Not a clue. I guess it means wines with lots of oak. It can also apparent mean highly acidic wines like Barbera and Beaujolais but cannot include Bordeaux or Burgundy. Apparently, Jadot’s Beaujolais have more fruit than their Burgundies. Who knew.
I think of Loring as a prime example of fruit forward. The fruit is so pure and in your face it is almost painful. The wines do age just fine.
When I think modern wines, I think Parkerized wines, low acid, ample oak, highly polished, and gobs of fruit.
Fruit forward is probably a characteristic, but not the only one.
Oak is not fruit, I think.
High acidity accentuates fresh fruit aromas and flavors.
Exactly, Peter. I can think of a number of wines that are fruit forward but nowhere near “modern.” The first couple that jump to mind are the Briceland Alderpoint Pinot, and the Enderle & Moll Bundsandstein.
I think this is just a rumor. Most people I know do not like dry Rieslings, me included. And the latest statistics show that most Germans still prefer off dry and sweet wines.
Cris says it very well.
Terms like “fruit forward” and “modern” are highly subjective, and on Wine Berserkers, often meant in at least a mildly negative way. There is a lot of overlap in the way those terms are used here, but not every wine that might be called fruit forward is also modern, and not every wine which would be considered modern is fruit forward.
One interesting example is Valdicava Brunello. Their vineyard is located in a microclimate in Montalcino which produces great ripeness and concentration to the fruit. Which causes many people to label/deride them as being “modern,” particularly if they drink the wines before they have matured, and yet in actuality, the winemaking actually doesn’t have most of the hallmarks of what is considered modern Brunello. As Antonio Galloni wrote:
Vincenzo Abbruzzese is one of the most outspoken, passionate growers in Montalcino. His beautifully tended vineyards yield some of the richest wines in the region; and that’s where most of the focus is – on the vineyards. The winery itself is unremarkable and is equipped with just the bare essentials. All of the wines are aged in large, neutral oak; what comes through is Abbruzzese’s commitment to low yields, sustainable farming and non-interventionalist winemaking.
. . .
Valdicava has been somewhat of a controversial property over the last few years. The Brunellos are typically very concentrated and dense when young, which can make them hard to assess. Make no mistake about it though; these are very serious wines whose only difficulty lies in giving them a few more years in bottle than the vast majority of Brunellos. A vertical tasting last year going back to 1988 published on > http://www.erobertparker.com > showed that the Valdicava Brunellos age exquisitely.
Yes, that’s the obvious, literal meaning, so I’d assume that’s what people mean.
Various yeast strains create some degree or other of fruity esters. In some regions the native yeasts are fairly neutral. That’s a term. In others, they create more fruity character. And some inoculation methods predate commercial isolates. You can browse a winemaking supply store’s yeast selections to see that many are selected for the aroma/flavor compounds they produce, some are selected for being “neutral”, while others are selected for other reasons (to deal with various issues). So, intentionally or not, the yeasts present in the ferm can make a wine more fruity.
Other grape variety or clone specific compounds may be, or perceived to be, more fruity.
You can certainly pick before full flavor development.
Concentration level would be a factor. Over-cropped. Skin-to-juice ratio (skin thickness and berry size). Shrivel. Bleeding off. Efficiency of maceration. Stuff like that.
Then you have various flaws that can dull fruit expression.
That certainly hasn’t been my experience in Germany. Do you think Germans who take a big interest in wine like sweet riesling? Or is are sweet wines more popular in the mass market?
Well that is true, I suppose, and yet comparing an 05 Cos with an 09 Le Dome suggests that even among Bordelais, “modern” and “fruit forward” are subject to massive differences in interpretation.
I think describing something as modern is useful only in regions with producers that depart from broad stylistic norms for their region. It is useful to describe a Barolo producer that uses roto fermentation and barriques as modern since that delineates it from typical examples. Often, then, describing something as modern is more a technical statement than a statement about fruitiness, though that is often a goal. In a region such as Mosel which has a history of highly technical winemaking, the distinction is not especially meaningful.
Astonishingly, the study of the Geisenheim University shows that young Germans drink significantly less dry wines than people of my age – see page 38. That suggests that off-dry and sweet white wines are very popular in the mass market. Apart from that, there obviously are distinct regional differences. In the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer region for instance, the interest in traditional Riesling seems to be higher than in other regions.
Lee,
Thanks for the thinking of us.
It is worth mentioning that all things being equal, lower alcohol allows fruit expression, or, perhaps more correctly, higher alcohol suppresses the perception of fruit.
On the other hand, higher alcohol tends to correlate with riper fruit, which may seem fruitier to many people than less ripe fruit.
I think you are classifying the results incorrectly. In most cases, dry wines are the most common choice. The results could easily be described as “most Germans prefer dry or off-dry wines” rather than the way you describe them as sweet or off-dry being preferred.
Yes. As fruit ripens, and alc goes up, it works both for and against the perception for fruit. It is a bit yin/yang…