Smoke taint question

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Robert R

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Just a general question: I see some discussions that mention possible smoke taint issues for 2020 grapes and juice out of CA and OR. Is a little smokiness that big a deal? Some varieties on the WGD mention that as a possibility. I am just curious.
 
Several years ago a small winery out in California that my wife and I stumbled across made a Cab Sauv or maybe a Zinfandel that had a hint of smokiness, they couldn't sell it at full price, but my wife and I loved it, bought up two cases worth. It added a very nice note for when you were out drinking by a fire or something like that.
 
A little smoke taint is passable and many wineries will still sell the wine but the taste is not like oak. So with a heavy smoke taint it will taste like licking an ash tray. I lost all of my 2013 vintage due to smoke from a fire close to me. The wine was terrible.
 
Coincidentally, there was just an article about dealing with smoke tainted grapes in the Jan 2021 edition of Wine Business Monthly. The AWRI study looked at 13 different treatment options and concluded that activated carbon fining was the best choice to remove most of the smoke taint from the juice&wine tested. They tested the commercial product Fenol Free but I wonder if powdered activated carbon off amazon would work just as well.

Apparently the other main issue with smoke taint is that the smoky compounds can be bound up and slowly released years later. The paper describes a study performed by the Dept of Enology at UC Davis showed that the free guaiacol levels significantly increased in the bottle over several years due to natural acid hydrolysis of the non-aromatic glycosated bound form. I couldn't tell if the article concluded whether the activated carbon treatment resolved this issue too.
 
The reason I asked in the first place was that on the Wine Grapes Direct site, some of the grape descriptions mentioned the possibility of smoke taint, and one was a chardonnay from a vineyard that only had it available because of that possibility and that Covid has hurt high-end wine sales from the region. I'd really like to try some really good chardonnay, but not if it might be undrinkable when made at the price the juice would cost.
 
The latest Bedrock Wine Podcast talks about smoke taint and one of the things that isn’t aligning with the Aussie data after smoke exposure is the amount of cresol that the CA grapes have versus the Australian at the same guiacol levels. CA grapes are much higher. The thinking is down the line the cresol can breakdown and release off flavors on the same order of magnitude in the bottle and that guiacol isn’t the only player in this conundrum.

https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Sensory-impact-of-smoke-exposure.pdf
 
Just racked my 2021 Marquette again and it definitely has a smoky bouquet or should I say aroma! Because of all the California fires this last summer, my grapes were bathed in dense smoke for months. I was curious at the time how it would effect my wine this year. No discernable taste, just the smell.
I'll embrace it as a reminder of the horrible smoky summer we went through.
2021 "Smoky" Marquette!
 
Interesting topic. Washington's Betz Winery scrubbed their entire 2020 vintage due to smoke taint, but they were the only winery in the region to do so. This summer I bought a case of 2017 Syrah from Terra Blanca on Red Mountain. 2017 was a heavy smoke year for that region. If you're aware of it, you definitely taste it. But the wine was discounted and very drinkable. I opened a bottle last night for guests, no complaints. As with perhaps all things wine, ask 2 experts, you'll get 3 opinions.
 

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