The production of reduced-alcohol wines using Gluzyme Mono® 10.000 BG-treated grape juice

High alcohol wines have become a major challenge in the international wine trade. Several physical processes areused to produce wines with reduced-alcohol content, all of which involve the selective extraction of ethanol basedon volatility or diffusion. In this study, the possibility of Gluzyme Mono® 10.000 BG (Gluzyme) (Novozymes, SouthAfrica) to reduce the glucose content of synthetic grape juice before fermentation was investigated in order to producewine with reduced-alcohol content. Gluzyme is a glucose oxidase preparation from Aspergillus oryzae, currently usedin the baking industry. Glucose oxidase catalyses the oxidation of glucose to gluconic acid and hydrogen peroxide(H2O2) in the presence of molecular oxygen. Gluzyme was initially used in synthetic grape juice, where differentenzyme concentrations and factors influencing its efficiency were investigated under winemaking conditions. Theresults showed up to 0.5% v/v less alcohol at an enzyme concentration of 20 kU compared to the control samples.This reduction in alcohol was increased to 1 and 1.3% v/v alcohol at pH 3.5 and pH 5.5 respectively in aerated (8mg/L O2) synthetic grape juice using 30 kU enzyme. Secondly, Gluzyme was used to treat Pinotage grape mustbefore fermentation. Gluzyme-treated wines at 30 kU enzyme concentration after fermentation contained 0.68%v/v less alcohol than the control wines. A decrease in acetic acid concentration of the treated compared to controlwines was also observed