Cyprus Wine Blog - December 2008

December is a month of holidays with Christmas and the New Year festivities. Christmas is celebrated throughout the Christian world, but is also celebrated by many non-Christians as a secular, cultural festival. The word Christmas originated as a contraction of “Christ’s mass”, a phrase first recorded in 1038 compounded from Old English derivatives of the Greek “Christos” and the Latin “missa”. No one knows the exact date of Christ’s birth, but in the 4^th century, Pope Julius I chose December 25^th as the day of celebration. It’s a holiday that’s celebrated in a variety of ways around the world.

Thanks to holidays like Christmas, December stays packed out with parties and festive get-togethers. Christmas is one of the most inspiring celebrations of the year, a time of hope, joy and love for the whole family to share. The chilly winter months and the warm Christmas spirit create the mixture of fun, merriment and excitement! First and foremost, Christmas is a tradition involving family and friends. For wine-lovers, the festive season is also the time for experimentation, and never was there a better time to share for those special bottles you’ve been saving.

In the run-up to Christmas, making lists and checking them twice seems to become everyone’s pastime. If you’ll be having a large number of guests coming and going, or if you have a party or two planned, it makes sense to have a ready supply of decent, everyday drinking wine around that tastes good but is affordable. For the sort of wine that people will be sipping with canapés or on its own, versatility is the key.

In planning for your wine selection, keep in mind the following two rules:

1. Wine and Food Pairing Rule – Be Flexible. It is better to be flexible rather than rigid in pairing food and wine. The key is balance and the wise approach is to rely on contrasts and similarities.

2. Identify a dominant flavour in a dish. Once you have determined the dominant flavour, try to match that with a wine – or the other way around. Match the weight of the wine to the food as well – delicate to delicate, bold to bold, simple to simple, great to great.

More complications arise because Christmas dinner often includes many dishes. So, in a multi-course dinner, the tradition is to build from a light to heavy progression and from dry to sweet. The sweet is the finale as a dessert wine or a post-mortem commemoration after dinner.

Grape varieties that make good, all-round party wines include Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz (Syrah). Blends from these varieties can be very good, too. Save your best reds for the main meal, whether this is lunch or dinner on Christmas Day. Keep the lighter, fruitier wines for Boxing Day.

For white wines, choose crisp, dry varieties. Avoid ones that have had lengthy ageing periods in oak barrels. Lots of people enjoy the resulting vanilla notes, but the flavour can quickly become cloying and can clash with food. Bottles that cost €10 and under should offer a fresh, pleasant, short and crisp flavour. It’s not impossible to find a really good sparkling wine or Champagne on any budget, but depending on how much you’re spending, you should have certain expectations.

Matching food and wine isn’t about the wine making the food taste good or vice versa: the combination should taste better than either of the component parts. Offer your guests one or two favourites – generally a red and a white.

Ideally, leave your wines to rest upright for 24 hours before opening or decanting them. Room temperature can be a little high for the more delicate reds, so leave your bottles to rest in a cool corner of the house. A bottle gives six glasses and you are advised to pull the corks well ahead and or decant the red wines before serving. Decanting is when you pour wine from one vessel to another, usually a bottle to a decanter. This is done to move a wine off sediment which has been thrown during the wine’s ageing.

There is a lot of confusion over whether or not to decant wines. As a rule, any wine that has thrown a deposit – older vintages of fine wine, young but big-bodied reds and vintage port – should be decanted. When you decant a wine, air gets into the container and the wine’s aromas are allowed to develop. Serve fine wine immediately after decanting so the aromas are not lost by the time you serve it. Full-bodied reds get better if you aerate them by pouring them into a decanter and leaving them for a while, at least half an hour. Young tannic wines could also benefit from breathing, softening and opening up as they mingle with the air.

Whatever food traditions your family follows over the festive period, there’s always a wine to match. Just so long as you remember to match the flavour and intensity of the wine with that of the food, you can’t go wrong. Most important of all, remember the old saying: “The enemy of a good wine is a greater wine”. Serve your lighter and less impressive wines first, and work up to the grand finale of that special bottle.

The Christmas lunch is the perfect time to splurge on the good stuff. “Good” doesn’t necessarily mean “expensive”, but spending a few extra euros tends to make a marked difference to the quality. Choose wines that will go with the kind of food you’re serving. Here are a few quick guidelines for some favourite Christmas dishes:

Turkey has the benefit of matching with a wide array of wines, including aged Cabernet and Shiraz , and as with most of the aromatic wines, it is wise to avoid anything with too much tannin or the turkey will taste very dry. If you prefer white wine, go for something with plenty of fruit and body. A nice change, particularly if you are serving your turkey with cranberry sauce, is a sparkling wine. A slightly sweeter sparkling rose (Monolithos Santa Monica) would work well too.

If the main Christmas dish is roast beef, a good red claret or Monolithos Cabernet Sauvignon could be a perfect match. With lamb dishes, use Merlot, light red wines (Monolithos Mavro 2007) or rose.

Roast chicken or pork loin can work with a variety of white (Ayios Stephanos White), rose and medium-bodied red wines such as Ayios Stephanos Red. However, try to avoid any full-bodied and beefy Cabernets.

In the case of duck or other richly flavoured birds, a Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot or Shiraz would all work well.

Cold meats and salads, being the lighter nature of the meal, has a natural affinity to lighter wines such as Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling, Monolithos Xynisteri, rose or a light red (Mavro).

Crab fish, shellfish and smoked salmon go well with sparkling wines (Santa Monica White).

Good cheese deserves an intelligent wine choice. Good suggestions could include blends of Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz and a Monolithos Mavro or Ayios Stephanos White.

There are also the traditional vegetables such as asparagus or artichokes that are usually at odds with wine, often giving off a metallic taste. The best thing to do is to match the dressing or sauce. Celery doesn’t go with anything. If applying oddball reverse logic, any wine works just fine.

Christmas cake is served with a sweet red wine. You can usually buy dessert or sweet wines in 750ml or 375 ml. If you serve it in small glasses, you should have enough for 15-20 people.

Christmas pudding should preferably be accompanied with Muscat or any kind of dessert wine such as Cyprus “Commandaria”, but you have to be careful with dessert wines. A sweet dessert wine may be overwhelmed by a sweeter dessert.

Some information and tips in wine selection

Tip 1: Red wines get lighter with age, white wines get darker. As a general rule, white wines – which are lighter in character than their heavy red counterparts – are served with lighter foods. Due to their heaviness, red wines are generally not served with an opening course, such as an appetizer – although there are exceptions. Instead, these tend to do much better with heavier foods, and are often found in combination with a weightier entrée, such as pasta with red sauce or beef dishes.

Tip 2: Tannins are bitter tasting, mouth-drying plant chemicals that are mainly found in red wines and in Cabernet Sauvignon especially. Wines with high tannin content are best drunk with food, especially red meat.

Tip 3: Grapes can be blended together in wine; frequently, Merlot is used to soften the Cabernet Sauvignon. However, be wary of buying very cheap blended wines, as it is not unheard of for grapes that are incompatible to be married.

Tip 4: Don’t be a fashion victim. Large, well-known factories have been known to buy up grapes from large areas and mix together some bland concoction which they then sell as grape juice. The reason many brands sound familiar is that vast amounts of money are spent on advertising, resulting in special offers like “Buy One, Get One Free”. As with clothing for instance, this probably means they were vastly overpriced to start with or they want to get rid of old stock.

Tip 5: Look out for smaller producers which you may not have heard of before who will probably have invested their money in making better wine, rather than on advertising. They are more likely to make wines which reflect the true nature of the grape varietals in question and excel in bringing out its best qualities. If you’re buying wine for a party or a gift, go for something a little unique, new or unknown. It’s always more exciting to try something new and this way, it’s less likely that people will recognize the name and know that you only spent €5 to €10 on the bottle.

