I suppose that’s a bigger problem in the US. The tolerance is 0,8% in the EU (in many countries it is only 0,5%) whereas in the US it can be up to 1,5% ABV.
If a wine is exported to a country where they require the wine to be labeled within 0,5% ABV from the actual content and they don’t use multiple labels for different markets, I can assume the ABV in the label is pretty accurate. I doubt there is much inaccuracy with the ABV in the EU.
I’ve seen many US wines here in Finland where they’ve replaced the original ABV in the label with a small sticker showing the more accurate value, though!
Bordeaux varietals - low 13’s to low 14’s
Syrah - 13 to low 14’s depending on terroir
Southern Rhone/Mediterranean varietals - 14 to high 14’s
Most Italian Red varietals - 14 to mid 14’s
Tempranillo - 14’s
Gamay - 13’s
Loire Cab Franc - low 13’s
Pinot Noir may not fit the OP, but mid 12’s to high 13’s
It’s rare you see a red on the low end but it happens on occasion.
I don’t disagree that reds can be balanced at 14-14.5 but it’s not my preference and especially above that you need a different kind of concentration and balance like Amarone. Even there, the wines are now too gawky for me. I’m not a fan of Zins at 15 and above. I can sense the heat and it’s not enjoyable to me.
For a long time, the alcohol listed on a label of European wine had more to do with math than chemistry: WineAlcBoundry - WineLowerRange where WineAlcBoundry = 14% and WineLowerRange = 1.5%. Hence the prevalence of 12.5% on labels.
I think, excluding wines greater than ~15%, our perceived alcohol of a wine has as much to do with the amount of ‘higher’ alcohols and stressed fermentations as the actual ethanol level.
It was the ‘17 Ontogeny - my first Bevan so I don’t have many reference points for their wines. Perhaps is just an outlier to the concept of > 15%? Will need to try some others in time. You know for science.
I’ve always thought that this incessant debate is kind of silly. Stylistically there is a difference between two wines from the same grapes where one clocks 12.5% and one clocks 14.5%, but that difference in physical alcohol in that glass is so small that I think we give it way too much weight.
I do get excited when I see California producers making Syrah or Cabernet at 12.5%, because it represents an entire philosophy to me. Not because I think Syrah at 15% is ‘hot’ or in any other way unworthy. I can love Storybook Zin at 13.5% and still love Turley’s Ueberroth Zin at 16.2%. Who knows how the Ueberroth would taste if it were picked so early as to keep to 13.5%, but I’m guessing it wouldn’t be nearly as lovely at the Storybook.
Even a very conservative and moderate producer like Williams-Selyem has allowed their Zinfandels to creep into the 15’s, while still making 13.2% Pinot Noir. I have to give them the credit to think that their Zin is better at 15.2% than 13.2%. And their Zin isn’t this huge flabby jam bomb with no elegance; it’s delicious and nuanced.
Respectfully, it is not silly at all. If anything, it just goes to show, for example, that our two palates could not be more polar opposites. That 2% difference that you discount, while may not be significant relative to whether you get inebriated from it, is actually extremely significant relative to your, or I should say my, perception of taste, flavor and weight. I cannot recall if I mentioned it in this thread, or another thread related to Loire Cabernet Franc, but I just had three bottles back to back of wines from the 2018 and 2019 vintages, all of which clocked over 14% in these warm vintages, and I’m basically walking away from all three. The perception of alcohol, and heaviness, was so palpable has to make the wines cumbersome, boring and not worth drinking to me. The herbaceous characteristic of the Franc grape itself was eliminated, and it was just heavy fruit.
I’m not discounting the difference in the end product, I just think that alcohol is difficult to impossible to isolate as the difference between two wines. Higher final alcohol means a lot about that wine (warmer vintage in general, longer hang-time, riper stems, riper phenols, dry conditions leading to harvest, etc.).
I’m also not saying that I love high alcohol (or low alcohol). My point is more that I think it is silly and to someone’s detriment to discount all wines above a certain arbitrary threshold. If you’ve tasted a specific wine and not liked it, good on you. But these folks that ‘won’t touch anything above 14%’ are just being elitist.
The OP’s title is actually a good one with my comments in mind. My ‘ideal’ Cabernet Sauvignon has 13.5% alc, but I’ve had examples all over the spectrum that have surprised me and I’ve liked. There are also 13.5% Cabernets out there that taste positively unripe at that level, depending on a dozen other vintage and site factors.
It’s funny how points of view have changed over the years - it wasn’t that long ago when a well-known critic lauded Bordeaux producers who “achieved” 14% natural alcohol, as if it was the ultimate goal to attain.
For all of us here, as experienced winos, our nose and mouths from experience are pretty good measurement instruments for our brains even if we also know that ABV on bottles have some accuracy issues. For whatever reasons individually, we know generally what we like and don’t like, which is the gist of the OP. And it could be grape and location and style specific.
On your specific point about Loire Cab Franc and also relating to other types of wines, I’ve become very comfortable now taking a break during solar vintages. More recently I thought it was going to happen for 2017 in much of Europe. But then a lot of finished wines had a playful acidity that drew me back in. From this perspective, in 2018, higher perceived alcohol, lower perceived acidity and overall balance, and some consideration for my pocketbook led me to again sit on the sideline largely after sampling a few dozen wines from various places in Europe in the last year. I’m sorry to hear some 2019s in bottle will present similar challenges to those of us who like lower alcohol and somewhat higher acidity in our wines. I have personally liked a number of 2019s already from places where many 2018s didn’t cut it.
Not everywhere. Different alc & labelling in many places.
To the OP - I don’t recall too many 14.5+ alc wines that I thought were light on their feet. I mean, maybe the alcohol isn’t obtrusive, but it is noticeable, especially after 2 or 3 glasses. Rhone blends with Grenache almost always tickle those numbers and they’re probably the best (most experienced) at trying to balance that, but you know when drinking it.
Otherwise I’m not too bothered on most wines. Agree with several mentioning Pinot (which if qualifies as medium/full bodied, I’m not interested in) that under 14% is strongly desired and under 13% is even better.
I agree with the interpretation. But, what is the penalty for noncompliance? And, how often are wine ABVs measured by the government to detect noncompliance. For many years, the SEC required mutual funds to supply it with data that no one in the SEC ever reviewed. (That has changed.)
And many don’t make that assumption. It’s not up to the consumers whether there is an accurate abv listed on the label – that’s up to the producers. The consumers have no choice but to go with what’s on the label, absent personal experience with the wine. The huge allowed abv labelling tolerances allowed in the US is annoying/frustrating, even though I do understand why some tolerance is allowed.
And, yes, Eric, some wines above 15% hide their alcohol well; in my experience, most do not; many folks (like myself) have zero interest in buying wines for which they have a 10% success rate. And, seeing as how I have never seen a label identify, or talk about, ‘higher’ alcohols and stressed fermentations, that’s not exactly a practical rubric to go by when buying wines – I don’t even know what you’re talking about when you say ‘higher alcohols’ – what did you mean by that?