how to difference whether the wine?

[Kcwhippet]

Fruity and dry (or off dry) are different concepts when defining wine. Dry generally means the wine has been fermented to a point where the taster doesn't perceive any sweetness, and that's at about .6% or less residual sugar. Of dry means there is a slight amount of residual sugar, but not enough to make the wine taste really sweet. Fruitiness is just that - a lip smacking fruity taste that's can be present whether the wine is totally dry or a dessert wine high in residual sugar.

First off, not every bottle has that "hole", which is called a punt. The punt originated when bottles were hand made by glass blowers and it was difficult to make the bottom perfectly flat. They pushed the base of the still soft glass down on a wood form which made the indentation, and the bottle was able to rest flat on a table. One advantage of the punt is to strengthen the base of the bottle and that's why it's used for sparkling wine bottles. There's a lot of pressure in a sparkling wine bottle and the punt helps keep the botom from blowing out. Since the development of more modern glass blowing techniques, the use of the punt in wine bottles, other than sparkling wine, is really not necessary. Some sources say it's now used to keep the sediment in wines in a localized place, but that's not a really accurate statement. By the way, the term punt comes from the glassblowing tool used to make the bottle - it's called a punty.

[This message has been edited by Kcwhippet (edited 10-27-2005).]