Tip 6: Vintage essentially means “year” – if a wine says Vintage 1997, it means all the grapes in that bottle come from the 1997 harvest. With port, expensive bottles of French red wine and fine champagne, the vintage (i.e. year) is especially important. This is because some years have had bad weather and that makes bad wine (a particular problem in northern Europe ).

Tip 7: A sparkling wine or Champagne bottle should be handled with care. If the bottle is warm, it is too volatile and could be dangerous. Make sure the bottle has been sufficiently chilled, at least 30 minutes in an ice bucket with ice and water or at least three hours in the refrigerator, before safely opening a bottle of bubbly.

Tip 8: The proper glass is crucial to wine enjoyment. Wine does not taste the same out of a plastic cup, so if you can, try to invest in some proper glassware. Your guests will be more impressed with whatever wine you decide to serve. Whatever glass you choose, remember never to fill it more than half way so that you leave room for the drinker to swirl the wine and fully enjoy its aroma.

Tip 9: Decant older wines. If you’re serving the wine yourself, you can help it out by pouring it into a decanter an hour or so before you plan to drink it. Decanters are designed to let air flow over the wine. A little breathing time can work wonders (particularly on older wines) and investing in a glass decanter can add value to an indefinite number of bottles for years to come. Decanting is generally considered only necessary for older wines with sediment, but it can also have positive effects on the flavour of younger wines, plus it just looks classy!

Tip 10: Serve your wine at the correct temperature. Make sure that you’re serving the wine at the recommended temperature, details of which are usually indicated on the back label. You can purchase special wine thermometers, otherwise simply approximate.

Sparkling wine: Serve very well chilled around 42º Fahrenheit (5º Celsius).

Light, acidic white wine: Serve well chilled around 45º Fahrenheit (7º Celsius).

Rose: Served well chilled, around 45º Fahrenheit (7º Celsius).

Light, fruity reds (such as Beaujolais ): Serve at cellar temperature, around 55º Fahrenheit (12º Celsius).

Medium bodied reds (such as Shiraz ): Serve around 61º Fahrenheit (16º Celsius).

Full-bodied, mature, tannic reds (such as Cabernet Sauvignon): Serve at a cool room temperature, around 64º Fahrenheit (17º Celsius).

Dessert Wines: Serve at around 55º Fahrenheit (12º Celsius).

The giving of presents is one of the key attractions of Christmas. They are more about the sentiment than the price tag. You don’t have to spend a fortune. Generally speaking, it goes without saying that some of the best gifts are those that people can use! And what can be put to better use during the holiday season than wine?

No matter where you go, wine is always a welcome gift. And it’s easy. You don’t have to rack your brain to come up something new. Not only that, you can add some cheese, crackers, nuts, biscotti, chocolates, or anything else that strikes your fancy, and you have a wonderful gift basket. A lot of these gift baskets are already prepared in local wine stores. Some of them are good, and some of them are terrible. Before you grab a basket and run, make sure you’re getting your money’s worth. A lot of items are thrown in that people eventually throw out.

Always remember to personalise your gifts with a message. Whether you’ve opted for a case of wine or a gift pack, a short message will make it meaningful for the lucky recipient.

Finally, make sure you buy early, particularly if you are ordering online. Whilst online retailers will often promise delivery of an order within a few days, there’s nothing worse than a present arriving late. Make sure you don’t disappoint and place your order with a couple of extra days’ notice, particularly at Christmas, which is always a busy time.

Wine News and Information

In Cyprus , where the reservoirs are almost dry and the taps often cease to flow, wine may also become scarce. Parched by a chronic drought, the island’s wine industry, among the oldest in the world, is under threat. Production was already very low in 2007. In 2008, accentuating the trend of the past 20 years, rainfall in Cyprus has been 50% below average, and temperatures climbed to 30º Celsius (86º Fahrenheit) and above from April, before easing off in mid-September. According to Government figures, last year the 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) of vines produced 191,000 hectolitres (five million gallons) of wine, down from 218,000 in 2006. This year, the grapes were smaller with less juice and more sugar. Weather conditions in the months of February and March are vital for grape growth. Having gone through two bad years of rainfall, the worst worry is what’s going to happen next year. If there is another year of drought, it could damage the survival of the vines, even though the vines of southern Europe like heat and are resistant to tough conditions.

UK wine drinkers are cutting the amount they spend on a bottle, with price now the most important factor in buying wine, according to a new survey. The study, commissioned by the Wine & Spirits Trade Association (WSTA), found that grape variety had been overtaken by price promotions as the most important factor for consumers in choosing wines. A poll of 1,000 wine drinkers found that the number of people willing to spend £5–£6 on a bottle of wine had dropped by 5% in the past three months. There has been a corresponding increase in those paying less than £5 for a bottle. Pubs and restaurants have also registered a downturn in sales of more expensive wines. According to the survey, customers are buying more and more wines under £12 which supports the findings that there was a corresponding drop in the higher price levels. These figures testify to the harsh reality facing millions of consumers with budgets squeezed and increasing pressure to reduce spending where possible. The Wine and Spirit Trade Association (WSTA) has calculated that the average spend on “everyday wine” has fallen from £4.85 to £4.73 between July and September. Spend on “special occasion” wines has fallen from £6.01 to £5.80.

Inhabitants of a tiny Italian town thought there had been a miraculous intervention recently when wine started flowing from the taps in their kitchens. The “miracle” occurred during the town’s annual harvest festival, the Sagra dell’ Uva, in Marino, south of Rome.

A huge crowd, gathered in the square to witness the annual spurting of 3,000 litres of the year’s newly pressed vintage from the Fountain of the Four Moors, became increasingly restless as the fountain continued to produce only the usual trickle of water. But then, a shout of “miracolo” rang out from a nearby house and a woman appeared at her balcony to announce that wine was flowing from her kitchen tap. It transpired that instead of connecting the wine to the 17^th century fountain, plumbers had hooked the pipes from the local vineyard into Marino’s domestic water supply. One resident said, “I was in the kitchen to fill a bucket with water. I immediately noticed a sweet smell from the tap and recognised instantly it was wine. Word quickly spread and everyone filled up bottles and plastic containers with the wine”. Mayor of Marino, Adriano Palozzi said, “It was a surprise and completely unexpected. People were calling it a miracle which it wasn’t – it was a mistake”.

A daily glass (or two) of red wine may reduce the risk of lung cancer in men, particularly in smokers, according to research published in the October issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention. Smokers suffer from an especially high risk of lung cancer. According to the American Cancer Society, 213,380 new cases of lung cancer were reported in the United States in 2007, with 160,390 deaths, making it a leading cause of cancer death in the country. Researchers selected 84,170 subjects from a pool of nearly 850,000 men, based on their alcohol preferences and patterns of smoking. The Men’s Health Study had conducted in-depth surveys on drinking habits, socioeconomic status, body mass index and history of chronic diseases. During that period, the study identified 210 cases of lung cancer.

The Kaiser scientists compared incidents of lung cancer to exposure to smoking, such as whether or not the person smoked or instead inhaled second hand smoke, as well as to their pattern of alcohol consumption. They found that men who drank red wine regularly, both smokers and non-smokers, had a lower chance of lung cancer. Moreover, the difference in risk between the two groups was large. The study found that non-smoking men who drank a glass or two of red wine a day were 4% less likely to get lung cancer. Yet, for smokers who drank a glass or two of red wine a day, the researchers reported a 60% reduced lung cancer risk. Despite the findings, the researchers stress that the best way to reduce lung cancer risk is to stop smoking. The fact that red wine drinkers showed the lowest risk of lung cancer, the study theorizes, may be due to dietary factors (red wine drinkers on average ate the highest amount of fruit and vegetables), but is more likely due to differences in the chemical makeup of red wine compared to other alcoholic beverages.

