Quality of base and sparkling wines as influenced by the type of fining agent added pre-fermentation

A comparison of the effect on base wines of pre-fermentative clarification between a fining mixture (potassium caseinate, bentonite and cellulose micr ocrystalline) and bentonite was carried out. Fining agents were added to tw o grape juices from different cultivars: Macabeo and Parellada. These varie tal wines are used for making sparkling wine within the appellation (certif ied brand of origin) Cave. Vinification was done in parallel on an industri al scale (1000001). The use of the fining mixture in grape juice made the f ermentations more complete and gave wines with less browning ability, more foam stability time and a lower content of nitrogenous fraction, polyphenol s and some volatile compounds than the wines treated with single bentonite. Sensorial analysis showed that the wines produced with the use of differen t fining agents had different organoleptic characteristics. In addition, th e effect of fining agent added pre-fermentatively was observed on some comp onents of sparkling wines. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserv ed.