Skin contact, skin maceration, fermentation on the skins – what's the difference? Julia breaks it down. Above, Pedro Mendes, younger son of Portuguese winemaker Hugo Mendes, looks puzzled as they wait for the Arinto to start fermenting with the skins (© Hugo Mendes).
Why separate the skins from the juice in light-skinned grapes and then just discard the skins? Why, when they contain so many more compounds than the juice and when they are able to convey so much about the wine’s place of origin?
That question has stuck in my mind since I first heard it asked. That was...