Monolithos Monthly News

Wine-lovers who participated in a fund raising function organised last month at “Fig Tree Villa” in Pachna were given the opportunity to taste the new Monolithos Merlot and Shiraz wines, vintage 2008. Our aim was to weigh up the response and generate product awareness. Though it’s too early to assess overall wine quality, most participants commented on the potentials of the new vintage which was characterised by a lot of finesse and roundness in the wines. It wouldn’t be exaggerating to say that we are excited by the first impressions on the quality and the potential of the 2008 vintage. We very much look forward to tasting the new wines when they are ready for bottling before summer 2009. We hope that with the two new additions to our range of wines, that we will have something for everybody.

Whether you’re buying large amounts of wine for a party or looking for the perfect match for the Christmas turkey, our promoters Martin Wood in Pachna (99165995) and Ian Blakeborough in Paralimni (99771021) can save you a lot of hard work. They will let you try before you buy and they will offer practical advice on matching wine with food, taking into account your personal tastes – and how much you want to spend.

The winery is always ready to welcome visitors. So if at any time you are passing near the village of Pachna and wish to visit the winery or purchase any of our products, Martin Wood will be pleased to meet and assist you at his “Fig Tree Villa” in Pachna, so do not hesitate to phone him at 25-816212 or 99-165995.

This is our last newsletter for 2008. We wish you true fun and joy this Christmas and a year of discovery, creation and fulfilment in 2009. May you always have love and wine to share, health to spare, and friends who care! However, drive safely or better still – don’t drive at all if you are drinking.

Cyprus Wine Blog - November 2008

The wine bottle has had a long and interesting history. The origins of the glass bottle can be traced back to about 1500 B.C. Various objects such as small bottles (balsam containers), small vases and goblets were made using a technique called “on friable nucleus”, a laborious process that consisted of winding molten glass filaments around a bag filled with sand or wet clay. Balsam containers were mostly produced to hold ointments and cosmetics. These glass working systems continued until the 1^st century B.C., when a glassmaker came up with the idea of using a glass tube, inserting the end in a crucible, taking a certain amount of molten glass and blowing in the pipe. The glass bubble that formed in this way marked the birth of blown glass, which today is still made in the same way. This is how bottles, carafes, flasks and vases, of any shape or size and for any use, came about.

Back in the days of Mesopotamia and Egyptian winemaking, the winemakers saved their wares in amphorae – clay flasks. These were stamped with the vineyard’s name, the vintage of the wine, type of wine, and so on. This went on for thousands of years, through the Grecian days of wine trade, until the Romans grew to power. With the use of the blowing technique, reduced production times and manufacturing ease, glass soon gained an important position compared to metal and clay objects that had been used till then. Syria , which in the second century became the world’s glass producing centre, exported its products everywhere. Rome , which at that time was imperial, immediately took advantage of applying the techniques, not only in Italy but also in all the provinces of the empire. Glass was quickly found to be a good medium for storing wine. Glass bottles used for pouring and preserving wine were found in Pompeii , which was destroyed in 79 A.D.

With the end of the splendour of Roman glass in the middle ages, glass artwork developed in the Byzantium , especially in Constantinople . Even the production of hollow glass is original, without however modifying the technique.

In 1204, the Crusaders conquered Constantinople and immediately the Venetian government took advantage of this by bringing the most skilful master glassmakers to the city, thereby guaranteeing Venice the works and art of those master glassmakers.

Bottles were originally onion-shaped because this design was easy to blow. It was not until the 17^th century that glass-making technology advanced to the point where more or less uniformly-sized neck bottles could be consistently produced, thereby permitting the marriage of the bottle-to-cork stopper. The development of these two elements – a uniform bottle neck size and cork stopper – are credited as the two necessary prerequisites of the modern international wine trade.

The real “wine bottle” was produced by Sir Kenelm Digby in 1652, but it seems that John Colnett was the one who patented it in 1661 and took all the credit for it. This bottle was made of dark, strong, heavy glass with a ball-shaped body that had a slight punt at the bottom to give the bottle stability. A ring was applied around the neck, a few centimetres from the bottle’s mouth in order to strengthen the neck and to hold the string that held and blocked the cork. During the next 30-40 years, the body became elongated and the neck became shorter to improve its stability. Bottles with elongated bodies and smaller necks were found to be more suitable for transportation and long-term storage. During this period, bottles were used for serving wine.

This “English bottle” did a lot to solve the problem of storage, preservation and transportation of wine and soon became popular throughout Europe . At that time, bottles were hand-processed and capacity could not be controlled. They were very often customized with a glass stamp showing the proprietor’s monogram or trademark, or the wine’s vintage. These wine bottles, blown in wooden moulds, permitted them to be sold with their contents for the first time. These bottles first spread from England to France , and then, at the end of the 18^th century, to Germany and Italy . Wine bottles varied greatly in size so that consumers never knew exactly how much wine they were getting. Therefore consumers brought in their own containers for a measured amount of wine to be poured into; it was illegal to sell wine in bottles.

In the 1800’s, people found ways of producing standard-sized bottles to between 700ml and 800ml – a size that was easy to make and also easy to carry, although other special sizes still existed. In 1821, an English company patented a machine to mould bottles that were uniform in size and shape. Selling wine already bottled, however, was illegal in England until 1860, due to both the political influence of pub owners and the lack of both labelling standards and means of authenticating the fill volume.

It was in the middle of the 19^th century that glass was produced using semi-automatic or almost industrial processes, and from the beginning of the 20^th century, automatic machines were used. There was almost a sudden leap from the hand-made product to mechanical production, and glass-making techniques improved rapidly with mechanization.

In 1979, as part of the push to become metric, the US required that all bottles be exactly 750ml. At about the same time, the European Union also asked their winemakers to settle on a standard size. Consequently, most wines bottles are 750ml, but there are still many other sizes. For instance, the Split contains 187ml, the half bottle contains 375ml, the Magnum contains 1.5 litres, the Double Magnum contains 3 litres, the Salmanazar contains 9 litres, the Balthazar contains 12 litres and the Nebuchadnezzar contains 15 litres. In the Champagne district, they have the Jeroboam containing 3 litres, the Rehoboam containing 4.5 litres and the Methuselah containing 6 litres.

Shapes for wine bottles evolved primarily from area tradition. There are “classic” shapes in general use by the majority of producers from any given area and “modern” shapes that are essentially more “artsy” variations of the classics. The Italians seem to have the most variations, such as the tall bottles of fanciful shapes that sometimes hold Chianti.

Through the centuries, every respectable wine region developed its own traditional wine bottle through which you can easily tell which region the wine is from or what particular wine you can expect to find in these bottles. The shape of the bottle does not affect the taste of the finished product. The sole exception is sparkling wine, where thicker-walled bottles should be used to handle the excess pressure.

Today, most of the great viticulture regions of the world have their own distinctive bottle shape. The typical Bordeaux bottle is easy to recognize by the austere straight shape with the “real” shoulders. This high-shouldered bottle may have derived its shape from the fact that older red Bordeaux varietals often have sediment settled at the bottom. When the wine is either decanted or poured into glasses, the shoulder of the bottle helps to trap sediment particles and prevent them from escaping with the good wine. This bottle is known from the beginning of the 17^th century and is certainly the most common, with a tall, symmetrical body and short neck. All red Bordeaux wines are to be found in green glass, while most white Bordeaux varietals are to be found in clear glass (with a few exceptions in green), but all have the distinctive high shoulders.

The classic Burgundy bottle has a wide body compared to the Bordeaux , and the shoulder has an elegant slope to it. This bottle radiates something kind-hearted and friendly, which you also can taste in these wines. The white Burgundy is bottled in clear or pale green glass and the reds mostly in green bottles. These bottles are also used for the Beaujolais wines and Rhone varieties. The neck starts just above half way up the bottle and forms a near triangle up to the top. The red grape of Burgundy is Pinot Noir and the white is Chardonnay, and this bottle shape is used by Pinot Noir and Chardonnay producers throughout the world.

