Grocers' Goods / A Family Guide to the Purchase of Flour, Sugar, Tea, Coffee, Spices, Canned Goods, Cigars, Wines, and All Other Articles Usually Found in American Grocery Stores

by Frederick B. Goddard

WINES.

Pure wine is merely grape juice fermented. When the sugar of the grape is wholly or nearly converted by fermentation into natural vinous spirits or alcohol, the result is a STILL or DRY WINE. If the sugar is very abundant, as in overripe grapes, and a considerable portion of it remains unfermented, a SWEET WINE like Tokay or Malmsey is produced. When fermentation has proceeded to a certain stage and the liquid is bottled, so that it continues to ferment and produce carbonic acid gas, the result is an effervescent wine, as SPARKLING CHAMPAGNE. If, during fermentation, the process be arrested by the addition of alcohol, certain vegetable substances are retained in the liquid, and such wines as PORT and SHERRY are the product.