I once encountered an observation that "rosé wines are difficult to imagine even when you know their origin and grape variety." While this is a fascinating perspective, as someone actually involved in winemaking, I find myself thinking, "Yes, that might indeed be true."
So why is it challenging to connect the information about rosé wines' origins and grape varieties with the actual wine characteristics, even when these details are known beforehand? Today, I want to explore this question by focusing on "reasons based on winemaking methods."
For those who regularly drink rosé but sometimes feel confused about what to expect, this article may provide some clarity.
What is Rosé Wine?
Countless rosé wines exist worldwide, and it's fair to say that rosé has achieved sufficient recognition in the market—probably not many people have never tried rosé wine. In Japan particularly, promotional campaigns often coincide with cherry blossom season due to the color similarity, making rosé increasingly visible in recent years.
Despite this increased exposure, if asked "What kind of wine is rosé wine?", surprisingly few people might be able to answer clearly.
Defining Rosé Wine
While we're told there are three types of wine—red, white, and rosé—rosé occupies a somewhat confusing position among these categories.
To put it extremely simply, rosé wine is red wine with light color. This may sound crude, but there is actually no more precise definition than this. If you make red wine with lighter color, that becomes rosé wine.
You might wonder, "But doesn't Germany have rosé made by blending white and red wines? And doesn't Champagne also blend red and white wines?" However, the former is called Rotling, and the latter is categorized as Champagne or sparkling wine—both are clearly distinguished from and are not technically "rosé wine."
Not all pink-colored wines are rosé wines. This is where it gets complicated, but there's an important distinction:
- Rosé = Light-colored red wine
- Pink-colored wine ≠ Rosé wine
These are clearly distinguished based on their respective "production methods." Put simply, wines that achieve pink color using anything other than black grapes are not rosé.
The Importance of Color in Rosé Wine
Since rosé is "light-colored red wine," color is the most important aspect of rosé wine. Without fear of misunderstanding, I'd say that taste is not the most critical parameter. This may sound harsh, but when you adjust production to achieve pink color, unless you have specific commitments to craftsmanship, the result generally falls within the taste range typically associated with rosé wines.
Therefore, nearly all winemaking considerations when producing rosé focus on color adjustment. These methods can be broadly categorized into two approaches:
- Methods that reduce color
- Methods that add color
Both of these approaches actually contribute to the situation where rosé remains somewhat difficult to imagine even with prior information.
For wine characteristics perceived when tasting to align comfortably with prior information, the images of grape varieties and regions in the drinker's mind must match the actual taste and aroma of the wine with reasonable precision. Only when this general agreement is established can attention turn to details, forming an overall impression. However, the production methods mentioned above tend to make such fundamental agreement formation difficult.
Methods That Reduce Color
When examining rosé production methods in specialized literature, the following techniques are commonly introduced:
- Saignée method
- Direct press method
- Co-fermentation method
- Blending method
Of these, co-fermentation and blending methods are, strictly speaking, methods for making pink-colored wines rather than rosé wines, as previously mentioned. This leaves saignée and direct press methods as general rosé production techniques, both belonging to "methods that reduce color."
"Methods that reduce color" involve reducing the content ratio of phenolic compounds, particularly anthocyanins, which are responsible for red wine's red color. Reducing anthocyanin concentration naturally lightens the color.
Concentration can only be reduced through one of two methods:
- Increasing the amount of diluting solvent
- Decreasing the amount of target substances
In wine, the diluting solvent refers to the water content in grape juice. Without adding water during the winemaking process, it's impossible to increase this amount beyond the juice volume.
Therefore, the only viable option is essentially to reduce the amount of target substances—namely, anthocyanins. The amount of anthocyanin-centered phenolic compounds in wine is roughly proportional to extraction time and conditions.
Particularly regarding color, the longer the contact time between skins (which contain high amounts of anthocyanin) and juice, the more extraction is promoted and the more accumulation occurs in the juice, resulting in deeper color. Conversely, to make rosé, you must generally reduce this skin-juice contact time.
Once phenolic compounds are extracted, it's difficult to dilute them afterward since you cannot increase the diluting solvent.
Note While it's not impossible to remove extracted phenolic compounds using techniques like filtration, this would also remove substances that shouldn't be removed, so filtration is usually not performed for this purpose.
Direct Press Method: Minimal Color Development
The direct press method maximally reduces skin-juice contact. In direct pressing, depending on the grape condition before pressing, if grapes enter the press completely undamaged, the extracted juice will have extremely low coloration. This can be understood from the fact that Blanc de Noirs, made using the same technique, appears completely identical to white wine.
As you can predict, direct press alone cannot actually produce rosé. The color becomes too light. While rosé is indeed "light-colored red wine," "excessively light-colored red wine" is not rosé.
The statement that color is most important in rosé relates to these circumstances.
Saignée Method: Extracting Juice During Coloration
The saignée method, conversely, involves extracting juice when phenolic compounds have been moderately extracted.
Saignée refers to the technique of extracting juice during maceration (also called extraction), the process where crushed grapes with skin-juice contact are left for a certain period. Whether you "extract juice" or "remove skins" significantly changes the winemaking objective.
