Why is Sercial dry?

[Marco D.]

I always wondered why Sercials are dry-ish, Malvazias sweetish etc... Can not the sweetness levels be controlled by winemaking? Can't someone plant Serical at a lower altitude and vinify it sweeter? Is sweet Sercial just not any good?

[Roy Hersh]

Yes the sweetness could be adjusted during the fortification/fermentation process, depending on when the aguardente is added thereby prematurely curtailing the fermentation leaving RS at a pre-determined level.

However, to answer your question directly, the key is that Sercial to show at its best ... which is to say, with the bright and vibrant acidity, needs to be at a higher altitude for this very purpose.

Nothing worse than flabby syrup! How disappointed are you when you drink a delicious Malmsey only to wonder, how great it could have been, if there had been more acidity to balance out the viscous juice.

[Marco D.]

Hey Roy,

Thanks for the reply.

But why not plant Malvazia at higher altitudes to get higher acids? The inverse of my original question might be why is Malvasia sweet? Is a drier Malvasia not so good?

I guess my real question is: Is there something special about the various grape varieties that has continued the tradition that they be vinified a certain way?

I suspect the explanation is complex and the result of hundreds of years of trial and error. :)

[Roy Hersh]

I'll leave the complexities of the answer to your very valuable question to Peter or Reidar who supercede my knowledge on that score.

However, I believe we are speaking of grape varietal typicity if I understand your question correctly. Some grapes have more natural acidity than others. Others provide more RS, others may be deeply extracted (from higher levels of anthrocyanins which provide pigementation to the grape skins) and others provide for textural and body weight characteristics while others still, are utilized for their aromatics.

So, I know that the Malvasia Candida grape possesses enough acidity when grown/picked properly, but it is always grown close to sea level and due to its sturdy skin, it can remain on the vine very late into the harvest. It is a naturally sweeter style of grape partially because it is allowed to ripen a bit longer, partially because it is the genetic makeup of the Malvasia grape and the fact that it is typically grown in warmer expositions certainly helps.

I hope this provides some insight, but again, will defer to the experts here.

[Reidar Andersen]

Well, this question is really interesting. Must admit I don't know too much without reading a bit. Maybe in Mr. Alex Liddell's book.

First I think I will ask him so I have this morning forwarded the question to him.

Hope he is home, he travels a lot......

[João Rico]

As far as i know sercial, Verdelho, Bual and Malmsey have their unique characteristics due to the nature of each grapes. The style from the different houses i think would come from the localization of the vineyard.

The way to emulate the sweetness in a grape is with Tinta Negra Mole (as posted before) and that's with use of winemaking expertisew. As i was talking to Ricardo and Americo from Barbeito, they explained me the process and told me some funny episodes regarding the winemaking with TNM. You see, sometimes they have to be awake all night controlling the Residual Sugar to make a specific kind of Madeira and then sometimes they forgot (or fell a sleep) and the wine that should be a Semi-Dry Madeira is now a Semi-Sweet.



João Rico
Portugal

[Marco D.]

I always wondered what it would be like to taste a Malmsey and Sercial of the same sweetness levels. With such a tasting, I would assume it would be easier to decern varietal differences between the grapes (without the differences being obscured by the powerful influence of residual sugar).

But of course other factors would need to be controlled: time in cask, vintage conditions, vineyard micro-climate, heating process, etc. Not sure if this could ever be acheived.

[Reidar Andersen]

Luckily, Alex Liddell was home today and he quickly answered my mail.

Thanks a lot to him !! :!:

He gave me permission to post a quotation from him:

"I think most of the contributors to your forum have a part of the doubtless complex explanation of the matter. Madeira malmsey is a sweet wine largely because of historical accident: it was originally planted specifically to compete with sweet wines originating in Cyprus, and no-one has thought fit to change this, although elsewhere as a table wine it can be (and is) made dry. Generally speaking, I think that the practice of growing malvasia at low altitudes and sercial at high altitudes, and the styles of wine now associated with them, etc., etc., have simply been honed by generations of experience and a slowly-consolidated consensus of opinion. It would be rather perverse (and perhaps doomed to failure) to try to go against the lessons learned over such a long period of time. (Detailed explanations of why this is so, in terms of grape physiology, climate and terroir, are doubtless in principle available, but their complexity goes far beyond my knowledge.) I know that some vintners have experimented with vinifying varieties in different ways, but have regarded the results merely as curiosities. Such is the weight of tradition with the four standard noble varieties: a weight of relatively well-defined tradition which has led to the styles of sweetness associated with them (dry, medium-dry, medium-sweet, and sweet) having become legally enshrined in terms of degrees Beaumé, and having been cut adrift from the varieties with which they were originally associated. The traditions with regard to other varieties, such as Bastardo and even Terrantez, are not so well defined. I would go as far as to say that there is no standard way of vinifying Bastardo. The MWC, for example, currently adopts a style for Bastardo, on the rare occasions they are able to obtain it, which veers more towards medium-sweet than medium dry. On the other hand, most of the older examples I have encountered have been pretty dry (going backwards in time, let us say, from the Adegas de Toreão 1927 – which is incredibly, and to some unpleasantly, dry). Terrantez is almost invariably dry – but the MWC’s Terrantez 1899 is amazingly sweet. I think, in any case, that bottle ageing tends to have an organoleptic drying-out effect on madeira – the characteristics of the wine in the dry-sweet spectrum become blurred. Anyone experienced in tasting old madeiras will know how often they have been confused by this – and have consequently had the embarrassment of mis-identifying the variety at a blind tasting. Be of good cheer – the experts often make such mistakes! There are old boals so dry that they seem like verdelhos, and there are sweeter-than-usual verdelhos. Even old malmsey – like the Adegas de Toreão 1901 - can occasionally seem to be a dry wine. But, of course, the previously-mentioned fact that, unlike today, there were no legal bench-marks regarding sugar content in the nineteenth century or for much of the twentieth century, is also part of the explanation – and is why I referred above to the “relatively well-defined” style traditions of the four noble varieties. Nineteenth-century vintners made all their wines according to their taste, so some variation is only to be expected"

Reidar

[Marco D.]

An amazingly well thought out response by Alex. Many thanks to Alex for the prompt response and to Reidar for the initiative to contact Alex.

[Roy Hersh]

Thanks Reidar and to Alex Liddell as well. I am hoping that at some point, I can convince him to attend one of my Madeira tastings here.

The post itself was amazingly informative and shows the depth of complexity to the original question.

Hey, maybe Mr. Lidell will now look in from time to time as this Forum continues to evolve.


I love this place.

[Shawn Denkler]

It is great to get some information from Alex Liddell on the subject, he certainly knows madeira well. It is so hard to get information on madeira, while there are many knowledgeable people on port.

[Peter Reutter]

I just got back from the holidays and what a great disscussion I have found here
Of course after Alex' post there is little to say. But I would like to add two additional facts that came to my mind as I read this very informative thread:

1:
May be some of the grape varieties characateristics are no longer as strictly defined as they used to be. Besides the "Old Wine" blends from D'Oliveiras (resulting from very small harvests, thus forcing the winemaker to mature a blend of different grapes) there are no old examples of blended vintage wines known to me. But today with the MWC's Alvada blend and the Malvasia-Bual blends from Barbeitos, it seems that some companys have thought about the very strict grape-style-sweetness pattern as well. Of course these blends are from varieties "close" together in style and sweetness, but I am not entirely sure if such a thing like a Sercial-Bual blend is a thing not possible. Especially when you consider Noel Cossarts book "Madeira - the island wineyard" where he describes the art of blending (pages 106 and 107) writing about how he used a Sercial to add to a blend and finally (after the first blend fell apart) succeeded in doing so. Also see the earlier thread about the Jubilee Solera.

2:
I absolutely agree with Alex that it is quite easy to mistake old Madeira wines for the wrong grape variety. Old Sercials can be quite mild leading to a Verdelho-like impression, Malmseys can be quite dry, also leading to a Verdelho-like level of sweetness (though seldomly loosing that special cough-syrup taste). I remember a good vintage madeira that I tasted in 2002 that had no grape variety indicated. I went for Bual, but others believed it was TNM or Sercial (because of the acidity) or even a blend.
Especially after Oidium and Phylloxera I wouldn't be surprised at all if some of the vintage madeiras in the desperate years after those two catastrophes were blended from different grape varieties.

I added the tasting note for the wine that I mentioned:
1878
Justino Henriques Filhos Lda. "Fanal" Fine Madeira Wine
Bottle:
Modern bottle of early industrial make, neck label with vintage, wicker cap, short leaking crumbling cork, light crusting, small tax stamp on the bottle.
Color:
Bright mahogany with orange rim.
Nose:
Intense and harmonious, filling the room in seconds, molasses, beef bouillon, orange peel.
Palate:
Lots of alcohol but not spirity, good sweetness with lots of balanced acidity, mouthwatering, caramel, molasses, roasted coffee beans and the orange peels again. Long orangy finish. Reminded me of Boal (even though no grape variety was mentioned on the label) but it could also be a good Tinta Negra Mole wine.
Footnote:
Tasted 1/2002.

Best
Peter

[Roy Hersh]

Thank you Reidar and Peter. With the type of expertise here, why would anyone go anywhere else to discuss Madeira? What a great thread and I am learning something new which is great!