The tricky part is that the wines of the Loire Valley are often packaged in the Burgundy bottle, too. In addition, other shapes are very similar, i.e. the Rhone shape, which often represents Syrah or a southern Rhone-style blend of Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre and other varieties. If you look closely, you’ll see that the Rhone bottle is not quite as wide and will often bear a coat of arms on the neck.

As already mentioned, the Loire bottle is similar in form and shape to the Burgundy bottle, however it is smaller and has something of the Alsatian “flute” with small, down-hanging shoulders.

The Alsatian bottle is beautiful, long, small and slender. It has something frivolous, a bottle with a lively radiation. Traditionally, if it’s a wine from the Mosel, the bottle is green and if it’s “Hock” wine from the Rhine , the glass is brown. The Alsatian wines of north-eastern France usually go in the Mosel bottle. If the wine is from the new world, this bottle shape usually indicates sweet wine of any type and the colour is the one the marketing department prefers.

In France , the arrival of the bottle coincided with the trials conducted to find bottles suitable for the production of Champagne . Only at the beginning of the 18^th century were bottles produced that were robust enough to resist the high pressure of this wine. It was with Champagne that the true, long-term preservation of wine was started. All Champagne and other sparkling wine bottles have a recess or indentation in the bottom of the bottle. If you turn a bottle of Champagne over, you’ll see a concave indentation in the bottom called a “punt”. The earliest origins of the punt are lost in history but there is much conjecture. The more commonly cited explanations for its purpose include:

. It consolidates sediment deposits in a thick ring at the bottom of the bottle, preventing it from being poured into the glass;

. It allows a bottle of sparkling wine to be turned upside-down and then stacked;

. It increases the strength of the bottle, allowing it to hold sparkling wine/champagne;

. It can make the bottle look bigger, impressing purchasers;

. It holds the bottles in place during the filling process in manufacturing plants;

. It accommodates the pourer’s thumb for stability and ease of pouring;

. It is part of the ancient glass-blowing technique. The word “punt” is short for pontil stick, which was a wooden tool that was attached to the base of the hot bottle while it was being blown.

For wine stored under tremendous gas pressure, this was essential because it relieved the pressure on the bottom of the bottle. Without the punt (or kick, as it is also called), the bottle might well have blown out at the bottom. The Champagne bottle has a shape similar to the Burgundy bottle but is made out of thicker glass to withstand the high (5-bar) pressure of the gas in the wine. In the early days of making sparkling wine in the Champagne region, it was a perilous business going into the cellar, because bottles exploded on a frighteningly regular basis. Winemakers and cellar workers routinely wore face masks and eye protection to avoid injury or disfigurement. Eventually, the thick, heavy bottle with the very deep punt we know now was developed.

Today, a punt is unnecessary and exists only because many consumers equate the presence of a punt as an indication of quality. Modern glass technology allows bottles to be made that do not require a punt for strength or stability, either for sparkling or still wines.

Arguably, the shape of a bottle will make little difference to the overall taste of a wine, although a sparkling wine, for example, may pour differently from a bottle than that associated with Champagne . Secondary bottle fermentation also dictates the attributes of the sparkling wine bottle and cork, which is similar throughout the world. However, colour is actually very important in a wine bottle. In fact, it’s more important than the shape. Colour in the glass can help protect the wine from damage from ultraviolet light. Wines are affected by light, therefore green or brown bottles are used and when long maturation is necessary, a dark green or brown bottle is used (NB: always store wine in a cool, dark place).

With cellaring in protected areas, though, colour takes on less significance. There are fairly wide variations in glass colours, from crystal clear through various shades of green and brown to nearly opaque, occasionally some blue as well. The traditional colours used for wine bottles are for Bordeaux wines dark green for reds, light green for dry whites and clear for sweet whites. In Burgundy and the Rhone, they opt for dark green whilst in Alsace , the dark to medium green predominates, although some producers have traditionally used brown. In the Rhine regions, the brown colour is common, although some producers have traditionally used green. Clear bottles have recently become popular with white wine producers in many countries, including Greece , Canada and New Zealand . Most red wine worldwide is still bottled in green glass.

Bottles and wine are integral to each other today, but that’s a recent development. Relatively heavy and fragile, glass has the distinct advantages for wine packaging of being both chemically inert, preventing contamination, and impervious to oxygen, preventing spoilage. There are advantages to storing wine in glass bottles, such as durability, presentation and even tradition. Glass bottles also have the great advantage of preserving a certain temperature for a longer period of time. Glass does not dilate when it is too warm or shrink when exposed to lower temperatures. It is, thus, ideally suited as a long-term storage container. And clear glass admirably displays its contents with brilliant clarity. The introduction of glass as a storage medium changed wine as we know it: while the notion of ageing wine is not a new one, bottles sealed with corks made it possible for the current fine wine scene to develop. For all its beauty, fragility and artistic history, glass has always enjoyed an eminently practical status.

All wines age faster in small bottles than in large ones. Larger bottles are more impressive, festive and convenient for serving more people. Glass is 100% recyclable. Finally, the key advantage of packaging wine in glass bottles is taste. Only a glass bottle can ensure the flavour, colour and aroma of wine. Today, without question, glass remains the overwhelming choice of wine consumers.

Wine News and Information

Italian police at the Port of Livorno have confiscated 30,000 bottles of red wine labelled as “Amarone”. The wine was on the point of being shipped to the US . According to the Minister of Agriculture's website, the confiscation is the result of an on-going investigation headed by a Treviso prosecutor into fraudulent practices within the local wine industry. Officials say that the wine involved is not actually Amarone, the Veneto ’s most renowned wine. They will not reveal what is actually inside the confiscated bottles. Once authorities release all the details including the identity of the company involved, the Consorzio will take legal action.

Wine sales in the UK show no sign of slowing, despite a turbulent week in the financial markets as London auction house Christie’s reported record results. The results demonstrate confidence in wine investment despite the volatile financial climate, and reflect the growing importance of wine as a serious investment opportunity.

The Indian domestic wine market is to double in size in the next two years, according to research. Current consumption of 5m litres is expected to grow 25% in the next two years, to reach 9m by 2010. The figures come from the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham). Reduced duties and eased restrictions on the distribution of wine to deter consumption of stronger alcoholic drinks, has helped the industry’s significant growth. Assocham also cites a rise in disposable incomes, and western influence on lifestyle among younger drinkers, as contributing factors. Wine consumption still lies some way behind other alcoholic beverages. 300m cases of beer and 90m of whisky and other spirits were sold in 2007-08. France accounts for almost 50% of India’s wine imports and Italy 30%.

The Wall Street Journal has gone into the wine trade – a highly unusual step in American newspaper publishing. The New York-based newspaper has established WSJwine, a department that offers to deliver to readers and the general public in 33 American states “quality wines of outstanding value,” domestic and foreign. The inventory consists of everyday and fine wines as well as rarities, some that come from small-production vintners and are “not readily available in stores,” WSJwine said. Under its new owner, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, the Wall Street Journal is undergoing a transformation from a business to a general news publication. Its wine critics, Dorothy J Gaiter and her husband John Brecher, write a column that has proved popular with readers for years. The Journal's announcement comes days after reports that amazon.com will start selling wine online to consumers in 26 states.

A fledgling cork recycling programme that aims to divert millions of used wine corks from landfills is gathering such momentum that its organisers aren’t sure they can keep up with what has become a flood of the buoyant little bungs. ReCork America, a campaign sponsored by the massive Portuguese cork manufacturer Amorim, has amassed more than one million used corks at a warehouse in Napa – so many that it’s not sure what to do with them all. The 18-month-old programme has signed up more than 40 wineries in California and Oregon, and about 100 restaurants, wine retailers and other groups, mostly in Napa, where Amorim is based, Marin and San Francisco, and is headed by Larkspur publicist Roger Archey.

