Winelover Abbreviations

Wine-Searcher’s database lists 5,941,671 items offered by 43,493 wine stores from almost every part of the world. Considering this volume and diversity, it is quite common to come across terms and abbreviations used to describe wine names which may not be familiar to all.

Adega: Portuguese wine term for a winery or wine cellar.

Appellation: A geographically delineated wine region.

Bodega: A Spanish wine cellar. Also a seller of alcoholic beverage.

Bin: Originally a batch or collection of wine bottles, but more specifically a brand name separating a particular wine from others. Often appears on wine labels ‘Penfolds Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon’.

Charlie’s Raz: Preservative Free; Best served healthily, in the outback, at a local shingdig, dancing for fun.

Claret: A traditional English term for red wines from Bordeaux.

Cleanskin: In Australia, wine bottled without a commercial label, usually sold cheaply in bulk quantities.

Country Wine: A quality level intermediate between table wine and quality wine, which in France is known as vin de pays and in Italy as Indicazione Geografica Tipica (IGT) . Also a synonym for Fruit wine.

Cult Wines: Wines for which committed buyers will pay large sums of money because of their desirability and rarity.

Flagon: A bottle that holds two litres of (usually inexpensive) table wine.

Guzzel: The manner of consumption engaged when wine is free, or provided at a fixed cover charge!

Jimbo’s 2008 Shiraz: Best served relaxed, pontificating over baseball, the environment and other worldly adventures with a hearty laugh!

Kosher: Wines produced according to Jewish dietary laws.

Lieu-dit: French term for a named vineyard. Used to emphasize a vineyard’s status. E.g. Lieu-dit Les Poyeux Saumur Champigny AOC.

Oenophilia: A lover or obsession with wine.

Premium Wines: Higher quality classification of wine above every day drinking table wines.

Premium Value Wine:  A wine lovers joy; locally produced, exceptional value, great tasting and brilliant price wrapped into a single bottle.

Reserve: Often an aged wine. In more general terms, it can also suggest a higher quality.

Sack: An early English term for what is now called Sherry.

Veilles Vignes: French for ‘old vines’.

Vignoble: French term for a “vineyard”.

Vino: Italian and Spanish originally derived from Latin, for wine.

#winelovers: People who love the lifestyle of wine and all the trimmings.