A guest picks up the bottle you have just poured and asks, "So is Prosecco made the same way as Champagne?" You need an answer that is short, correct and confident. Understanding the four or five decisions a winemaker takes explains almost every difference you will taste in the glass.
The Core Process
All wine starts the same way: yeast converts the sugar in grape juice into alcohol and carbon dioxide. That is fermentation. Everything else is a choice.
| Style | Key decisions |
|---|---|
| White | Grapes pressed first, juice fermented without skins — so no tannin, no colour |
| Red | Fermented on the skins — extracting colour, tannin and flavour |
| Rosé | Brief skin contact (hours), then juice run off; or by direct pressing |
| Orange / skin-contact | White grapes fermented on skins — tannic, textured whites |
After fermentation, wine may be aged in stainless steel (clean, fruit-driven, neutral), in oak (adding vanilla, spice, toast, and allowing slow oxygen ingress), or on its lees (spent yeast cells — adding bready, creamy texture).
Malolactic conversion turns sharp malic acid (green apple) into softer lactic acid (butter, cream). It is standard for most reds and for oaked Chardonnay; it is usually blocked for crisp aromatic whites like Sauvignon Blanc and Riesling.
Sparkling Wine
Bubbles come from trapping the CO2 of a second fermentation. How you trap it defines the style — and the price.
| Method | Where second fermentation happens | Typical wines | Character |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional method (méthode traditionnelle) | In the bottle, aged on lees | Champagne, Cava, English sparkling, Franciacorta | Fine persistent bead, bready/brioche autolytic notes |
| Tank method (Charmat) | In a pressurised tank | Prosecco, most Sekt | Fresh, floral, primary fruit; softer bubble |
| Carbonation | CO2 injected | Cheap fizz | Coarse, short-lived bubbles |
Sweetness on a sparkling label runs (driest to sweetest): Brut Nature / Zero – Extra Brut – Brut – Extra Dry – Dry / Sec – Demi-Sec – Doux. Note the trap: "Extra Dry" is sweeter than "Brut". Guests get this wrong; you should not.
Fortified Wine
A neutral grape spirit is added, raising alcohol to roughly 15–22% ABV.
- Port — spirit added during fermentation, killing the yeast early, leaving sugar behind. Sweet. Ruby, Tawny, LBV, Vintage.
- Sherry — fortified after fermentation, so naturally dry at its base. Fino and Manzanilla age under a veil of flor yeast; Oloroso is fortified higher, ages oxidatively. PX is sweetened.
- Madeira — deliberately heated and oxidised; almost indestructible once open.
Onboard Notes
- Fino and Manzanilla sherry are effectively white wines: chill them, and treat an open bottle as having a life of days, not months. Guests who ask for "a dry sherry" are often shocked at how good a fresh one tastes.
- Never store fizz near an engine-room bulkhead or in direct sun. Heat raises bottle pressure and can push corks.
- If a guest asks the Prosecco/Champagne question, the honest one-liner is: "Different second fermentation — Champagne's happens in the bottle, which is where the bready character and finer bubble come from."