Level 2 wine exam practice · Learning outcome 1

The vineyard and the grape: practice questions

30 original multiple-choice questions on this chapter, each with an explanation. Five are below; the rest, plus timed mocks, are in the app.

Sample questions

A customer asks for a sweet wine made from grapes that froze on the vine. Which label term points to it?
  1. Late Harvest on a wine from the USA
  2. Eiswein on a wine from Germany
  3. Vieilles Vignes on a wine from France
  4. Vendanges Tardives on an Alsace wine
Answer: Eiswein on a wine from Germany. Eiswein (Icewine in Canada) is made from grapes that are left on the vine until they freeze and are then pressed while still frozen, which concentrates the sugar. Late Harvest and Vendanges Tardives describe grapes picked late after extra ripening, not freezing, and Vieilles Vignes refers to the age of the vines rather than to any sweet style.
In summer a grower cuts off some of the bunches so each vine carries less fruit. What is the aim?
  1. To increase the volume of wine for an inexpensive label
  2. To stop the vine flowering a second time in late summer
  3. To concentrate flavour in the grapes that remain
  4. To protect the vine from fungal disease in damp weather
Answer: To concentrate flavour in the grapes that remain. Reducing the yield means the vine's sugar and flavour compounds are shared among fewer grapes, so each berry is more concentrated and the wine has more intensity. Cutting fruit lowers volume, which is why the resulting wine usually costs more, and it has no direct effect on disease or on flowering.
Every year a grower in a damp climate loses part of the crop to grey mould on the bunches. Which vineyard option targets this problem most directly?
  1. Irrigating the vines through the summer
  2. Spraying the vines against fungal disease
  3. Converting the vineyard to organic methods
  4. Harvesting the grapes with a machine
Answer: Spraying the vines against fungal disease. Grey mould is a fungal disease that thrives on wet bunches, and spraying with a fungicide is the direct way to stop it taking hold. Irrigation adds water where there is already too much, machine harvesting changes nothing before picking, and going organic restricts which sprays may be used rather than solving the rot.
To make sugar in its leaves through photosynthesis, the vine combines carbon dioxide from the air with which other resource?
  1. Nitrogen taken from the air
  2. Oxygen taken from the air
  3. Nutrients drawn up by the roots
  4. Water drawn up from the soil
Answer: Water drawn up from the soil. The vine needs sunlight, warmth, water, carbon dioxide and nutrients; photosynthesis uses the energy of sunlight to combine carbon dioxide and water into sugar. Nutrients from the soil keep the vine healthy but are not the raw material of the sugar, and the vine releases oxygen in this process rather than consuming it.
What does AOC or AOP on a French label guarantee?
  1. The wine was made from a single grape variety grown in the named area
  2. The wine was matured in oak barrels for a minimum period
  3. The wine comes from the named area and follows that area's rules
  4. The wine comes from a broad area with few restrictions
Answer: The wine comes from the named area and follows that area's rules. AOC and AOP are the same thing, the French version of the EU's PDO, which means the grapes come from a defined area and the wine obeys that area's rules on grapes, yields and methods. A broad area with few restrictions describes IGP, the French PGI, and neither category by itself requires a single variety or oak ageing.
Drill all 30 in the app