Sarah E. Mayfield, Renee Threlfall,* Luke R. Howard, Nathan B. Stebbins, and John R. Clark
*University of Arkansas, 2650 N Young Ave, Fayetteville, AR 72704 (rthrelf@uark.edu)

The Enchantment winegrape is a new Vitis hybrid cultivar developed by the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. Enchantment includes in its parentage the V. vinifera cultivars Petit Syrah, Alicante Bouschet, and Petit Bouschet and the hybrid cultivar Salvador. This teinturier red winegrape has shown consistent good production in Arkansas and similar growing regions.  Preliminary work on the winemaking potential of Enchantment demonstrated that the wine has a deep, red color and vinifera-like sensory characteristics. This research identified anthocyanins in berries and during wine production of Enchantment harvested in 2017. Grapes were destemmed, crushed, and fermented on the skins for four days. Berry samples were taken prior to crush and wine fermentation samples were taken at eight, 16, 24, and 32 days. Berries were separated into skins, seeds, and flesh, where skins had the highest total anthocyanins (1165.3 mg/100 g fresh weight), followed by flesh (10.5 mg/100 g), while seeds contained no anthocyanins. In the berries and wines, only anthocyanin-3-glucosides and their acetyl and coumaric acid derivatives were present. This is a significant finding, as native cultivars typically contain more anthocyanin-3,5-diglucosides, which exhibit less color stability. Malvidin-3-glucoside was the predominant anthocyanin in berry skins, flesh and wines, and other anthocyanin-3-glucosides included delphinidin, cyanidin, petunidin, and peonidin. During fermentation, total and individual anthocyanin concentrations increased between eight (100.4 mg/100 mL total anthocyanins) and 16 days (138.2 mg/100 mL total anthocyanins), and then decreased, likely due to complex formation with tannins. This study demonstrated that Enchantment grapes and wine have a vinifera-like anthocyanin profile, with malvidin-3-glucoside as the predominant anthocyanin. Therefore, wine produced from Enchantment grapes will likely have more depth of color and greater color stability than wine produced from other native cultivars grown in Arkansas and the surrounding region.

Funding Support: Southern Region Small Fruit Consortium grant