Cork manufacturers produce about 13 billion stoppers each year, but to date, there has been no coordinated effort in the United States to keep the corks out of landfills. Without a recycling network, most people and businesses just throw them in the garbage. “That’s a shame, because as a natural material, corks have no business in a landfill,” Archey said. The vast majority of the world’s wine corks are made from the bark of the cork oak tree in Portugal. The bark is “peeled off like a banana” every few years and turned into a range of products beyond wine corks, from shoes to ping-pong paddles, Archey explained. Despite being a natural material, cork takes years to break down in a typical landfill because it is durable and water resistant, he said. So the goal of ReCork America is to build a nationwide grass-roots coalition of wineries, restaurants, individuals and others who will work together to efficiently recycle wine corks.

The largest challenge is an economic one – financially speaking, old wine corks simply aren’t valuable enough to make recycling worth it. Beyond logistics, another major challenge is quality control. While cork is recyclable, other types of “alternative closures” such as plastic corks and screw caps are not. For the programme to be effective, people will need to diligently separate out the natural corks from the man-made ones, Archey said. That could prove tricky, as a recent Family Winemakers of America wine-tasting event in San Francisco proved. Another challenge is finding a cost-effective way to reuse the corks. Archey said he's talking to one company that’s experimenting with turning them into packing material and another that may make them into flooring. “We’re looking for some creative ideas,” he said. Whatever outlet they find for the corks, Amorim is unlikely to profit from the venture. But there are other benefits. The main one is marketing and education. Every time someone thinks about cork as a sustainable natural material, Archey knows they might think twice about reaching for an un-recyclable screw-cap or plastic cork, which he enjoys referring to as a “hunk of petroleum in your wine bottle”. “Doing the right thing will return profits and business in ways that you don’t even think about,” he said.

Monolithos Monthly News

The year 2008 harvesting is over and for Monolithos Winery, this year is marked with the experimentation and production of two new wines made primarily from Merlot and Shiraz grapes.

Merlot is widely considered as softer and medium in weight with fewer types of tannin than Cabernet, and is ready to drink sooner. It also takes well to oak ageing. It is characteristically deep in colour with black cherry aromas and herbal flavours are typical. Merlot is the third most popular red wine grape variety in Australia and one of the most popular in USA.

The Shiraz grape variety gives hearty, spicy reds. It can produce some of the world’s finest, deepest, and darkest reds with intense flavours and excellent longevity. Shiraz is the dominant red wine grape variety in Australia. The wine is characterised by an incredibly concentrated blend of blackberry fruit, spice and chocolate, all within a firm structure that keeps it together beautifully.

Both Merlot and Shiraz perform very well in hot regions such as the southern slopes of Troodos mountains and particularly the hills of Pachna where they are considered as “emerging” varieties. The end result of the experimentation will be an ever-widening choice for discerning Monolithos wine-lovers. The new wines will be available before summer 2009.

If at any time you are passing near the village of Pachna and wish to visit the winery or purchase any of our products, Martin Wood will be pleased to meet and assist you at his “Fig Tree Villa” in Pachna, so do not hesitate to phone him at 25-816212 or 99-165995.

Regards from all of us here at Monolithos and always remember Oliver Goldsmith’s words (1919):

“I love everything that’s old — old friends, old times, old manners, old books and old wine.”

October 2008 Cyprus Wine Blog

Despite recent news that wine has become the number one social drink in the western world, it’s pretty clear that in general, most consumers know very little on the subject.

Drinking wine has been part of human consciousness ever since day one of human existence. Wine is a very old product whose origins merge into the origins of civilisation itself. The history of wine is inseparable from that of humankind. According to archaeologists, the oldest wine casket comes from the Neolithic period (8500-4000 B.C). Perhaps that’s when the consciousness of human beings started to reason, beginning with poetry and philosophy.

Several archaeological records as well as ancient references and writings have proved that wine-making in Cyprus is an ancient tradition. In fact, archaeological findings indicate that Cyprus was the first Mediterranean country to produce wine 6,000 years ago. Homer speaks of the excellent quality of Cyprus wines, and Stassinos, the author of the “Cyprus Epic Songs”, writes how the Cypriot sweet wine (nowadays called Commandaria) was produced. The first reference to Cypriot wine in the Bible is in Solomon’s “Song of Songs” 1:14 “My beloved is unto me as a cluster of Cyprus grapes in the vineyards of Engadi”. The Pharaohs of Egypt, as well as the ancient Greeks and Romans, all imported Cypriot wines. An old Cypriot chalice of the 6^th century BC recommended its user to “be happy and drink well,” signifying the quality of wine in Cyprus . Mosaics discovered in ancient sites on the island bear witness to the importance of Cyprus grapes and the wines they produced.

In modern times, despite the fact that Cypriots have a long tradition in cultivating grapes and making wine, the knowledge of the contemporary Cypriot in this field is relatively limited compared with other European wine-producing countries. This raises the obvious question of whether and, if so, to what extent, knowing about wine plays any role in the production and quality, or even whether it is necessary for appreciation and enjoyment.

Knowledge is the act of learning which is gained through experience or education. Knowledge is one thing – understanding is another. Understanding means confidence on a subject with the ability to use it for a specific purpose, if appropriate. Understanding is very different, even though it actually derives from knowledge. Obviously, most of us can taste without understanding the physiological mechanisms involved. However, it is always good to acquire knowledge about anything you’re interested.

Acquiring knowledge about wine is important, since if you are educated on the subject while drinking, this might add to your understanding and appreciation of the wine. Undoubtedly, there are all sorts of practical benefits to knowing about wine, even if you are not a winemaker, wine seller, sommelier, wine writer, or wine critic. Knowledge and experience help you decide which wines to try, which wines to buy, and which wines to serve with which foods, as well as the ability to recognize tainted, oxidized, or otherwise flawed wines. Much of this knowledge provides pleasure of its own, thanks to the fact that there is so much to learn, and that so much about it is interesting.

Being clued up about wine is very practical, such as knowing how to store and how to serve it. Practical knowledge is obviously valuable when it comes to choosing what wines to buy, deciding when to open them, and choosing which one to have with a particular dish. This requires knowing at least roughly what the wine should taste like. When you’re drinking a fine wine, it’s nice to know what kinds of grapes went into it, where it came from and when, who made it and how.

Knowing what you drink is based on knowing how to taste. Learning how to taste teaches you not only how to perceive with your senses, but how to interpret those perceptions. Surely, the pleasure in drinking a wine is enhanced by some knowledge of the range of aromas and flavours that similar wines are capable of. And the more familiar you are with other wines, especially similar ones, the more you can appreciate what (if anything) is special about the one you currently taste. No one would argue with that. But even though there’s a big difference between the pleasure of pursuing and acquiring knowledge about wine and the pleasure of drinking wine itself, the two can of course go together. Having such knowledge about a wine while drinking might add to your understanding and appreciation, but one can argue whether such knowledge actually adds anything to your pleasure while drinking the wine. Can it make the wine taste better, or otherwise add to the experience?

Of course, in wine there is a level of enjoyment that is open to all, irrespective of experience. We have an innate preference for some flavour cues. Many wines have some sweetness of fruit that is appealing to novices, and certain successful popular styles of wine focus on providing simple, accessible, fruity flavours. People also appreciate wine for its intoxicating properties. Let us call this wine’s “hedonic” appeal. But there are two further levels of appreciation that can be teased out, which only come with experience and learning, although it is likely that for most of us, this separation is a rather artificial one; in reality, our appreciation of wine probably results from a seamless fusion of all three levels.

