Beyond liking scores: the importance of the drinking experience to understand our consumers

Changes in the low molecular weight phenolic fraction, obtained by liquid-liquid microextraction technique, were studied after controlled oxidation of two typologies of Sangiovese wines (Brunello di Montalcino and Chianti Classico) belonging to two vintages (2017 and 2018). The fractions were characterized by LC-MS and quantified by HPLC. The most abundant extracted compounds were the phenolic acids. The effect of oxidation, vintage, and wine typology was stated by a three-ways ANOVA. Gallic and syringic acids significantly increased after oxidation while (–)-epicatechin decreased the most.

4-Ethylphenol (EP) in wine is associated with organoleptic defects such as barn and horse sweat odors. The origin of EP is the bioconversion reaction of p-coumaric acid (CA), naturally present in grapes and grape musts by contaminating yeasts of the genus Brettanomyces bruxellensis.
Yeast cell walls (YCW) have shown adsorption capacities for different compounds. They could be applied to wines in order to adsorb either CA and/or EP and thus reduce the organoleptic defects caused by the contaminating yeasts.

Background: The Flavan-3-ol extraction from grape skin and seed during red-winemaking and their retention into wines depend on many factors, some of which are modified in the winemaking of blend wines. Recent research shows that Marselan, have grapes with high proportion of skins with high concentrations of flavanols, but produces red-wines with low proportion of skin derived flavanols, differently to the observed in Syrah or Tannat. But the factors explaining these differences are not yet understood.

Infection of grapes (Vitis vinifera) by Botrytis cinerea (grey mould) is a frequent occurrence in vineyards and during prolonged wet and humid conditions can lead to significant detrimental impact on yield and overall quality. Growth of B. cinerea causes oxidisation of phenolic compounds resulting in a loss of colour and formation of a suite of off-flavours and odours in wine made from excessively infected fruit. Apart from wine grapes, developing post-harvest B. cinerea infection in high-value horticultural products during storage, shipment and marketing may cause significant loss in fresh fruits, vegetables and other crops. A rapid and sensitive assessment method to detect, screen and quantify fungal infection would greatly assist viticultural growers and winemakers in determining fruit quality.

Yeast cell walls (CWs) may adsorb wine components with a significant impact on wine quality. When dealing with red wines, this adsorption is mainly related to physicochemical interactions between wine polyphenols and cell wall mannoproteins. However, mannoproteins are a heterogeneous family of complex peptidoglycans including long and highly branched N-linked oligosaccharides and short linear O-linked oligosaccharides, resulting in a huge structural diversity.