New World wines are those wines produced outside the traditional wine-growing areas of Europe, in particular from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Chile, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa and the United States.
History
Each of these countries have separate wine-growing heritages that go back centuries, but there are some common themes. As in 'the old country', the Church often initiated imports of wine and then promoted local viticulture to provide wine for ritual purposes.
Where immigrants came from wine-growing areas, they brought their grapevines and winemaking traditions with them. British colonists on the other hand tried to replicate the styles that they were used to importing, and sold them under the familiar, semi-generic, names. So for instance both Australia and the USA made wines sold as 'port' or 'Burgundy' that were often made from Syrah or other Rhone varieties, whilst 'Chablis' and 'hock' might be made from Welschriesling or Chenin Blanc. Since much of the wine imported into the colonies was fortified to preserve it during the sea voyage, the local markets expected their domestic wine to be similar in style, and with a few notable exceptions, many early wines in the New World were fortified.
The New World imported wine from the early days of European colonisation, particularly for religious purposes. Perhaps the first significant example of the trade going the other way was Constantia from South Africa, which by the eighteenth century had become a firm favourite among European royalty. The first wine was exported from Australia in 1822, and pre-phylloxera Australian wines won plaudits in the 1870s and 1880s, with one compared to Château Margaux at the 1878 Paris Exhibition, and Bebeah winning a Gold medal at the 1882 Bordeaux International Exhibition.
But it's fair to say that Constantia aside, New World grapes and wines remained an essentially local affair until the late nineteenth century. In 1863, the phylloxera root aphid arrived in France from North America and devastated the local Vitis vinifera vines. This epidemic forced viticulturists in the Old World to look for answers in the home of the pest, stimulating a huge amount of research and exchange of ideas between vine growers and winemakers worldwide. At first it was hoped that the solution lay in hybrids between Vitis vinifera and the New World vines that the aphid normally fed on, but in general hybrids had neither the wine quality of the vinifera parent nor the resistance of the New World species. So vast numbers of Old World vines were grafted onto rootstocks of New World species. Phylloxera forced other changes that would later differentiate Old World and New World wines - the replanting led to traditional field blends of different vines being replaced by monocultures, with blending happening in the winery rather than in the vineyard. Also, some traditional varieties largely disappeared from Europe that remained important in the New World, such as the Corbeau (Bonarda) of Argentina and Zinfandel of California.
The growth of air travel after the Second World War promoted more awareness of wine styles and winemaking in other parts of the world. Pioneers such as Max Schubert tried to make the best table wine possible, using the best grapes he could find regardless of where they came from, the antithesis of the Old World passion for terroir. The result of Schubert's obsession was Penfolds Grange Hermitage, a blend of Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from around South Australia first made in 1951. The success of Grange in competitions through the 1960s signalled that the New World had a genuinely world class wine for the first time since Constantia. Len Evans, "the godfather of the Australian wine industry", encouraged other Australian winemakers to switch from fortified wines to table wines, founding the Australian Wine Bureau in 1965, compiling the first major encyclopedia of Australian wine in 1973, and eventually getting into the winemaking business himself.
As in other fields, the 1960s were a time of revolution in wine - but with wine it takes 10 years to see the results. Other pioneers had been working in California, and achieved a breakthrough of their own in the Paris Wine Tasting of 1976, which saw a French jury judge a Californian wine ahead of French ones in both red and white wine categories. This competition was important in giving confidence to New World producers, particularly in North America, but also reflected some of the archaic practices of French winemaking that that had already been challenged elsewhere in Europe. Italy's Super Tuscans were leading the revolution and could almost be regarded as the first European "New World wines"; around the same time, the Wine Olympics saw French wine lose to Grange and to Torres' Gran Coronas from Spain, and Château Musar from Lebanon broke through at the Bristol Wine Fair of 1979.
It is interesting to compare what happened next in the different countries. North American producers concentrated on developing their large domestic market. Australia was obliged to concentrate on exports, and achieved extraordinary success in that regard in the 1990s, with Penfolds playing a major part using the experience and techniques introduced by Schubert to produce more affordable wines. Australians had international influence in another way. Since the winemaking season in the Southern Hemisphere is six months before that in the North, Antipodeans could 'moonlight' during their quiet season by supervising wines made in the Old World. Such 'flying winemakers' have been very influential in disseminating New World styles and techniques among Old World wineries, particularly in the 'new New World' of southern France and Eastern Europe.
Characteristics of New World Wines
Style
Since New World vineyards are generally in hotter climates than those of Northern Europe - in fact some major New World regions are irrigated desert - New World grapes tend to be riper. Thus New World wines tend to be correspondingly more alcoholic and full-bodied. Critics such as Robert M. Parker, Jr. have influenced New World producers and consumers towards a fruitier style, with more use of new oak. However in recent years there has been a reaction against some of the very oaky, alcoholic styles that typified late 1980s Australian Chardonnays for example, as cooler vineyards have been identified and winemakers have become more sophisticated and more restrained.
Varietal labeling
Traditionally New World wine used names of well-known European regions, such as Burgundy, Champagne. Sherry, Port, and Hock. This gave consumers a general idea of how the wine might taste. This changed as winemakers developed the confidence to develop their own styles of wine such as Grange. Europeans producers objected to the use of their regional names, and writers such as Frank Schoonmaker in the US encouraged the use of varietal names as used on Alsace wine. One reason was that unlike Europe, there was no history of particular localities being associated with particular styles of wine, and winemakers might buy in grapes from many sources. Indeed wines such as Grange specifically ignored the origin of the grapes in order to achieve a more consistent style. So led by winemakers such as Robert Mondavi, varietal labelling became common during the 1960s and 1970s, and has since spread to most of Eastern Europe and much of Western Europe.
Subsequently New World winemakers have 'rediscovered' the art of blending wines, with blends such as Shiraz/Cabernet Sauvignon, Semillon/Sauvignon Blanc and the Rhone combination of Grenache, Shiraz and Mourvedre ("GSM") all becoming more common. And as New World viticulturists have better understood the soils and climates of their vineyards, terroir has come to the New World, with the 'terra rossa' of Coonawarra known for its Cabernet Sauvignons, and the Eden Valley and Clare Valley and Chile's Bío-Bío Valley for Riesling.