Impact of Soil Profile Mineralogy on the Elemental Composition of Chardonnay Grapes and Wines in the Anapa Region

The aim of this work is to study the correlations of the elemental composition in the “soil–grape–wine” chain to determine the regional origin of Chardonnay grapes and wine. Soil samples (n = 40) from five vineyards in the Anapa region, Russia, taken from eight different depths, grapes from these vineyards (n = 75), and wines obtained from these grapes (n = 5) were analyzed using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. The mineralogical composition of the soils was determined using thermal and X-ray phase analysis. The mineralogical composition of vineyard soils mainly consists of calcite, quartz, nontronite, vermiculite, and muscovite. According to spectrometric analysis, the distribution of both the total content and the mobile forms of elements in soil profiles turned out to be similar. The content of Na, Ca, and Sr increased with increasing sampling depth, while the content of Co, Cu, Fe, Ni, Mn, Pb, and Zn decreased. Regardless of the area of cultivation, the predominant elements in grapes are K, Ca, Na, and Mg. It is established that the elemental profiles of grapes and wine are correlated. At the same time, during the winemaking process, a decrease in the concentration of most elements (Al, Ba, Ca, Cu, K, Mg, Mn, Ni, Rb, Sr, Ti, and Zn) is observed. It has been shown that the vine is able to accumulate not only mobile but also less bioavailable forms of metals from the soil (Cu, Fe, K, Rb, Ti, and Zn), while the migration of Ca and Na remains low (<7%). Using discriminant analysis, a model of grape identification based on the concentrations of Al, Li, Mn, Na, Pb, and Rb was developed. This model demonstrated a high accuracy (100% for training and test datasets) in grape classification by region, confirming that the elemental “fingerprint” is a reliable marker of terroir.