Characterization of red, white and rosé wines with designation of origin alentejo and geographic indication alentejano

Abstract

The aim of this work was to characterize red, white and rosé wines submitted to the certification process done by the Alentejo Regional Wine Commission (CVRA) over several years. The reason of being of a demarcated winegrowing region is grounded on the singularity of their wines conferred by the local characteristics, such as the grape varieties used, the edaphoclimatic conditions and the associated cultural heritage. To stablish the fingerprint of the Designation of Origin Alentejo (DOC) and Geografic Indication Alentejano (IGP) wines, is essential both its sensory evaluation and its physical-chemical characterization. The values obtained in this certification process by the CVRA throughout several harvest years contribute to characterize and study the evolution of this wines to better establish their profile. Comparing the results here obtained with those published for Douro wines1, a wine region comparable to Alentejo in terms of shared interior Mediterranean climate2, we find for a similar interval of harvest years (2008-2015) that the means for red, white and rosé wines are much alike regarding total acidity, volatile acidity, pH and acquired alcohol strength, but noticeable lower in total sugars for Alentejo wines, especially for white and rosé wines (less than half g/L). We can also observe that DOC Alentejo and IGP Alentejano wines display very similar mean values of the various parameters, and that many of these variables have similar trends of evolution, in successive years of harvesting.