Aroma profile of Tempranillo tropical red wines from different seasons in the São Francisco valley, northeast of Brazil

Aromatic characteristics of wines are strongly influenced by agronomical and enological factors, depending of the climate, cultivar and winemaking process. Tropical wines are a new concept of vitiviniculture that is being developped in the Northeast of Brazil since the 80’s, located between 8-9º latitude of the South Hemisphere, where the second most important cultivar used for reds is Tempranillo. In this condition, vines produce grapes and enologists elaborate wines twice a year, because high temperatures, solar radiation and water availability for irrigation.

The aim of this work was to determine aromatic profiles of Tempranillo red wines, from three vintages, by using gas chromatography-mass spectrometer (GC-MS). The volatile compounds were extracted by SPME and analyzed on a Shimadzu GC 2010 Plus instrument. The volatile compounds were identified by comparison of the mass spectra recorded by the spectrometer database-NIST, as well as matching the retention indices and mass spectra with the literature data. The concentration of the volatile compounds was determined and quantified by an external calibration curve.

Results are discussed and showed that Tempranillo red wines presented different aroma profiles according to the vintage and seasons, and compounds were identified as esters, alcohols, acids, hydrocarbons and phenylpropanoid. The comparison of the results with data from the literature suggests that the Tempranillo tropical wines were influenced by climate and cultivar factors, presenting typicality that is highly valorized for wines from a determined region worldwide.