Summer is fun time. Walking, swimming, cycling, boating, rowing – there is tremendous movement of young and old, in their pursuit of the pleasures of summer. Every year, millions of tourists choose to spend their annual holidays close to inviting beaches and waterfront cafés, strolling through the historic villages and sophisticated towns of the Mediterranean . Those who choose Cyprus as their destination will soon discover that the natives of Cyprus have a typical Mediterranean temperament. They are relaxed, easy and raring for fun, but by no means lazy. People in Cyprus – tourists and locals alike – celebrate summer, celebrate life! Gastronomy, food and wine are, as you understand, a central issue in their everyday enjoyment. From taverns to classy restaurants you will be amazed by the variety of choices available all over the island. You can choose between Cypriot and Greek food or international, as well as Italian, French, Asian, Chinese and even Mexican.
However, have you ever wondered why, when on holiday, the wine which tasted perfect with the local food at the little tavern tastes so different back home? We often hear about wines that can't travel well. Everything seems to taste better when you’re on holiday, and the same is true of wine. We are often disappointed when we discover that the wine that tasted so good at the picturesque little tavern overlooking the sea just doesn’t taste the same in another environment?
In an attempting to provide a logical explanation of the popular conviction that for some strange reason, certain wines just do not travel well, we shall try to put forward a few possible explanations.
Many factors influence the complex process by which the brain decides whether or not it likes a certain taste. For instance, most people have had the experience that the wine they enjoyed drinking in a holiday atmosphere or in the company of friends, tasted only half as good when they drank it alone at home. The context in which a wine is consumed may have as much influence on consumer acceptance and liking as its objective sensory attributes. When entertaining, we all appreciate the importance of the right atmosphere for a memorable dining experience, and how the enjoyment of wine can be a very subjective issue. The right glassware, proper serving temperature, remarkable service and even the right persons to dine with contribute to the total picture.
The enjoyment of wine depends as much on environment, company, and accompanying palate pleasers as does the wine itself. Wherever you are in the world, it is likely that the local cuisine and wines have developed together over the centuries, producing a compatibility that should enhance your enjoyment of both. It is no accident that Italian wines tend to show a certain savoury flavour that complements many rich sauces perfectly, particularly those with tomato, which is notoriously difficult to match with wine. Your palate could be fractionally altered if you spent a week or two eating foods containing a lot of rich sauces, garlic or chilli. These can build up over time and linger like an overpowering cloud over your palate, changing it and affecting your ability to identify certain flavours of a wine. It is also acknowledged that wine and food matching are interlinked.
Research results have verified that context variables are as important to reported preference as the oenological variables (malolactic fermentation, oak contact, sugar addition). In the case of wine, the situation in which it is consumed has an extremely important impact on the consumer’s acceptance. However, this effect is not the same for all types of wine. Serving wine with food may have a more positive effect, depending on the accompanied type of food.
There is also a school of thought which maintains that our sense of taste is not physically altered by environmental changes. “It’s our desire that changes.” Perceived sensory attributes have very little to do with the wine itself and more to do with the situation in which it is consumed. An unpleasant experience can leave a bad taste in your mouth. In other words, if a wine seems to taste better on holiday, it is neither the wine that’s changed, nor your physical ability to taste. It’s simply because you are enjoying yourself and because you’re not in the mood to be too critical. It’s the same reason Champagne tastes better at a wedding reception, than at an official Champagne tasting.
You might also find that your perception of a wine is altered by the altitude at which you taste it. If you swirl a glass of Swiss wine on a Swiss mountain where the air is thinner, more of the wine’s volatile aromas should be detectable by your nose than if you performed the same experiment in a tropical climate, where the humidity in the air can act as a wet blanket.
Take the case of air travel. It is now accepted in wine circles that a combination of many factors, such as pressurised cabins, and the effect of individual passengers’ stress levels, all affect our taste perceptions on board aeroplanes. Wines appear flatter and duller where fruit is concerned, but acidity and tannins emerge as more aggressive.
Another reason concerns how the wine was transported. From the field to the bottle, wine is a living thing. It begins as a fruit and is born through a biological process – fermentation. Like all living things, a hostile environment can damage it.
Temperature extremes are a common experience for wine during transport, which in turn may have a detrimental effect on its quality. Most of us have had the experience of tasting a “cooked” wine damaged by excessive heat in transport or storage, although very few of us are aware of what went wrong. The shipping and/or transportation conditions and practices during the shipment of wine are thus critical factors. It is widely acknowledged that heat destroys wine whilst cold may damage it. However it’s not the travel itself, but the circumstances. In most cases, provided the wine has been correctly stored and allowed to settle for a while before consumption, it really shouldn’t have changed. Wine is very sensitive to temperature, whether too high or too low. Additionally, fluctuations in temperature can compromise a wine’s overall freshness and quality. Just as you should expect your produce to arrive in a refrigerated truck, you should also set expectations for the manner in which your wine arrives at your restaurant’s back door.
