European patent EP19218856.3

📌 European patent EP19218856.3

🍷 Process for wine aging using grape stems as an ecological alternative 🍇

The practical component that allowed the patent to be applied for and now granted was done with Dona Matilde wine, by winemaker João Pissarra (a former CITAB collaborator), in 30L stainless steel vats and using stems with different degrees of toasting (the toasting was done in a muffle).

The inventors of this patent are:

📌 João Pissarra;

📌 Irene Gouvinhas;

📌 Ana Novo Barros.

This patent relates to the use of grape stalks, a waste product from the wine industry, as an alternative to the use of wood chips or staves in the wine ageing process. 

It describes a wine ageing process in which the grape stalk undergoes a toasting process prior to being added to the wine, in order to confer sensory properties similar to those conferred by the use of wood substitutes or barrels, verifying the formation of the same compounds that are formed with the use of oak wood substitutes.