However, as we learn about wine in general – the history, geography, grape varieties, winemaking practices, and differences between producers and so on – and as we face each new glass, the different aspects of the sensory experience take on a fresh meaning. We attend to the process of tasting more carefully; we understand the significance of the various aromas and flavours, the structure and the texture. We begin to develop our own “culture” of wine by a process of exploration and benchmarking.

The best way to make wines taste better is to taste better wines! Ignorance can keep you from knowing what wines to drink, but it can’t keep you from enjoying good ones when they’re put in front of you. Knowing how to taste obviously helps, and in appreciating wine, there’s no substitute for experience at tasting. Most wine drinkers, no matter what their level of knowledge and sophistication may be, are on a similar path of evolving understanding. Each mouthful whose flavours and aromas we drink, each bottle label we unconsciously imprint in our memory, each line-item on a wine list that we select for the evening’s meal, is another volume in our own library of experience, and determines how we will experience the next. The more wine we drink and the more we learn, the better context we have to evaluate (or enjoy) every future glass. Really tasting wine adds an extra dimension to the basic daily routines of eating and drinking. It turns obligation into pleasure, a daily necessity into a celebration of life.

Wine is much more than a commodity or just a food. It contributes to sophisticated dining, enhances and facilitates social interaction, challenges the senses and the intellect, and makes glad the heart of moderate and well-balanced man or woman. Wine should be a friend for life. Wine evokes thoughts of friends and societal values. This is particularly true when combining responsible consumption with food and family.

In the early 20^th century, the British writer D. H. Lawrence complained: “We have lost the art of living, and in the most important science of all – the science of daily life – we are completely ignorant.” Wine is so much a part of culture, just as art is a part of culture. Since wine is interwoven with history, politics, religion, geography, art, science, sociology and other fields, there’s hardly any topic that can’t be used to get back to talking about wine.

Life can be lived in a casual way, or plumbed to the depths. We all choose how and where to spend our energy and attention. You may play music, cook seriously, and take care of a lovely garden. Maybe the things you love aren’t vital, but they make life richer. Passion is never wasted effort. There is culture in wine. It can be found in the ritual of drinking it, appreciating the craft of the winemaker, and in the wine’s stimulation to our taste buds.

The beauty of wine is that every bottle is different, which makes it fun to keep exploring all the wonderful surprises the world’s wine regions have to offer. This is the best way to understand your own personal tastes and to gain confidence in them, because no one knows your taste like you do.

Certainly, many of us find that a nice bottle of wine can give some social occasions a gentle nudge in the right direction. Wine means tradition, culture, health, coexistence, sharing enjoyable experiences. It would be nice to see data on how many meals, parties and other social gatherings are improved every day by the addition of a nice glass of wine! We don't yet measure wine’s contribution to world happiness.

Unlike many modern foods, wine’s attractions rely not on bold consistent flavours, but upon a subtle array of shifting sensations that make its charm difficult to define. Today, wine is an integral component of the culture of many countries, a form of entertainment in others, and a libation of choice for advocates of its health benefits. Globalization and the accompanying rapid worldwide access to information is gradually leading towards a more knowledgeable and empowered consumer with a more sophisticated understanding of product value and a discriminating demand for quality. The control of the definition of quality will eventually be shifted to the consumer. In essence, wine producers are selling a sensory experience to the consumer.

Wine consumers in developed nations are typically prosperous, but wine is also consumed in impoverished areas where it is still safer to drink than the local water supply. Regardless of the region in which the wine is produced or the economic status of the consumer, all wines are expected to be pleasant experiences for the imbiber. It’s not like Pepsi or Coke that’s made in million-gallon vats and every bottle tastes the same.

When the corporate winemakers of the world begin to make wines all in the same way, designing them to offend the least number of people, wine will no doubt lose its fascinating appeal and individualism to become no better than most brands of whiskey, gin, scotch, or vodka. One must not forget that the great appeal of wine is that it is a unique, distinctive, fascinating beverage and different every time one drinks it.

Winemaking technology has changed greatly over the last three decades, and perhaps most importantly new techniques have enabled the development of new wine styles – in particular, fresh, fruit-driven characteristics which simply weren’t possible before.

Finally, personal taste, which is infinitely variable, is the key determinant of when a wine is at its best. Some people like the fruity freshness of young wines, while others prefer the darker complexity of older wines. Where along the curve of a wine’s evolution you prefer to drink your wines is a question only you can answer, based on your own experience.

In addition to a product that is enjoyable in all sensory aspects, consumers expect wines to be healthful and produced in an environmentally sustainable manner. In the future, these last two factors will become increasingly important economic drivers of profitability.

Wine, because it is affected by many factors such as the weather, is different every year. Wine is not meant to be enjoyed for its own sake; it is the key to love and laughter with friends, to the enjoyment of food, beauty and humour and art and music. Its rewards are far beyond its cost.

It is up to the consumer to discourage bad winemaking. The quality of wine will improve when consumers make up their minds to drink better wine. Concluding this short essay on the contribution of consumer knowledge to the quality of the wine, let us remember the saying: “The wine you drink is the wine you deserve”. This applies to all countries and nations, Cypriots included.

Wine News and Information

Scientists are currently developing an electronic tongue that is set to be more reliable and sophisticated than the human palate. According to research reports from Spain , a device is already able to tell the difference between certain grape varieties and vintages. Using tiny synthetic membranes, each sensitive to different chemical components in a wine, the e-tongue can already distinguish the differences between wines of different grape varieties. It can also tell whether the same wine is from older vintages. The device works in the same way as the human tongue and is sensitive to sweet, salty, sour, acidic, and savoury (umami) tastes. It could be used to detect frauds committed regarding the vintage year of the wine, or the grape varieties used.

The Robotongue, a machine first made by a Brazilian scientist in Sao Carlos , is a device so sensitive it can discern different vintages of Cabernet Sauvignon from the same producer, and different producers of the same vintage.

It is said to rival human taste buds, with the great advantage that it never tires – unlike humans whose palates become saturated. Taste buds are believed to contain receptors that are triggered by flavour-imparting molecules, an area that is still only partially understood. The electronic tongue works on the same principle. It uses chemical sensors to measure different tastes, producing an electronic “fingerprint” which can then be assessed, recorded and presented as data. The electronic tongue should be of practical use to the wine industry, especially for producers who seek consistency year by year in their blends. The electronic tongue, reports Nature magazine, will be invaluable for companies needing accurate and constant quality control of wine, tea, coffee, mineral water and other foods.

In a number of countries, winemakers are packing their bottles with artificial additives that reduce wine to an “alcoholic cola”, according to an investigation. In some cases, producers use water, sugar and sometimes hydrochloric acid to ensure their wine has a uniform taste and consistency.

Research into the quality of the 1.5 billion bottles consumed in Britain has also cast doubt on the reputation of Champagne , with one expert suggesting that 70% was not worth the premium price. Malcolm Gluck, author of The Great Wine Swindle, said: “Many, many wines are no better than a sort of alcoholic cola. You get artificial yeasts, enzymes, sugar, extracts, tannins, all sorts of things added.”

Some of the most well-known new world brands use milk and enzymes to make the wine less cloudy and ensure that the wine tastes the same from one batch to the next. More than 60 Beaujolais producers are being taken to court, accused of disguising low-quality grapes with excessive amounts of sugar. In Italy , 70 million litres were seized and found to comprise just 20% wine, the remainder being water, sugar and ingredients such as acid and fertiliser, used to boost the alcohol content to achieve a higher price. Furthermore, an investigation found traces of fungicide in leading Champagne brands, and discovered that experts struggled to distinguish between a £6.99 sparkling wine and a Champagne three times the price.

Monolithos Monthly News

October is the end of the harvest season in the area of Pachna and the time that vineyard preparation for the winter begins. At Monolithos, grape skins collected after pressings are mulched and put aside to use as fertilizer in the vineyard. By the end of the autumn, the leaves start to fall and eventually shoots become stick-like and lose their green internal fleshiness. By December, the vines are ready to be safely cut back for the winter season.

