Dessert wine

A still wine type that is both sweet and high in alcohol and usually served after a meal or with a dessert. Dessert wines typically have 17% to 22% ABV. Port and Sherry are the two best known dessert wines, but others include Madeira, Malaga, Marsala, Muscatel, and Tokay.

A term formerly used to indicate sweet wines, such as sherries, ports, and muscatels, which are fortified with brandy to bring them up to an alcohol content of around 16% to 18% ABV. The present-day meaning is more precise: a wine to be served with desserts or by itself after a meal. Dessert wines today include such sweet wines as Muscat, Canelli and "late harvest" White Riesling, which have alcohol contents as low as just 10% to 12½% ABV.