maderization occasionally madeirization is the process by which a wine is made to taste like madeira, involving mild oxidation over a long period and, usually, heat. Such a wine is said to be maderized. Although this tasting term is occasionally applied pejoratively to mean that a wine is oxidized, it should properly be applied only to wines with a high enough alcoholic strength to inhibit the action of acetobacter, which would otherwise transform the wine into vinegar. Very few maderized wines are made today by simply ageing the wine at cellar temperature; the oxidation process is instead hastened by heating or ‘baking’ the wine as on the island of Madeira. Oxidation reactions, like most organic chemical reactions, can be roughly doubled in speed by a temperature rise of 10 °C/18 °F. For example, a wine requiring ten years at a cellar temperature of 20 °C to develop a maderized character could manifest approximately, although not exactly, the same character after about two and a half years at 40 °C or 15 months at 50 °C. Maderized wines are normally amber to brown in colour and have a distinctive cooked or mildly caramelized flavour. Wines processed at excessively high temperatures may taste burnt and harsh. Most such wines and especially those made from american vines or american hybrids are fortified and sweetened before being marketed. Madeira and similar wines such as early sherry-style wines made in California were particularly popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries but have since fallen out of fashion. See also rancio wines.
