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Tasty reads

The wine-tasting: smell

December 12, 2012
Bouquet del vino

The bouquet is the main characteristic of a good wine, though the less known. In fact, there can be beautiful flowers without smell, but there can’t be a good wine without bouquet.

Bouquet del vinoBut, what exactly is the bouquet? A scent, a generous and pleasant scent; its name comes from the French language, where it means “bunch of flowers”, but what else? It’s not clear. The bouwquet could be defined as “wine’s soul”, that undefinable particular that science cannot reproduce. Professional wine-tester define three kinds of bouquet, that appesr one after the other while keeping wine in the mouth; they are the primary, the secondary and the tertiary bouquet.

The primary bouquet is the original flavour of certain kinds of grapes: here in the Langhe it is typical of a wine such as the Moscato.

The secondary bouquet is made by the ferments who live in the must and transform it into wine. So, this bouquet is born while the new wine ferments, and is characterized by a winy smell, that same smell that fills the cellar in the time of the harvest, mixed with fruity flavors such as peach, prune, abricot, raspberry, or flower flavor, such as violet, rose, iris, lily of the valley, carnation, peony, or others. These flavors are so percise, that allow experts to recognize from which vineyard comes a particular wine.

In the end we have the tertiary bouquet, the final one, coming from peace and solitude of the cellars. It is originated and develops from the fruit or flower flavors, changing them into some kind of cooked meat, game, humus flavor. It is the essential bouquet, that a wine obtains with age.

Texts from “Barolo as I feel it” by M. Martinelli (ed. Sagittario 1993)

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Massimo Martinelli

I was born near a river, the biggest Italian river, the Po, in a zone where it is already majestic ald solemn. Rivers have been signs and nests for civilisation. To me this is a great cultural honor because the ancient cultures were linked to the rivers, and events in history have often happened on water. Rivers have been ways for transports and commerce, and ideas also; from them I learned that things go, but they don't come back. So I have a "liquid" sensibility, and I strongly prefer wine to water. I intensely study it. Either as a producer, in the Renato Ratti firm in Annunziata di La Morra, in the core of the land of Barolo, or in writing and talking (courses of wine-testing, of cooking); the titles of my books are well-known (perhaps because they are difficult to find): Wine-testing (Quaderni del Museo Ratti dei Vini di Alba 1975), Langhe cooking wine (edizioni Antoroto-Mondovì 1977). I also gather wine labels; my collection is very interesting. It is composed by around fifty thousand labels. In the Langhe, in the land of Barolo I have found a very peaceful life. Massimo Martinelli ------------------------- Sono nato in riva ad un fiume, il più grande fiume d'Italia, il Po, in un punto in cui è già maestoso ed imponente. I fiumi sono stati i segni e le culle della civiltà. Per me ciò costituisce un grande privilegio culturale essendo le antiche civiltà collegate ai fiumi, come le vicende dell'umanità che si sono svolte lungo i corsi d'acqua! I fiumi inoltre hanno permesso rapidità di scambi commerciali e di idee, per questo so che le cose vanno e non ritornano. Ho quindi il senso "liquido" e preferisco decisamente il vino all'acqua. Ad esso infatti mi dedico con accanimento. Sia come produzione, nelle Cantine Renato Ratti all'Annunziata di La Morra, nel cuore del Barolo, sia con scritti o interventi divulgativi (corsi di degustazione, di conoscenza, di cucina), con titoli ormai prestigiosi (anche perché introvabili), quali La degustazione (Quaderni del Museo Ratti dei Vini di Alba 1975), Langhe cucina vino (edizioni Antoroto-Mondovì 1977). Ed ancora raccogliendo le etichette dei vini, oggetto di collezione che può essere considerata fra le più interessanti, con circa 50 mila esemplari. Nelle Langhe, nelle terre del Barolo ho trovato una grande oasi di pace. Massimo Martinelli

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