Sensory and chemical characteristics of ‘dry’ wines awarded gold medals in an international wine competition

Abstract

The objective of this work was to identify the sensory attributes associated with the highest awards given to wines in large competitions. Data from the Mundus Vini annual wine competitions (editions) from 2014 to 2016 were used. The chemical analysis and sensory attributes were subjected to cluster analysis and logistic ridge regression to identify predictors of grand gold and gold medal awards. High ethanol levels and sugar concentrations, mainly in red wines, were observed. For both red and white wines, three clusters were identified which broadly separated grand gold from gold medal awarded wines. The discrimination of G wines was mainly due to higher scores of bitterness and green/vegetative characters in both red and white wines, and with barnyard attributes only in red wines. The prediction regression for white wines showed that the exotic fruit was the most valued sensory attribute along with the quality indicators of body and complexity. Red wines had a higher number of predictors, including positive attributes like dried fruits and spicy or negative attributes like green/vegetative and red berries. This study identified the most relevant sensory features most valued by competition jurors, which were broadly consistent with the so-called international commercial wine style.