Wine Word of the Week: Appellation



By Kori ~ April 16th, 2009.

Wine Word of the WeekThis week’s Wine Word of the Week is appellation.

Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine:
Controlled appellations are a method of labeling wine and designating quality that is modeled on France’s appellation controlee system. It embraces geographical delimitation and is the principle on which quality wine schemes such as the DOC of Italy and Portugal, the DO of Spain, and the AVA system of the United States are based.

Layman’s terms from Kori:
Appellation refers to a wine’s region of origin. Different countries use different systems but they all basically serve to identify the geographical area from which the wine came (i.e. where the grapes were grown).


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