tannin and may exhibit a pronounced spicy, masculine character. The grape is grown across Central Europe, inc...

Bobal is a variety of Vitis Vinifera, a red grape used in winemaking. It is native to the Utiel-Requena region in Valencia, Spain. The name derives from the Latin bovale, in reference to the shape of a bull’s head. It is grown predominantly in the Utiel-Requena DO where it represents about 90% of ...

Decanting is all about removing sediment from a wine, and allowing the wine to breathe. These are things that older, red wines need to do – younger wines and white wines do not usually have to be decanted. First, the sediment. Wines have all sorts of organic things in them - yeast, grape ski...

The history of wine spans thousands of years and is closely intertwined with the history of agriculture, cuisine, civilization and man himself. Archaeological evidence suggests that the earliest wine production came from sites in Georgia and Iran, dating from 6000 to 5000 BC. The archaeological evid...

In the 60s and 70s, the bad old days of Hirondelle and other truly naff wines, screw caps were mostly associated with cheap wines. Nowadays, however, perceptions have changed and many winemakers in the New World, for example, Chile, the USA, and Australia are experimenting with screw tops on many ...