When "extracting juice," the main production target is red wine. Conversely, when "removing skins," the purpose is solely rosé production.
A common approach involves extracting only part of the juice rather than the entire volume, continuing maceration after partial juice extraction. This allows the remaining juice to receive more extracted compounds, enabling production of more substantial red wine. This exemplifies the "juice extraction" method, where the primary purpose is producing well-extracted, substantial red wine.
In this case, rosé production becomes secondary to red wine production. Wine law regulations interpret this as red wine juice concentration, limiting juice extraction to a maximum 20% water reduction. This restricts the upper limit of possible rosé production volume.
Another characteristic of this case is the absence of pressing. Since maceration continues in the original tank after juice extraction, skins cannot be pressed. Consequently, both the quantity and variety of extracted compounds significantly decrease compared to natural content levels. Furthermore, due to limited volume, juice from different tanks is often blended, and this accumulation can blur the finished rosé's profile.
From the winery perspective, since the primary purpose remains red wine production, slightly unfocused rosé as a secondary product is often acceptable.
In contrast, pressing occurs in the "skin removal" case. Since skins are removed, no further color development occurs, so the entire volume goes toward rosé production.
When seriously making rosé, this method is naturally often chosen, but it wastes considerable amounts of compounds accumulated in the skins. Since pressed skins are typically not re-used with other juice, this "waste in a sense" cannot be recovered.
Sometimes people mention that phenolic extraction occurs during pressing. While increasing press pressure and skin cell destruction rates might enable some extraction during pressing, this would result in flavors and aromas with excessive off-notes and uncontrollable color intensity, so extreme press pressure is usually avoided. Thus, the amount extracted before pressing represents the maximum content in the wine.
Early-Harvest Grape Rosé Production
Though rarely discussed, there's actually another rosé production method based on "color reduction." While infrequently introduced, this is probably the most common rosé production pattern in actual practice: winemaking with early-harvest grapes.
Early harvest reasons vary, but in all cases, fruit maturation remains incomplete at harvest. This can result in insufficient grape coloration. Since grapes haven't accumulated sufficient anthocyanins originally, no amount of extraction can deepen color—there's simply nothing to extract. The result is naturally rosé.
Additionally, early-harvest fruit often cannot undergo long extraction or high-pressure pressing, contributing to limited color development.
The previous two methods were positive approaches that avoid using "what's available" to lighten color, but this method is negative—there's no way to develop color because "it's not there to begin with." Lack of anthocyanin accumulation means insufficient accumulation of phenolic compounds overall. Sugar content is also inadequate while acidity is typically high, resulting in wines that lack overall "character."
Regarding finished wine quality, this is somewhat negative winemaking. However, not worrying about color makes this an extremely convenient technique for rosé production. Above all, decision-making is easy, and there's no apparent waste of skin-accumulated compounds that go unused.
Since final quality can be adjusted to some extent by combining with other methods, this remains an accessible technique for winemakers.
Rosé production—not limited to early harvest—almost always involves "adjustments" using additional methods. This contributes to making wine profiles or typicité less recognizable. With purely "color-reducing" production methods, only elements originally tied to grape varieties and regions remain, so characteristics persist despite weaker impact.
However, suppressing grape elements through color reduction while adding "adjustments" can overwrite original characteristics with those from adjustment wines, partially masking original profiles.
Let's now discuss these "adjustments."
Methods That Add Color: Rosé Wine Adjustment Techniques
Various rosé wine adjustments employ the latter of the two winemaking approaches mentioned initially: "methods that add color."
This occurs because rosé made from grapes capable of substantial extraction without color addition already possesses solid original taste and characteristics, requiring no subsequent adjustment. Adjustment involves supplementing deficiencies, so it always targets something lacking.
Repeatedly, when color extraction fails in rosé, other extracted compound content is necessarily low, often resulting in relatively thin wines. Whether direct press or early harvest, adjustment becomes necessary to supplement various deficiencies, starting with color.
We've established that commonly known rosé production methods include:
- Saignée method
- Direct press method
- Co-fermentation method
- Blending method
The first two are "color-reducing methods," while co-fermentation and blending methods are not strictly "rosé" production methods.
You might expect additional "color-adding methods," but this isn't the case. Adjustment is primarily performed using blending methods.
Blending method is "basically" not a rosé production method because the blending targets are red and white wines. This is permitted in most countries only for sparkling wines, and since sparkling wine constitutes an independent category, it doesn't belong to the rosé wine category—this follows that logic.
However, this concerns blending "red wine" and "white wine" combinations. The problem is mixing red and white wines—items belonging to different categories within the "still wine" category—across categorical boundaries.
Conversely, if items belong to different categories like sparkling wines, no "red wine" or "white wine" categories exist within that category, so mixing them becomes permissible.
Let me restate: The problem is mixing items of "different categories" within the "same category."
This also means mixing items of the "same category" within the "same category" poses no problem. Since rosé is "light-colored red wine," it's actually not a category parallel to red and white, but rather a "red wine subcategory." Therefore, no rules prohibit mixing "rosé" and "red wine."
