Creative Writing | Guide to Wine | Genealogy

Vintage Wines

Do all wines improve with age? If not, which wines do? Take your palate on a journey into the past.

The more you taste, the more you'll realise how different factors affect a wine: the grape or grapes used to make it, where those grapes were grown and how they were treated in the winery.

But those aren't the only factors. The flavour of many wines is intimately related to two key factors: the year it was made and how long ago it was made. These two factors are inextricably linked. When wine buffs discuss the 'vintage' of a wine, they are referring to the weather conditions in the year it was made and the impact these might have had on the wine. But as the wine gets older they will also be referring to the way that it is has aged.

It sounds complicated doesn't it? But it becomes less so when you unburden yourself of some baggage that may be lurking at the back of your mind. Let's consider two commonly held beliefs.

MYTH 1: A VINTAGE YEAR ON THE BOTTLE INDICATES QUALITY

This is true of only a tiny proportion of wines, mostly European. Like so many issues relating to wine, it is another case of southern versus northern winemaking. In the northern regions, where the climate changes dramatically from one year to the next, wine is more likely to reflect the year in which it was made. In the southern regions, where the weather tends to be less temperamental, wine is more likely to be pretty much the same from year to year.

But even in Europe vintage variation is becoming less of an issue than it once was. The leaps and bounds in winemaking technology have enabled producers to iron out the effects that a poor harvest might have on a wine. The truth is that the vintage only tends to be of vital importance when you're buying good-quality wines from areas such as Bordeaux and Burgundy.

MYTH 2: ALL WINES IMPROVE WITH AGE

Rubbish! The vast majority of wines - particularly whites - become increasingly dull and flaccid with age. Only very good-quality red wines, a few whites and some Champagnes become softer and more attractive with age - and even that is very much a matter of personal taste. All other wines are made to be consumed in a year or two. A love of rickety old wines - or 'le vice anglais' as the French sometimes call it - is a peculiarly Anglo-Saxon obsession that has little to do with the pursuit of pleasure. Yes, some wonderfully mature wines do have a charm all of their own, but the vast majority are like anything else that has been lurking in a dark, dank cellar for a few years - pale and dusty.

TASTE TEST

Old red Bordeaux is expensive, but for the purposes of this Taste Test you can keep costs down by choosing a wine that isn't from one of the star years. A trustworthy wine merchant will help. Try tasting:

a cheap one- or two-year-old Cabernet-based red Bordeaux
a ten- to fifteen-year-old Cabernet-based Bordeaux from a good vintage


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