At present, the tanks are full of fermented must. October is the time when racking off lees takes place in the winery. This way, dead yeast constituents such as protein metabolites, amino acids and hydrogen sulphide are prevented from producing unwanted extractions. In red wine, there is a large quantity of seeds in the lees and if not removed for a long time, the wine will become strong in tannins. Minimal filtration is also considered at this time, but only as needed to preserve the wine’s natural integrity.

The winery is always ready to welcome visitors. So if at any time you are passing near the village of Pachna and wish to visit the winery or purchase any of our products, Martin Wood will be pleased to meet and assist you at his “Fig Tree Villa” in Pachna, so do not hesitate to phone him at 25-816212 or 99-165995. Regards from all of us here at Monolithos and always remember:

“Sorrow can be alleviated by good sleep, a bath and a glass of wine”.

Thomas Aquinas

September 2008 Cyprus Wine Blog

In recent years, we have been witnessing an incredible number of individual wines and new wine brands hitting the market expressly targeted at women. There's even a wine magazine devoted to women wine drinkers. Is there really so much of a gender gap in wine drinking and wine connoisseurship that we need special marketing efforts?

Historically, the perception has been that women drink white wine while men prefer red. Times have changed, and while significant differences remain between men and women when buying and drinking wine, stereotypes are not always accurate. Men and women are just different. Why wouldn't they have different tastes in wine?

It sounds obvious, but defining this difference is tricky. There are two popular wine-related beliefs making the rounds these days, both of which deserve to be put to rest because they are nothing more than pure and unfounded misconceptions. The first of these would have us believe that men are better qualified to taste wine than women, and the second that some wines are more appropriate for men and others for women.

It is common knowledge in the food and wine world that people fall into three broad categories, namely non-tasters, normal tasters and super-tasters; that is to say, people with limited ability, normal ability and extra-ordinary ability to discern the flavours and aromas in foods and beverages. Several studies have found that the majority of so-called super tasters – people blessed with double the normal number of taste buds – are women.

Taste is related to the number of taste buds on the tongue: the more taste buds, the stronger the ability to taste. Simply stated, women have a genetic tendency towards having a greater number of taste buds and a greater concentration of scent receptors and that make them better qualified than the majority of men to taste wines. It is therefore far more than mere coincidence that women rank very high indeed among the most highly respected people who write about and taste wines for a living. Women are more likely to be super tasters – that is, they respond more to components such as bitterness and tannin in wine.

Research has demonstrated that women are more likely than men to show preference to sweet foods, though the particular targets of satisfaction differ from culture to culture. It appears that they have preference for more fine distinction flavours which may have to do with biology. However, most tasting isn’t about taste itself – sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami – but about smell. The flavours enshrined in tasting notes are mainly perceived through aspiration into the retronasal cavity above the mouth and behind the nose. Most variability in flavour is due to smell.

Gender generally influences the sense of smell. It is known that during pregnancy, women have even more acute senses. Research shows that women are somewhat more sensitive to smells than men. If women can smell better, they would taste better because you can have maybe five sensations with your palate, but smell hundreds of aromas. The common-sense explanation of women’s greater capacities is that they evolved through their long-standing role as gatekeepers of the food supply and nurturers of vulnerable infants. Men may do the hunting, but women do the cooking, and after a couple million years, it adds up.

But if men and women have different palates – more a perception than proven fact – does that explain why they tend to favour different wines? The preconception that women prefer white wine is not necessarily true. Growing evidence suggests many women who are knowledgeable on wine opt for a red wine. Also, a recent survey in the New York area showed that 57% prefer red, and industry sources said they believe women now choose red wine as often as men.

Researchers at the Australian Wine Research Institute conducted a study on “sensory proprieties” of cabernet sauvignon and shiraz on 203 Sydney red wine drinkers, with roughly equal numbers of both sexes. The conclusion reached showed that there is no relationship between gender and taste. The determining factor for taste is genetics, not gender. We are not equal when it comes to palate. People are sensitive to some flavours and not to others.

The level of alcohol can influence women’s choice. Reds are often 14% and over, while whites range from 10% to 12%. There are no statistics on the quantity of wine consumed by each gender, but there is a consensus in the wine industry that women drink less and prefer lighter wines in terms of style, grape variety and alcohol level.

Men generally get to choose the wine when eating out. A survey found that women are more likely than men to feel uncomfortable when it comes to choosing wine at a restaurant, pairing wine with food, or interacting with a waiter when selecting wine at a restaurant. However, women buy 80% of the wine sold in the USA . Numerous studies have been done that show that the most important consumers of wine are women. They buy the wine, drink the wine, share the wine, introduce others to new wines, etc. Women are substantially less afraid to try wines made from unfamiliar varietals, from unfamiliar appellations, from unknown producers.

At a typical lunch, men start with a noble white and move to a cabernet sauvignon or shiraz , whereas women prefer a sauvignon blanc or bubbles. One physiological explanation behind women’s love of sparkling wine is they are more tolerant than men to this wine’s high acidity. The Australian Bureau of Statistics’ 2004-2005 health survey shows 32.8% of women drink wine compared with 25% of men. Even more striking, the proportion of women drinking sparkling wine is three times higher than that of men.

If women have a head start at wine tasting, part of it surely is socialization. In fact, tasting wine requires a dose of social encouragement, since no one is born with an innate fondness for fermented grape juice. Along the socialization trail, women are more likely to learn to use and trust their senses and to rely on sense memories as reference points for talking about new experiences.

Genetic and hormonal factors make a difference in how people taste and smell, and some of those differences are related to gender. Chances are there’s more to be discovered. Existing studies have barely begun to uncover a host of other demographic factors – race, ethnicity, age – where differences could also be significant. But psychological and social attitudes to wine have more influence than palates when it comes to gender difference.

Major wine and spirits companies use well-financed research and may know something about gender thresholds and preferences for oak, tannin, acid and other wine components, but stays locked up in corporate product development vaults and never makes its way into the more public, academic arena, so the rest of us can only guess.

Women are always happy to ask questions. Findings suggest that, if a consumer is unsure about making a wine selection, women are more apt than men to seek information from store personnel, a server, sommelier, or winery personnel. Labels and shelf tags are also significantly more important for women. While winery region is very important to both men and women, women rely on medals and award more than men.

Chefs, regardless of gender, make good wine tasters, because they're practising their sensory equipment. Its equivalent to training for an athletic event: using those muscles over and over again.

Gender issues are so complex. Men and women do in fact differ in terms of the relative importance they will place on pleasure, health, and convenience as it relates to food and beverage consumption. In a study involving print ads, women were more sensitive to ads that conveyed the wine’s sensory qualities, while the men were more influenced by ads that emphasized sex appeal.

Women wine buyers are educated, smart, sophisticated, and value-conscious. They typically think of wine as a food product, and are more willing to look beyond points when they make their decisions. Health concerns also play a role, as white wine was once seen as having fewer calories than red. However although studies show that women have a more acute sense of smell than men, women are less inclined to stick their noses in a glass of wine and report every aroma they think they detect.

As the global wine industry grows more competitive, marketers are asking themselves how best to differentiate their brands to consumers in ways that are critical to success. Consumer perceptions of a wine's quality are important factors in the decision process, but with thousands of wines to choose from, how does a consumer select one wine over another? When evaluating how wine buyers make their decisions, it is probably wise to look for differences by demographic and psychographic variables.

The wine industry has entered a stage where just making good products is not enough to grow the market. There is a wide choice of products available for consumers and these industries need to move from a production orientation to a marketing orientation based upon understanding the consumer. In addition to developing new wines tailored to women’s tastes and busy lives, marketers also need to develop a better understanding of how women shop for wine. Many wineries are starting to develop products that appeal primarily to women, such as lighter, low-alcohol wines. As wines are becoming so alcoholic, it is difficult to drink a glass of wine during the week, especially with women’s busy lives. Having children, women would really like to have a glass of wine now and then, but might forego it because of the demands on their lifestyles.

