Terroir 2020 banner
IVES 9 IVES Conference Series 9 Regionality in Australian Shiraz: Sensory profiles of wines from six regions and their associations with chemical, geographical and climatic elements

Regionality in Australian Shiraz: Sensory profiles of wines from six regions and their associations with chemical, geographical and climatic elements

Abstract

Aim: Regional characters relating to Shiraz in Australia are not well documented. This study aimed to characterize the sensory, chemical and climate profiles of wines from various Australian Shiraz producing regions. 

Methods and Results: Sets of wines (22 to 28) from six prominent Australian Shiraz producing regions were assessed by groups of regional winemakers using a rapid sensory method called Pivot© Profile (PP) to obtain biplots of their sensory characteristics. Three or four samples from each region were selected using Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering (AHC) analysis of the PP data resulting in a subset of twenty-two wines, which were then assessed using sensory descriptive analysis. A comprehensive chemical profile was also undertaken, including monoterpenes, norisoprenoids, low molecular weight sulphur compounds, oak volatiles, esters, and non-volatile compounds. Seventeen season-specific climate indices were also complied for each sample. Multivariate analyses (Principal Component Analysis and Partial Least-Squares Regression) showed that wines with stalky/cooked vegetal sensory attributes had higher cinnamate esters and dimethylsulfide, relating to a later budbreak and harvest day; wines with higher monoterpenes were associated with floral aroma; higher solar radiation was linked to higher tannin and colour density values, norisoprenoid and phenylethyl acetate concentrations and an association with dark fruit/dried fruit and tannin/colour attributes. 

Conclusions:

Distinctive sensory and chemical fingerprints exist for the specific regions studied, and the climatic profiles were strongly associated with key compounds influencing sensory differences. 

Significance and Impact of Study: Relating multiple site- and season-specific climate measures to chemical composition and characteristic sensory attributes of regional Australian Shiraz wines can help grape growers, winemakers and wine marketers better understand and promote the effect of place on their wines. 

DOI:

Publication date: March 17, 2021

Issue: Terroir 2020

Type: Video

Authors

Wes Pearson1,2*, Leigh Schmidtke1, I. Leigh Francis2, Sijing Li1, Andrew Hall1,3, B. Thomas Carr1,4, John Blackman1

1National Wine and Grape Industry Centre, Charles Sturt University, School of Agricultural and Wine Science, Locked Bag 588, Wagga Wagga, NSW 2678, Australia
2The Australian Wine Research Institute, PO Box 197, Glen Osmond, SA 5064, Australia
3Institute for Land, Water and Society, Charles Sturt University, PO Box 789, Albury, NSW 2640, Australia
4Carr Consulting, 1215 Washington Ave., Wilmette, Illinois, USA

Contact the author

Keywords

Wine regionality, Australian Shiraz, wine sensory profile, wine chemical profile, wine climate profile

Tags

IVES Conference Series | Terroir 2020

Citation

Related articles…

Grouping Vitis vinifera grapevine varieties based on their aromatic composition

Climate change is likely to impact wine typicity across the globe, raising concerns in wine regions historically renowned for the quality of their terroir1. Amongst several changes in viticultural practices, replacing some of the planting material (i.e. clones, rootstocks and cultivars) is thought to be one of the most promising potential levers to be used for adapting to climate change. But the change of cultivars also involves the issue of protecting the region’s wine typicity. In Bordeaux (France), extensive research has been conducted on identifying meridional varieties that could be good candidates to help guard against the effects of climate change2 while less research has been done concerning their impacts on Bordeaux wine typicity.

Evolución de los compuestos fenólicos durante el envero y la maduración en la DO Tarragona

La evolución de los contenidos en las pieles de compuestos fenólicos (fenólicos totales, antocianos totales, antocianos individuales por HPLC, catequinas y proantocianidoles) a lo largo

SENSORY PROFILES AND EUROPEAN CONSUMER PREFERENCE RELATED TOAROMA AND PHENOLIC COMPOSITION OF WINES MADE FROM FUNGUSRESISTANT GRAPE VARIETIES (PIWI)

Planting grape varieties with several resistance loci towards powdery and downy mildew reduces the use of fungicides significantly. These fungus resistant or PIWI varieties (acronym of German Pilzwiderstandsfähig) contribute significantly to the 50% pesticide reduction goal, set by the European Green Deal for 2030. However, wine growers hesitate to plant PIWIs as they lack experience in vinification and are uncertain, how consumer accept and buy wines from these yet mostly unknown varieties. Grapes from four white and three red PIWI varieties were vinified in three vintages to obtain four diffe-rent white and red wine styles, respectively plus one rosé.

austrianvineyards.com: online viewer of all designations of Austrian wine

To digitally record and present all the origins of Austrian wines in the same perfect and clear way was the motivation for the Austrian Wine Marketing Board (Austrian Wine) to start with the project in 2018. In June 2021 the results were presented to the public in an online viewer showing all the designations of Austrian wine, available at https://austrianvineyards.com in a largely barrier-free manner. The online viewer provides tailored individual maps fitted to the respective zoom level. The smallest unit of wine-origins in Austria is called Ried and is displayed in a plot-specific manner highlighting areas under vine. Information on the Ried include administrative district, winegrowing municipality, cadastral municipality, large collective vineyard site, specific winegrowing region, generic winegrowing region, winegrowing area and, in many cases, an illustrative picture. Complementary data on the size, elevation (minimum-maximum), orientation (in 8 sectors plus flat) and gradient (minimum, maximum, average) are based on the area under vine according to the EU’s Integrated Administration and Control System. Additional information covers climate data. The diagrams are taken from the monthly breakdown of data in the annals of the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics, Austria provide a display of values for air temperature, precipitation, and sunshine hours for the reference year and the long-term average. Seasonal aggregated data on temperature, precipitation, and sunshine hours complete the display. Short descriptions with emphasis on geology and soil, field name in historical maps, etymology of the denomination, and main planted variety complements the available information for the main designations in the online viewer. These descriptions are compiled by winegrowers, geologists, historians, and journalists. All the information and data can be extracted to a pdf-file. Printed vineyard maps are also available. Missing content regarding wine origins in Styria will be completed in winter 2021/22.

Iso-/anisohydric behavior in wine grapes may be a matter of soil moisture

There are claims that wine grape cultivars are either isohydric or anisohydric; the former maintaining, and the latter decreasing, their plant water status as soil moisture declines. However, available information is inconsistent. There are those that show an existence of a continuum in cultivar response to soil moisture rather than a distinct categorization. Others even show both behaviors in the same cultivar grown in different environments. In this study we investigated the behavior of 30 own rooted Vitis vinifera cultivars during successive drydown and rewatering cycles over two growing seasons in arid eastern Washington (<200 mm annual precipitation).