Understanding The Basics Of Acidity, Tannin, And Body In Wine

You don’t need to “get” wine to enjoy it—but knowing what you’re tasting makes it a whole lot more interesting.

If you’re a frequent reader of my articles, you’ll know by now how to order wine with some semblance of competence. But this time, we’re going to take it a step further. We’re not just going to look like we know what we’re doing; we’re going to actually be what we’re doing. Now, does that sentence make a lot of sense? No, it doesn’t. But this article will, so ready your wine keys and napkins, because today we’ll be diving into the fundamental structure that makes up wine. 

First things first, let’s do away with the notion that you need a laundry list of exotic descriptors to describe a glass of wine. When you hear the term wine tasting, you might picture a collection of stuffy old men in dinner jackets, swirling their wine around their glasses before confidently declaring it carries notes of elderberries on a freshly rained-on forest floor in June. But the reality is a lot more accessible and a lot less pretentious than that. To begin building an understanding of wine, you need only get a grasp of these key components to begin with: acidity, tannin, alcohol, body, and sweetness.

These are often called the “skeleton” or “backbone” of a wine, and it’s their unique and varied combinations that lend the world of wine such breadth. And the great thing is, if you have a nose, a mouth, and a working pair of eyes, you already have all you need to understand them.

Acidity

When you’re looking for the acidity in a wine, you can somewhat gauge it by how “lively” the wine feels. Generally speaking, you’ll hear wines high in acidity described in terms like “crisp” or “tart.” These kinds of wines also tend to be very refreshing. When drinking a highly acidic wine, pay attention to what goes on in your mouth. You might feel the sides of your tongue activate and your mouth start to water. This, in turn, makes you want to drink more of it and shows how acidity drives drinkability in a wine.

You can liken it to the same effect you get from a squeeze of lemon or a splash of vinegar in your salad dressing. It’s an important component because it works to counterbalance sweetness. If a wine is too sweet without enough acidity to round it out, it can often come across as too cloying. A wine high in acidity is also great for neutralising richness in a dish.

Picture digging into a creamy, decadent plate of pasta. It would start to get quite heavy after a while, wouldn’t it? And that’s precisely the moment you reach for a sip of a nice, tart wine to cut out all that richness.

Tannin

While acidity should be fairly easy to grasp, considering the sheer number of examples out there, tannins are an altogether more difficult find. Mostly a characteristic of red wines, tannins make themselves apparent by way of a drying sensation on the tongue and gums. Ever had a cup of over-steeped black tea? Remember how your mouth felt after that? That would’ve been the tannins at work. 

More of a texture than a flavour, it has a way of making a wine feel a little more “serious”, though that isn’t to say that less tannin-intensive wines can’t be complex. Whereas in the case of over-steeped black tea, the tannins are unpleasantly concentrated, in a good red, the right amount of that same tannic sensation imparts a good deal of structure to your glass.

Body

When looking out for these characteristics, one of the first to make themselves apparent is the body. So what exactly is the body in a wine? To put it simply, it’s kind of how “heavy” the wine feels. A good analogue for this would be milk. A light-bodied wine would be akin to drinking skimmed milk, while a medium-bodied wine might more closely resemble whole milk. A full-bodied wine, in that sense, might start to approach the consistency of cream.

The body of a wine also kind of sets the tone for when you’d want to drink it. Something light works great when you’re just casually sipping away, while a fuller-bodied wine feels a bit more at home when the occasion calls for something a little bigger.

Alcohol

The next building block we’ll be taking a look at is alcohol. Alcohol presents itself as a gentle warming sensation at the back of your throat shortly after swallowing. It’s an element that adds to the overall “weight” and “size” of the wine, tying very closely to the body in this sense. 

It’s got a subtle heat to it that can make a wine feel rounder or fuller, but shouldn’t feel harsh or burning. Balance, as it is with most things, is key here, with too much alcohol in danger of overpowering the other elements in a wine, whereas too little will have the wine feeling unpleasantly thin. Alcohol frequently, but not always, correlates with the body, with fuller-bodied wines tending to have a higher alcohol percentage.

Sweetness

And lastly, we have what is probably the easiest characteristic to identify in a wine, namely its sweetness. How sweet a wine is comes down to how much residual sugar is left in it after the rest of it has been converted to alcohol. It’s the dance partner that keeps in check, and in turn is kept in check by acidity. An easy mistake to make is to conflate fruitiness with sweetness. These two aren’t necessarily the same, as a wine can be dry and yet still fruity.

So there you have it, a list of the most important things to look out for to add some intention to your sipping. Forget about trying to pick out fruits or chase down minerality for now; that can come later—just focus on what you’re actually feeling in the glass. You can take this article and condense it into a simple checklist the next time you’re out tasting some wine.

Just ask yourself: is it crisp or soft (acidity)? Does it dry out your mouth (tannin)? Does it feel light like water or heavier like milk (body)? Is there a bit of warmth going down (alcohol)? Does it taste dry or a little sweet (sweetness)? And then finally, and most importantly, do I like it? With these basics under your belt, you’ve got everything you need to start making sense of what’s in your glass—minus any snooty theatrics.

Opening photo: Rachel Claire| Pexels