What colour can tell you about wine

When drinking or tasting wine most people focus only on the smell and the taste of it, ignoring what ought to be the first step - looking at the wine's colour and its general appearance. You might think that choosing red, white or rosé is all you need to think about in terms of the colour of wine but in fact the colour can give you a number of clues about the wine's age, style, grape and even where it was produced. In blind and non-blind tastings sommeliers and wine experts always start by looking at the wine in the glass. Here's how and why...

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How to assess a wine's colour

Look at the colour of the wine in a clear glass against a white background. Pouring wine only until the glass is a quarter or a third full means you can safely tip the wine glass to look at the colour without spilling any wine.

What gives wine its colour?

The colour of wine derives primarily from phenolic pigments found in the grape skins (the juice of most grapes is actually clear).

There are more colour pigments in the skins of some grapes than in others so grape variety has some impact.

Interaction with oxygen during the wine-making process can also make the juice become darker but with careful treatment of the juice and/ or the addition of sulphur dioxide (read my blog on sulphites in wine) this risk can be minimised.

Ageing or even fermenting a wine whether red or white, in oak, will alter the colour. Partly this is because of the slight oxidation that occurs when a wine is aged in oak barrels but also due to chemical reactions between the juice/ wine and the oak.

Similarly aging a wine even in bottle means there will be some albeit minimal exposure to oxygen which will change the wine's colour.

With age a white wine becomes darker whereas a red wine's colour breaks down and so it becomes lighter.

The thicker the grape skin and the longer a wine is left on the grape skins, the darker a wine will become. Similarly a harsh grape pressing will mean that more colour is extracted from the skins. Most reputable wine makers tend to press gently these days, mainly to avoid too much bitterness from the pips and stalks entering the juice.

In addition for red wines, acidity has an effect on the colour; generally the higher the acidity the brighter, lighter red a wine is likely to be. This can also help in ascertaining the climate of the region a wine was produced in and therefore the origin of a wine - a wine produced in a cooler climate area would generally have less ripe grapes and if you remember from my blog on acidity, therefore tend to have more acidity.

Wines are lighter both in colour and in body from cooler regions. Conversely wines with lower acidity from riper grapes grown in warm climate regions tend to be bigger and more full-bodied with deeper colour.

The colours of white wine

White wines are not white at all but range through a long list of shades from a pale lemon colour with green notes through different shades of gold to orange. White wines have tended to become paler over recent years as wine-making processes have improved; in particular there are now only very rare occurrences of over-oxidation.

Paler white wines towards the lemon-green and lemon end of the spectrum are likely to be:

young

light in body

dry

with fruit & floral characteristics

unoaked and

from cooler climate regions

More gold-coloured white wines are more likely to be:

older

richer

fuller-bodied

aged or fermented in oak (or on their lees or yeasts)

with fruit and some spicy and even bready characteristics

from warmer regions

Amber or orange white wines are more likely to be:

sweeter or sweet especially if produced from much riper or and even botrytised grapes

even richer and fuller in body

possibly intentionally oxidised like sherry and orange wines

older, possibly past their best if they have been left too long and have oxidised too much

By the way, I tend to find that people who say they get headaches from white wine lean towards the lighter coloured wines.

The colours of red wine

There are many hues of red wine, perhaps more than for white wine, or perhaps simply more distinguishable. To keep things simple, red wines can range from bluey purple through crimson reds to browner shades of red to brown itself e.g. in tawny port.

Red wines at the purple and light red end of the spectrum are more likely to be

very young possibly too young

lighter in body

higher in acidity

with fruity characteristics

low in tannins

unoaked

from cooler climate regions

A garnet-coloured wine which is a deep red with brick-coloured hues is more likely to be

older

medium to full bodied

lower in acidity

fruity but also with vanilla and toasty characteristics

more tannic though in good wine these will have softened over time

oaked

from warmer climate regions

A red wine at the tawny or brown end of the spectrum is likely to be

aged

round and full-bodied

rich

nutty with dried fruit characteristics

oaked

fortified like port

and potentially past its best if not fortified

The colours of rosé wine

Rosé wines can range from the most delicate pink through salmon pink hues to orange. They take their colour from the black grapes used in their production - particularly important is the length of time the juice is left on the skins for extraction of the colour. In recent times the preference seems to be the paler Provence-style rosés.

Pale pink rosé wine is likely to be

dry

crisp with high acidity

with summer fruit flavours

light bodied

unoaked

from cooler climate areas

Rosés that veer towards salmon-pink and orange are more likely to be

medium-bodied

possibly oak-aged

possibly off dry like Blush the preferred style in the USA

with riper fruit and spicy characteristics

You can read more about rose in my guide to rosé wine..

I don't have the space in this blog to cover other visual observations that can be made about wine e.g. colour intensity, clarity, deposits (though you may want to read this blog about wine faults), legs etc and I have had to make some broad generalisations. Nevertheless colour is an important factor for sommeliers and wine experts when asked to taste a wine blind. Once they look at the clues, combine their thoughts on the colour of a wine with an analysis of the aromas and flavours, they can usually make a good guess on the origin of the wine.

I'll be covering smelling and tasting wine in later blogs.

Lindsay Cornelissen DipWSET is passionate about good quality wine and set up Wines With Attitude to share that passion with other wine lovers.