I came across a few interesting wine based tidbits while trolling the internet. Thought I would share them with you.
* Electronic Wine Taster - the Barcelona Institute of Microelectronics has invented an electronic wine taster. This gadget has six sensors on a microchip to mimic the six types of taste receptors on the tongue. Talk about taking the romance out of wine! Not sure that the world has been eagerly aniticpating this one.
* Calistoga Appellation – After 6 years of legal wrangling the federal government (TTB) has approved a new American Vinicultural Area (AVA) in the Napa Valley. The Calistoga AVA is situated at the northern end of the Napa Valley near the town that bears its name. In order to put an AVA desgination on a label, 85% of the grapes must come from the AVA. The fight was over the fact that two brands, Calistoga Cellars and Calistoga Estate Vineyards do not in fact source the majority of their grapes from the AVA. In the end the TTB has grandfathered these two wineries. The true Calistoga AVA producers are not happy with this, but compromises never make everyone happy.
* $37,000 Bottle of Cognac – Paris’ landmark restaurant, Tour d’Argent, recently put 18,000 bottles of wine from their cellar up for auction. There may be a global recession going on, but prices for these wines went through the roof. The $37,000 bottle in question was a Vieux Cognac Le Clos Griffier dating back to 1788. Marie Antoinette was still 5 years away from her date with the guillotine.
* Bad Wine Makes Good Energy – Wine making consumes a great deal of water. The waste water coming out of vineyards is packed with unfermented sugars, biomass, and improperly fermented vinegar. Yuck! Those clever people at Penn State have found a way to use microbes to convert those waste products into energy.
* Am I Blue - I am not making this one up. A group of German researchers have determined your opinion of wine is impacted by the color of the lighting in the room. They gave test subjects the exact same Reisling in four different rooms with different background lighting: white, red, green, and blue. When the testers were in the red or blue rooms they thought that the wine was better and more expensive.
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