Vinesugar : Wine Glossary and Terminology

Wine Glossary Terms: V

verietal: A wine named for the principal grape from which it is made.
vertical tasting: This involves various bottles of wine but as opposed to 'horizontal tasting' where you're tasting different varietals; in vertical, the varietal is the same but the vintage is different. These, to me, are very fun because you get to see how the varietal differed from one year to the next and work on your palette's sensitivity.
vin de pays: A French term that simply means wine of the region or country. A category of ordinary table wines meant for quick drinking.
vintage: The term vintage is the period of picking or harvesting grapes each year. It is NOT when the juice was transported to bottles and distributed. You may hear people refer to certain years as "vintage years" - these are worthy years to remember because they are considered to have produced high quality grapes ideal for winemaking. It can even be broken down further by getting specific to a certain varietal. For example, for California Cabernets, '99 was considered a vintage year along with '01
Viognier: The white grape of the northern Rhone Valley of France where it makes the expensive wine known as Condrieu. In the early 1990s, more than thirty top California producers began making viognier to much acclaim. The wine has an opulent, lush body and dramatic honeysuckle, white melon and jasmine flavors.