How to Make 10 Classic Wines

Most books about home winemaking feature sections on “Making Red Wine” and “Making White Wine.” But when real, live vintners, amateur or professional, clean out their fermenters and get down to business, they’re not making red or white — they’re making Zinfandel or Riesling, or aiming to put together a Bordeaux-style blend. Maybe you’ll be satisfied if your first batch of wine tastes like, well, wine; but from the second harvest on, most home winemakers want their Chardonnay to taste different from their Sauvignon Blanc and want their Syrah to be just as Syrah-like as the ones at the local wine shop. While a lot of the steps in successful winemaking are similar across the board — any vinification requires cleaning equipment, monitoring the fermentation, avoiding oxidation, controlling temperature, etc. — different varieties have their own idiosyncrasies, imperatives and options. The more you respect the individuality of a grape variety in your cellar practices, the more the end result will resemble what you had in your mind’s palate before you started. If you make Pinot Noir the same way you’d make Cabernet