An overview on Strawberry [<i>Fragaria</i> × <i>ananassa</i> (Weston) Duchesne ex Rozier] wine production technology, composition, maturation and quality evaluation

356-365 Strawberry, Fragaria × ananassa (Weston) Duchesne ex Rozier is an important fruit of family Rosaceae, occupies an important place among the small fruit plants and is grown throughout the world. Deep red in colour with a unique shape, highly perishable fruit has a pleasant flavour. It is rich in vitamin C, sugar, organic acids, anthocyanin, phosphorus, iron, other minerals, vitamins, etc. and its flavour is characterized as fruity, sweet and tart. It is utilized for the production of purees, juice concentrate, juice, jams, preserves and rose red wine. Different methods used to make wine are carbonic maceration, on the skin fermentation and thermovinification. Thermovinification method produces the wine of better quality than the others. The cultivars evaluated for wine production are: ‘Chandler’, ‘Doughlas’, ‘Camarosa’, ‘Elsanta’, ‘Polka’ and ‘Tenira’. Wines from ‘Camarosa’ cultivar are found to have many desirable characteristics such as esters, optimum acidity, redder colour units, alcohol and total phenols, while ‘Chandler’ cultivar had higher amount of ethyl alcohol, more phenols, anthocyanin than other cultivars. The method of vinification has influenced the phenolic content. Different phenolic compounds identified by TLC in wines from all the strawberry cultivars are catechin, epicatechin, quercitin and ellagic acid which are known to play a key role of antioxidants. During maturation various changes took place including increase in esters, a decrease in phenol content whereas ethanol content, TSS and acid remained unchanged. In flavour profiling, out of 14 descriptors attempted, 6 had very high intensity like, alcoholic, phenolic, higher alcoholic, astringency and bitterness and the vegetative, yeasty and earthy were found to have lower intensity. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) has also been applied to the wine. The present paper is presenting an overview on production technology, composition, maturation and quality evaluation of strawberry wine.