Regarding wines that are “appropriate” for women, we should not take them seriously. It is true that some wines are described as “masculine” and others as “feminine”, but even a quick glance at that terminology shows that the descriptors used are taken from misguided beliefs and stereotypes about what men and women are supposed to be like. Wines that are said to be masculine, for example, are described in terms of being aggressive, deep, flinty, strong, forward, coarse and even vulgar, and those said to be feminine are soft, subtle, sensual, caressing, warm and even "sexy". Stating that men tend to favour wines described as masculine and women those that are feminine is an obvious error. Many recent market analyses in France and the United States have shown that women and men have precisely the same partiality to deep, young and aggressive cabernet sauvignon wines than they do to soft, subtle and caressing white wines made from sauvignon blanc grapes.

One of the potential misconceptions about the use of sensory consumer studies is that they might bring about homogenous wine styles. On the contrary, information about the diversity of consumer preferences allows winemakers to tailor wines that most consumers will enjoy, as well as to produce wines that appeal more strongly to specific groups of consumers. The variety and subtlety of wine flavours and tastes is part of the continued attraction of wine and this will not change.

Varietal labelling will remain helpful to the consumer as it provides a useful guide to what types of flavours might be expected in a wine. In conjunction with other label cues such as vintage, region and producer, the grape variety information on a label helps the consumer to decide, based on past experience, whether they might like the wine in the bottle. Further indication of wine style can also be helpful, whether on a back label or an explicit designation such as, “lightly oaked” or “soft, fruity style”. It is well known that individuals differ in the flavours they prefer and that the inability to detect specific smells and tastes can be hereditary. It is also important to consider that, in addition to the aforementioned genetic variations, sensory experiences are also dictated by a powerful kaleidoscope of other interactive factors: vision, emotion and memory.

Discovering why individuals are more receptive to different tastes and smells is an area that will enable winemakers to capture new audiences in a changing global marketplace.

Despite the structural diversity of taste compounds (tastants), the gustatory (taste) system senses only five types (modalities): sour, salty, bitter, sweet and umami. Specialised cells named taste receptor (TR) cells mediate recognition of these five types of tastants. These cells are tightly packed into taste buds, mainly on the surface of the tongue.

Compared to the human tongue, our powers of smell – scientifically called olfaction – are infinitely greater. Not only can we detect thousands of different odorant compounds that vary considerably in size and chemical structure, we can also distinguish and identify these odours.

It is claimed that the wines we are making and delivering to the consumer today are consistently better than at any time in the history of wine. Wine is often bought to drink in a social setting; therefore the choice of wine needs to satisfy both one’s internal ego needs as well as the external expressive needs. Emotionally one seeks an enjoyable experience, but also wants others to enjoy the choice and therefore be impressed by the buyer’s selection. Another addition to the modified model is “perceived risk”. Unlike durable goods purchases, which have functionality as an important but assessable key factor, intangible product purchases such as wine can tend to have a number of important psychological risks inherent in choices.

Although some of the diversity among individuals and populations is cultural and learnt, there could well be a genetic aspect to defining likes and dislikes for specific tastes and aromas. Scientists are working to define fully the genetic differences among individuals’ sensory perception and to do that, it is necessary to assign particular taste compounds and odorants (odour compounds) to their corresponding receptors (sensory “organs”). Considering that taste and smell receptors constitute the largest, and possibly most diverse, gene family in the human genome, this is a challenging undertaking, but one that will potentially offer great benefits to the wine industry.

Although determining the basis for preferences is difficult, the unravelling of the human genome sequence is beginning to provide a scientific understanding of how we process aromas and flavours. Moreover, advances in knowledge as to how flavour perception is influenced by factors such as ethnicity, gender and age are also being made. These studies can be used to develop an individual’s “flavour print” as a means to measure a person’s capacity to detect key flavour compounds in wine, thus providing an entry point towards establishing measures for predicting flavour preferences in market segments.

Humans, although not so dependent on the chemical senses as other mammals, are still able to detect and discriminate between thousands of different odours. The question is: How many genes are required to allow us to sense this chemical universe? In this outline, you will be introduced to the genomics of taste and smell and the genetic basis.

It is important to remember that, in addition to the aforementioned genetic variations, sensory experiences are also dictated by a kaleidoscope of other interactive factors, including vision, emotion and memory. As an illustration of this complex interactivity, when a white wine was artificially coloured red with an odourless dye, it was olfactory described as a red wine by a panel of tasters. This simple psychophysical experiment demonstrated that, because of the visual information, the tasters discounted the olfactory information and that this perceptual illusion occurred during the verbalisation phase of odour determination. It is therefore clear that there is still much work to do before the complete gustatory and olfactory codes are cracked, but thanks to the advances that are now being made, it is at least starting to look like a tractable objective.

Wine News and Information

Cocktails to beat the heat

Sangria is a super summertime wine “punch” which originated in Spain . Typically, sangria is made with red wine, fresh, seasonal fruit and a little soda water or citrus flavoured soda. It is easy to make, easy to drink and a huge hit at summer get-togethers – even for those who are not “into wine”. Over the years, the original sangria was adapted to local conditions to make a fruit-filled wine beverage that is refreshing and easy to drink with a wide variety of foods. Keep in mind that all of the following recipes are based on a standard 750ml bottle of wine.

The Basic Sangria Recipe

To make sangria you need, the juice of a lemon or orange, season fruit, 1 to 2 tablespoons of sugar and a bottle of wine. Take the season fruit such as apples, peaches, grapes, plums, pears, cherries or what ever is available at home. Slice them into thin layers and place in a jar. Add the juice of an orange or lemon, pour the wine add the sugar and stir well. Finally, place the jar in the fridge for a few hours to get cold. You can also leave it overnight to chill if you’re not in a hurry. The beauty of the basic sangria recipe is that it’s as delicious as it is easy, and it only gets better as you adapt it to your own taste. This sangria recipe is perfect for large summer parties, and is even a favourite who are not normally wine drinkers.

Passion Fruit Sangria: Use pineapple and passion fruit juice mixed with a sweeter white wine ( Santa Monica white)

The New Zealander Sangria: Kiwis and limes make this a knock-out sangria recipe with origins from the islands “down under” (Monolithos white table wine)

Strawberry Sangria – a rose wine sangria: Mix fresh strawberries with one of summer’s most requested wines (Monolithos Santa Monica rose)

Monolithos Monthly News

The three most important factors that determine when it’s time to harvest are sugar levels, tannin development and acidity. Other considerations include ripeness, flavour, and pH. Of course, it’s also important to take into account the time of day that harvesting will take place.

In the “ New World ”, people choose mostly to pick by machine, whilst in the Mediterranean region, the most common method is to pick by hand. Machine harvests are quicker, yet machine harvesters do not discriminate on what they pick from the vine, so the harvest will also include branches, leaves, mould, and maybe even birds nests. In Cyprus we hand-pick, which is more time-consuming and perhaps more costly, but ensures a more carefully selected product.

During the past few weeks, we have been busy with harvesting transporting, crushing and fermenting malvasia, cabernet sauvignon, shiraz and merlot grapes. This is the first time we are processing merlot which is a relatively new grape variety for Cyprus . We look forward to assessing the results!

If at any time you are passing near the village of Pachna and wish to visit the winery or purchase any of our products, Martin Wood will be pleased to meet and assist you at his “Fig Tree Villa” in Pachna, so do not hesitate to phone him at 25-816212 or 99-165995.

We thank you for your continued support, take care and remember the words of Martin Luther:

“He who loves not wine, women and song, remains a fool his whole life long.”

Regards from all of us here at Monolithos