This is somewhat gray area territory. However, practically speaking, mixing red wine and rosé inevitably, without exception, produces rosé. Why? Because color definitely becomes lighter than the original red wine. While there's some range, red wine that becomes lighter than its original state is "rosé," no longer "red wine."
Therefore, winemakers wanting to produce red wine never mix red wine and rosé. Since rosé need only be "light-colored red wine," if mixing red wine and rosé produces rosé, no additional rules are necessary.
In other words, creating rules against mixing these two lacks practical significance.
The Rosé Wine Adjustment Trick
Now let's discuss specific adjustments. The most important "adjustment" item in rosé is "color tone." Whether saignée, direct press, or early-harvest pressing, obtained juice typically has considerably light color. Therefore, adding color becomes necessary to achieve more beautifully appealing color tone.
How do you add color? Simple: add red wine with intense color.
And at this point, "what kind" of red wine to add is not predetermined. It's the producer's choice.
In Germany, for example, if listing grape varieties and regions on labels, blending limits are 15% maximum, but this applies to different varieties and regions. No such restrictions exist for identical varieties and regions. From this perspective, actual blending combinations might include:
- Adding red wine of identical region and variety with no upper limit
- Adding red wine of identical region, different variety up to 15% maximum
- Adding red wine of different region, identical variety up to 15% maximum
- Adding red wine of different region, different variety up to 15% maximum
The first scenario is easily imagined as extending saignée method rosé production. For example, adding a few percent of red wine that continued maceration after juice extraction to rosé made from extracted juice. Since this involves blending from completely identical grapes, prior information about regions and varieties rarely conflicts with wine content.
In contrast, methods 2 onward can create significant discrepancies between prior information and wine impressions. Case 4 particularly creates large divergences.
Of course, such blending occurs beyond rosé. Theoretically, there's no reason rosé alone would increase discrepancies. However, rosé base wines inevitably possess weak characteristics. Therefore, even adding a few percent of different wine makes that wine's nuances more strongly perceptible compared to similar blending with other white or red wines.
Consequently, grape variety and regional images known as prior information conflict with actual wine taste characteristics, making wines seem unimaginable.
The Regional Trick
"Region" categories also encourage this tendency. If label-listed regions were vineyards, regional characteristics would emerge more easily even with identical blending conditions. Conversely, when label-listed regions represent broader geographical divisions, base wines possess inherently more blurred characteristics.
Adding red wine with strong characteristic expression from different regions would probably make imagining the labeled region from the finished wine considerably difficult.
The Blending Wine Trick
Blending wine characteristics also obscure finished rosé profiles.
For example, what happens when you blend wine finished with heavy-toast new oak and complete malolactic fermentation into rosé finished in stainless steel tanks only, at low temperature in reductive conditions?
Moreover, if blending fully matured Cabernet Sauvignon from different regions into early-harvest Pinot Noir rosé? Or adding several percent Merlot on top of that?
Accurately predicting grape varieties and regions from the finished wine, or predicting wine taste from prior grape variety and regional information, would be extremely difficult. The taste would probably be Cabernet Sauvignon-dominant, potentially leading to assumptions of Cabernet Sauvignon saignée rosé.
A Specific Case: How People Get Deceived
The ultimate example involves a certain German Pinot Sekt. While this concerns Sekt sparkling wine categories rather than still wine situations, the taste prediction principle remains identical.
This Sekt clearly indicated on its label that it was Pinot Sekt made from Pinot grape varieties. The liquid color was pink. Drinkers would initially assume this was rosé-type Sekt made from Pinot Noir, or perhaps Pinot Noir-based with small amounts of other Pinot varieties like Pinot Blanc or Pinot Gris blended in.
However, the actual production method involved 80% Pinot Blanc, 18% Pinot Gris—a completely white Sekt base—with 2% Merlot added to achieve pink coloration.
Since 98% of ingredients were made from Pinot varieties, the label contained no problems. Furthermore, as Sekt, blending white and red wines was legal. However, the Pinot Noir that drinkers likely imagined from label and color was completely absent, finished as entirely unexpected Sekt. From the drinker's perspective, this feels fraudulent.
However, neither the Cabernet Sauvignon-colored Pinot Noir rosé nor the essentially white wine-based pink-ish Pinot Sekt did anything wrong. Both were produced completely according to law—flawless wines and Sekt. No one can criticize them for differing from taste expectations based on prior information.
But this is exactly what happens.
Conclusion
Unlike red and white wines, rosé has a thin base wine core and receives stronger influence from blending targets. When originally produced like Blanc de Noirs, adjustment range for color tone and coordinated taste becomes broader.
Such wines allow winemakers to craft according to personal taste preferences, with considerable freedom for adjustment. Wines literally "constructed" this way often differ from face value.
These unique circumstances specific to rosé wine create results where images derived from prior information about grape varieties and regions don't match actual wine taste, aroma, and characteristics—making them difficult to imagine.
To understand and enjoy rosé wine, it may be important to understand these production method peculiarities, avoid over-relying on prior information, and honestly accept each wine's inherent characteristics.
