World wine appellations

WINE TALK
1

Formalizing the Complexity / Diversity of Wine Appellations

World wine appellations show a certain complexity and diversity to express their specifications.

The first level of specifications normally appear on the wine bottle labels referring to aging, wineyards and “climat”/“terroirs”, grapes, … (expressed as reservas, crus, monovarietals, …).

Nevertheless, the same terms often correspond to different formalizations and specifications of the world appellations.

For example in Bourgogne an AOC (appellation of controlled origin) may refer to “Regionale”, “Village”, “PremierCru” or “GrandCru”;
however while the PremierCrus are a higher quality type of the Villages AOCs,
the GrandCrus (such as Richebourg, Corton-Charlemagne, Chambertin, …) make AOC appellations per-se’.

A peculiarity of Bourgogne appellations is that the same GrandCru may be subdivided between different producers.

At the same time, in Bordeaux an AOC GrandCru may be specified in up to 5 different levels (1er to 5eme);
however for a Margaux even the top 1er GrandCru remains part of the Margaux AOC appellation.

On the other hand, other top Bordeaux appellations such as Pomerol (or more generally in France the ChateauNeuf-du-Pape)
traditionally did not include GrandCru specification in their AOC .

In Italy the DOCG (denomination of controlled and guaranteed origin) appellations normally include a “Riserva” or “Superiore” typologies referring to higher quality wines in terms of aging and grapes selection,
although such requirements are different between the Riservas of the different Italian DOCG appellations
(Brunello di Montalcino and Barolo being the most demanding).

Similarly in Spain the DOC (denomination of controlled origin) foresees a “GranReserva” as the highest quality typology, that e.g. in the case of Rioja has significantly more stringent aging requirements than similarly specified GranReserva from APP or GI (geographical indication) appellations in SouthAmerica.

A unified template may be modelled to map the diversity in the implementations of concepts and specifications.

The principle is based on abstracting a high level formalization for the world wine appellations, before dealing with their characteristics and contents.

A prototype template is going to be posted next.
Suggestions are welcome.

2

:popcorn: Do we really need an additional level of standardization?

3

There is no AOC Grand Cru whatsoever in Bordeaux. The few select producers are rated from 1st to 5th Cru classes, but they have nothing to do with appellation regulations.

What do you mean by unified template? Do you mean that all the wines that aim for Riserva / Reserva / Reserve levels should all be treated equally from the perspective of vinification? Be aged for the same period of time in oak?

4

Simone,
Are you asking as a fellow hobbyist? Or asking as someone with an affiliation to a business or group trying to formalize these World Wine Appellations?

5

Tom,

I am doing research on my own, no commercial or professional relations.

6

Otto,

by “in Bordeaux an AOC GrandCru” I of course meant “a GrandCru in a Bordeaux AOC” : the message I want to pass is exactly that in Bordeaux a Ch.Margaux1er"GrandCru" or a Ch.BoydCantenac3eme"GrandCru" belong to the “AOC Margaux” (together with all the other Margaux aoc wines), while in Bourgogne each wine labelling the “GrandCru” semantic makes an AOC by itself (e.g. LaRomanee"GrandCru" is an AOC per se’, separated from the whole aoc VosneRomanee).

7

RTP Richard, is that you?

1 Like
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This is because there is no official appellation of any Crus in Bordeaux. The 1855 classification is a completely different thing - just a list of wines considered to be great (or the most expensive) at the time. It wouldn’t even make sense to have a Cru system in Bordeaux, where the wines can be made with any fruit the producer chooses to use within the appellation - the fruit used in the wine is not tied to vineyard. Typically Cru systems are tied to the vineyard, whereas in Bordeaux they are not, which is why it’s confusing to compare Burgundian and Bordelais Cru wines.

Secondly, you still seem to have confused something. You are now speaking of left bank Bordeaux wines as Grand Cru wines, whereas the only Grand Cru wines you can find in Bordeaux are in Saint Émilion. Ch. Margaux is classified as 1er Cru wine in the 1855 classification, not 1er Grand Cru. Boyd-Cantenac is 3eme Cru, not 3eme Grand Cru. This confuses the discussion about Cru systems of Bordeaux and Burgundy even further.

1 Like
9

Right.

Bordeaux’s is a producer classification within named sub-regions. It is not a vineyard classification (like Burgundy’s or Mosel’s).

10

The scholastic information in the previous posts, well known to everyone who has any education on wine, is just adding to the problem that often the same semantics is used despite the conceptual differences (e.g. between Bourgogne and Bordeaux) .
Regarding the Ch.MargauxPremier"GrandCru" it suffices to look at how it is officially labelled (attached image) ,
s-l500
allowed within the Margaux aoc .
Incidentally, if it would have been labelled just as “PremierCru”, it would have clashed anyway with the nomenclature in Bourgogne (again despite the different meaning obviously).