Scholars at the Canada's Brock University have devised a vocabulary based on familiar liquids, foods and household materials they feel best describe the wide range of textures experienced when drinking any wine.
Until now there has been no reliable "lexicon" to describe a wine's texture, says Gary Pickering, the professor of wine science leading the research.
A panel of 11 wine tasters sampled 136 types of white wine over 21 sessions, wearing nose pegs so as to focus solely on a wine's texture, rather than its taste or aroma.
The researchers used the tasters' written impressions to come up with materials and foodstuffs that conveyed a similar sensation.
The list ranges from emery boards to chamois leather, talcum powder to satin and baby oil to sunflower oil - and has adjectives such as cleansing, cloying, supple and disjointed.
'The initial crunch suggests meringue... then a harmony of marshmallow and olive oil as it slides off the tongue,' is how one of the impressions that was listed by the panel tasters.
The study and the 'lexicon' by the researchers and reported by the UK Telegraph may add a few words to the tasters way of describing the texture and may interest the wine techies but is unlikely to have an immediate universal effect on how a wine should be tasted.
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