Are all wines marked with the year on the label?

In fact, not all wines must be marked with a year, and wine without a year is not fake wine.

“Non-vintage” wine means that the proportion of a single year of winemaking raw materials is not satisfied between 75% and 100% (requirements vary from country to country/region), so the year is not displayed on the wine label. The most common non-vintage wines are non-vintage champagne, sparkling wine, non-vintage port, etc.

Is that non-vintage wine a bad wine?

the answer is negative! Multi-vintage blending is actually a kind of behavior for winemakers to “buy insurance” when dealing with unpredictable weather conditions, in order to ensure constant product quality and consistent taste. In addition, there are some special types of wine, which are “secret recipes handed down from ancestors” after years of blending. Therefore, it cannot be said that non-vintage wine is bad wine.

Most of the wine labels will mark the year, of course, there are exceptions, such as champagne and fortified wine (Port, Sherry, Madeira, etc.), usually without the year, there is a year uncommon.

Vintages for Champagne and Port

Champagne is a typical “blended wine”, this blend includes wines from several different years mixed together, so the year is not marked on the bottle.

Champagne is a region that relies on blending, which can also be said to be a feature of Champagne. Due to the very cool climate in the Champagne region, the weather varies from year to year, and in some years the grapes are not fully ripe because of the coolness. Therefore, in order to ensure quality, quantity, maintain product stability and reduce product differences, champagne producers have to blend wines from different villages, varieties and years. Therefore, most champagnes are non-vintage, and the base wine used to make champagne is a mixture of several years. Unless it is a particularly good year, it is possible to produce champagne that does not need to be mixed with other vintage base wines, that is, “vintage champagne”. Vintage champagne is more expensive because it is relatively rare.