Understanding Rose Wine

One should know that Rose wine is not a blend of red and white wine. They are made from red grape-varieties.

Rose wines also known as Blush wines are wines having a reddish tinge which makes it more of red wine, and less of white wine. Its actual color varies depending on the grapes used. It sometimes appears more of orange color than pink or purple.

Rose wines are produced by crushing the red grapes early enough so that they don’t lose their color or tannin before coming to final product. Rose wines have very little tannin.

Earlier it was though that rose wine is a white wine mixed with some red wine. It was done with the purpose to retain its crispness of white wine and hearty character of a red wine. But that’s not true this experiment was not good enough.

Rose wines are sometimes mocked at by wine specialist, though few find its crispiness very refreshing in hot weather. This is the reason it is sometimes called as summer wine. They have very different characteristics depending on the place where it comes from. Like European Rose wines are dry, while ones that are from the United States are sweet.

The basic difference between red wine and rose wine is that rose wine’s skin is left to ferment with juice for four to five days and in case of red wines its skin is left for more than weeks and can range up to a few months.

Popular type of rose wine is White Zinfandel those are popular in California. They are made using the red zinfandel grapes. They are mainly the result of a practice called as bleeding. It is commonly used in the production of Zinfandel. In case of bleeding an ample quantity of liquid is taken so that the resulting wine is stronger and more concentrated. After the satisfying result, the process continues just like white wine. Rosé de Provence is produced similarly.

Another king of rose wine is Beaujolais wines. They are formed by fermentation method called as carbonic maceration. This allows them to have deeper color. It is a very crisp, dark berry wine with very soft tannins.

Some rose wines are called grey or pale rose wine and made by pressing grapes as soon as they arrive in the cellar. The process is similar to that of making white wine. The pink colored rose wines are made by putting grapes in the fermentation tank after being crushed.