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Determination of the polyphenol contents in Macedonian grapes and wines by standardized spectrophotometric methods

Ivanova Violeta (Institute of Chemistry, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Sts. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, FYR Macedonia + Department for Enology, Institute of Agriculture, Sts. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, FYR Macedonia)
Stefova Marina (Institute of Chemistry, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Sts. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, FYR Macedonia)
Chinnici Fabio (Department of Food Science, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy)

Wines and grapes contain a large array of phenolic compounds belonging to non-flavonoids and flavonoids. This study evaluates the polyphenolic contents of six commercial red and white Macedonian wines and four grape varieties. Spectrophotometric methods were applied for the determination of the total phenolics, the total flavonoids, the total anthocyanins and the total catechins. The efficiency of acetone/water (80/20) and methanol/water (80/20) solutions for the extraction of polyphenols from grape pulp, seeds and skins were compared. The best extraction efficiency was achieved using acetone/ water. The obtained results showed that Macedonian grapes are rich in polyphenols, whereby the highest concentration of total phenolics was found for Vranec grapes. The analyzed wines contained high contents of polyphenol; the highest contents were found for Disan wine produced from the Vranec variety of grapes (1515 mg/L total phenolics, 1103 mg/L total flavonoids, 237 mg/L total anthocyanins and 845 mg/L total catechins). Principal component analysis was employed to check possible groupings of the studied red and white wine samples. A clear separation of white wines from red ones was observed.

Keywords: wine, grape, polyphenols, spectrophotometry, berry extraction