Test your wine knowledge with quiz questions from our expert.
Which of the following is the trademark name used for the highest quality category of wines from Austria's Wachau region?
Smaragd
Meaning "emerald" and taking its name from the area's local green lizards, Smaragd is the trademark name used for the highest quality of Wachau wines. Steinfeder (named after an indigenous grass in Wachau) is used for the lightest category of the region's wines, and Federspiel (named after a falconry dummy) is the term used for Wachau's medium alcohol content wines.
Which Sonoma vineyard is home to some of the oldest Semillon plantings in all of California?
Monte Rosso
Named after "red earth," the Monte Rosso vineyard (situated on the Southwest side of the Mayacamas mountain range) was planted in 1886 with Zinfandel and Semillon. Some of those vines are still producing fruit today, making the vineyard home to some of the oldest producing Semillon vines in California. The fruit is currently used as a blending component for Louis M. Martini's Sauvignon Blanc.
Which Austrian wine region typically has the lowest average grape yields?
Thermenregion
Thermenregion, with its 42 different wine-growing villages, typically has the lowest average grape yields among Austria's wine regions. The area's 2181 hectares of vineyards, bordering the Wienerwald (Vienna Woods), have ample thermal faults and springs, but little to no volcanic soils.
Which of the following is NOT part of Austria's Kremstal wine region?
Strass
Kremstal consists of three main vineyard zones in Austria: the town of Krems, the rocky Krems River valley, and the villages surrounding the Gottweig Abbey south of the Danube river. Strass is one of the leading viticultural towns in the Kamptal region of Austria.
True or False: of the top ten most-planted wine grapes in South Africa, Pinotage is the only variety with decreasing plantings since 2007?
False
Within the top ten most-planted wine grape varieties in South Africa, Pinotage is the only member of that group to have seen an increase in hectares planted since 2007. As of 2017, Pinotage's plantings in South Africa have increased from 6.5% to 7.4% of the country's total area under vine.
True or False: the grape name Pinotage is partly derived from the word "Hermitage?"
True
The Pinotage grape was created in South Africa in 1925 by crossing Pinot Noir with Cinsault. Abraham Perold, the first Professor of Viticulture at Stellenbosch University, had hoped to create a wine with the flavors of Pinot Noir, but without the difficulty that grape demonstrates for farming in South Africa. Cinsault, known locally at the time as Hermitage, grew well in the South African climate, and was thus chosen as the partner grape for the crossing.
Which of the following is NOT permitted in the production of Austria's Grosse Reserve sparkling wines?
Machine grape harvesting
Of the three quality tiers permitted in Austrian sparkling wine (Sekt), the most stringent is Grosse Reserve: it requires that grapes be hand-harvested only and pressed within a single municipality, and that the resulting wine must have its secondary fermentation (which provides the bubbles) in bottle (with thirty months of maturing on the lees).
True or False: Austria has more red wine grapes planted than white wine grapes?
False
67 percent of the wine grapes planted in Austria are white. Of those, Grüner Veltliner predictably leads the way, accounting for 31 percent of the plantings (of the reds, Zweigelt leads at 14 percent).
About how many hectares of vineyards are farmed in Austria?
46000
As of 2018, Austria had 46500 hectares of vineyards, from which 2.75 million hectolitres of wine were produced. Generally, Austria produces about as much wine as is consumed locally within the country, though thankfully for wine lovers they export about 52 million litres.
True or False: as of July 2019, there was no standard keyboard emoji for white wine?
True
While the "Wine Glass" was approved as part of Unicode 6.0 in 2010, and red wine has been represented in keyboard emoji since Emoji 1.0 in 2015, a white wine emoji has been conspicuously absent. In 2019, Chardonnay pioneer Kendall-Jackson Winery co-authored a 19-page proposal outlining the need for a white wine emoji addition, for review by the Unicode Technical Committee (UTC) .
