Abstract
Understanding the sensory attributes that explain the typicity of Australian Cabernet Sauvignon wines is essential for increasing value and growth of Australia’s reputation as a fine wine producer. Content analysis of 2598 web-based wine reviews from well-known wine writers, including tasting notes and scores, was used to gather information about the regional profiles of Australian Cabernet Sauvignon wines and to create selection criteria for further wine studies. In addition, a wine expert panel evaluated 84 commercial Cabernet Sauvignon wines from Coonawarra, Margaret River, Yarra Valley and Bordeaux, using freely chosen descriptions and overall quality scores. Using content analysis software, a sensory lexicon of descriptor categories was built and frequencies of each category for each region were computed. Distinction between the sensory profiles of the regions was achieved by correspondence analysis (CA) using online review and expert panellist data. Wine quality scores obtained from reviews and experts were converted into Australian wine show medal categories. CA of assigned medal and descriptor frequencies revealed the sensory attributes that appeared to drive medal-winning wines. Multiple factor analysis of frequencies from the reviews and expert panellists indicated agreement about descriptors that were associated with wines of low and high quality, with greater alignment at the lower end of the wine quality assessment scale.
Highlights
Typicity is a term that indicates the degree to which the characteristics of a wine reflect its delimited geographical area, and is influenced by terroir, grape variety, and viticultural and winemaking techniques [1]
This research aimed to demonstrate how content analysis can be used as a tool to investigate regionally distinctive wine sensory profiles and to select regional wines for future studies, using the abundant tasting data that is available in online wine reviews
This was undertaken for Cabernet Sauvignon wines from selected Australian regions by assessing descriptors from online wine reviews in comparison to those arising from sensory assessment of wines by an expert panel
Summary
Typicity is a term that indicates the degree to which the characteristics of a wine reflect its delimited geographical area, and is influenced by terroir, grape variety, and viticultural and winemaking techniques [1]. Trading wine on the basis of typicity has become important for “Old-World” European wine producing countries such as France, where provenance and wine regional typicity are valuable tools used to recognise high quality wines [3]. Wine regions in Europe are synonymous with certain grape varietals, but it is “New-World” producers that have tended to use varietals as a means of differentiating their wines [4]. This has been the case in Australia, a successful New-World country that occupied fifth place for global production (accounting for 5%) in 2016 [5]. That is not to say that provenance is an unrecognised concept in places like Australia, where wine producing regions and their wines are
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