There are many ways to talk about wine, seriously! This is why it can be so confusing. The terms are endless and vary on a scale of ‘say it as it is’ and ‘complete wine snobbery’. But one of the most popular ways to talk about wine is to talk about wine body. So what is wine body? This wine body guide dives into everything you need to do about this weird wine term that you’ll likely see around in your wine notes.
As much as talking about bodies might bring us to a discussion of the shape of the wine bottle, the wine body is not a discussion of physical appearances but how the wine feels inside your mouth when you take a sip. You’d think that would be called something like taste right? Well, the taste is more about the different flavours within the wine, whereas the body is just about heaviness. So lets dive into this wine body guide.
Wine body guide: The three types of wine body
There are three main categories of wine body across all the wine varieties, making it quite simple to remember. The difficulty comes in understanding the difference between them. To help with this, here are a few examples:
- light body – Similar mouth feel to skim milk or coconut water
- medium body – Similar mouth feel to full cream milk or coconut milk
- heavy body – Similar mouth feel to cream or coconut cream
Regardless of what metaphor you use, you can imagine the difference between these in your mouth. Something like cream is going to feel quite heavy and full in your mouth, while something like coconut water is very light. Wines are very similar in their body, although a heavy wine won’t feel like drinking a whole glass of cream, I can promise you that!
Those wines that are full-bodied are big, bold and powerful. Light-bodied wines are delicate and lean. Then you’ve got the middle, which is those wines that fall in between. Most wines will generally fall somewhere in between light and heavy.
The problem is that there is no real legal definition policed by the wine police (probably not a thing, but it would be great to witness) that determines the cutoffs between categories, but there are a few other factors that affect the wine body.
Factors impacting wine body: Alcohol
The main factor affecting wine body is alcohol. This is good because winemakers have to put this on the label like a little cheat sheet for us all, giving a hint of wine body before we even sip.
The reason for this is largely down to the science, which was something I was never good at so it often goes over my head. It’s related to a term called viscosity. Viscosity is something you can see in the wine ‘legs’ when you are tasting, which run down the side of the glass. Wines with more alcohol become more viscous, and so become heavier.
Therefore the higher the alcohol content, the fuller the body. Because of this, it’s easy to pick how heavy a wine will be based on its alcohol content. As a general rule:
- Light body – wines with less than 12.5% alcohol. These are crisp and refreshing, such as Riesling and Prosecco
- Medium body – wines between 12.5% and 13.5% alcohol. Many wines fall under this category, and some examples include Rose and Sauvignon Blanc
- Heavy body – wines over 13.5% alcohol. These are your powerhouse wines, such as Merlot, Malbec, Shiraz and Chardonnay
If you are with me so far, you’ve got the basics of wine body. But there are some other contributing factors.
Factors impacting wine body: Extract
But other factors impact the wine body, including something called extract. At the risk of going too ‘sciency’ on you all and this going over your head, a range of other factors makes up the extract. It includes the tannins, glycerol, sugars and acids in the wine.
Here are a few general rules which are all you need to know about extract:
- Generally, red wines are more full-bodied than white wines because they have more tannins
- A wine that is fermented or matured in oak is heavier than wine that isn’t matured in oak
- White wines can be made heavier through certain winemaking techniques such as leaving the wine on its lees (those are the dead yeast cells, which sounds grosser than it is), and stirring the lees periodically
- Less tannin means a lighter wine
- The more acidic the wine, generally the lighter the wine is
Some of these you can work out from the label, but you may have to try the wine to determine what extract is impacting the heaviness in the wine.
Factors impacting wine body: Grapes
As you would expect, the body of a wine is also impacted by the grape variety, because this is what makes up the wine. Although the winemaking technique can impact the body through the choice of when the grapes are picked, and the production and maturation of the wine, the type of grape plays a big part too.
Some wines will have a higher sugar content when ripe, producing more alcohol when turned into wine. The skin of the grape also affects the amount of extract, with thick-skinned grapes containing more than thin-skinned varieties. This is why thick-skinned grapes such as Merlot and Shiraz tend to be heavier than thin-skinned grapes like Barbera and Gamay. So some wine varieties are pre-disposed to being heavier than others.
The climate that the grapes are grown in also impacts the body of the wine. A Chardonnay grown in a cool climate is going to taste very different from one grown in a warm climate. As a general rule, grapes grown in warmer climates produce riper grapes. Riper grapes mean more sugar, which leads to higher potential alcohol content. As we’ve learnt, the alcohol content is the primary determinant of the wine body. So the higher the alcohol content the heavier the wine.
In summary
Now we’ve covered a lot in this wine body guide, so here are a few things to remember:
- Wine body isn’t the appearance of the wine but the feel of it in your mouth (think coconut water vs coconut milk vs coconut cream)
- There are three main types: Light, medium and heavy
- The main determinant is alcohol content. The higher the alcohol content, the heavier the wine (pro tip: you can guess the body by reading the wine label)
- Wines that are more tannic and less acidic are heavier than those that are less tannic and high in acidity
- Wine varieties with thick skins are heavier than those with thin skins (Shiraz vs Gamay)
- Warm climates typically produce heavier wines due to producing high-sugar grapes, leading to high alcohol potential
So next time you’re tasting wine, try this out! You can usually figure it out by reading the wine label, but if you want, try to taste the wine first and see what you think.