There seems to be a complex effect called travel shock, particularly on red wines that are neither filtered nor fined. This may be due to the vibration of travel affecting the balance of certain pigments in the wine, as well as interactions with the disturbed tannins. Wine could also be affected by prolonged vibration during transport in a plane, ship or truck over a certain period of time. High-quality fine wines, which are usually un-fined and unfiltered, may be more susceptible to travel shock than mass-market branded types of wine that are more likely to have been stabilized in a number of ways.
Wine is one of the most chemically complex of foods or beverages. It has aspects of both solutions and colloids. In other words, some of the substances are dispersed homogeneously and others heterogeneously. There are certainly many pigments, tannins, and other phenolics, as well as pectins and other polysaccharides suspended in wine which are susceptible to a good shaking on the bed of a delivery truck. You can imagine that if shaken vigorously, the wine will obviously taste different. This could also explain the relatively lesser effects on fined and filtered wine (which reduces or removes many of these substances) and greater effects on red wine (which have more pigment, tannin, and phenolics than whites).
Listening to music can affect the way wine tastes. Based on extensive research, scientists have confirmed that music influences taste, and they claim that the results could have important implications for restaurateurs. It is widely acknowledged within the scientific community that music affects behaviour, and recently it has been scientifically proven that music can affect perception in other senses – in other words, it could change the way wine tastes. The research showed that when a powerful, heavy piece of music is heard, a wine such as Cabernet Sauvignon is perceived as being 60% more powerful, rich and robust than when no music is heard. Apparently, music stimulates specific areas of the brain. When wine is tasted, these areas of the brain are already active and prime the listener to taste the wine in a corresponding manner. Researchers reported that cabernet sauvignon was most affected by “powerful and heavy” music, and chardonnay by “zingy and refreshing” sounds.
Incidentally, “bottle shock” is a distinctly different creature to “travel shock”. Also sometimes called “bottle sickness”, it refers to temporary changes in the taste of wine associated with the process of bottling. Historically, of course, wines were bottled by hand before the advent of mechanized bottling lines. When these were first developed, the process was designed to fill as many bottles as quickly as possible, which involved a lot of vigorous pumping, spraying, and splashing. This aeration resulted in a transient oxidized taste until the oxygen introduced during bottling was absorbed and reached stability in its reactions with the components of the wine. “Bottle sickness” or “bottle shock” is a temporary condition characterized by muted or disjointed fruit flavours. In any case, the problem should disappear after giving the bottle a few days’ “rest” before serving it. Some wines can take as long as four to five weeks to recuperate; other wines recuperate more quickly from this transient condition. Many producers therefore choose to hold their wine in bottle for a few months before release and distribution.
Great wine inevitably has a sense of place, and is a product of both the natural environment and human culture in which it is birthed. What better way is there to gain a deeper appreciation of a region’s wine than to visit the vineyards that produced it? Fortunately, wine regions are often very accessible and open to tourists, and one highly recommended suggestion is to combine a holiday with a visit to a wine country. Once you get home, resist the urge to guzzle your wine straight away. Just like we feel the effects of jet lag, your wine can suffer a kind of car lag and may need a few days to recover from travel “bottle shock”.
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. 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. 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.
When enjoying a local wine during a delightful vacation, you may well decide to bring a few bottles of the same back home. Perhaps not too surprisingly, when the identical wine is tasted after an exhausting day at work or whilst opening the bills in the mail, it doesn”t taste the same. Of course, this is not the travel shock of the wine, rather your shock of returning from travel!
So, what do you do after you are back from holidays? Try to wait no less than four to six weeks for all wines, if possible. For especially fine or expensive wines, it is usually better to wait a minimum of three months. Generally speaking, red wines need longer than whites to settle down. But no guidance is absolute.
Hopefully this will be a helpful guide to you all. Any comments or further information on this topic will be most welcome.
Wine News and Information
Wine prices in UK are predicted to rise by about 10% this year. The average price of a bottle of wine rose to £5.98 from £5.75 last year. Despite the rising cost of living, consumers were spending more on wine. A recent survey also found that wine drinkers might be induced to spend more on their everyday drinking. Those paying on average of £4.64 for an “everyday” bottle of wine said they might spend up to a maximum of £6.81. French wines from Bordeaux , Loire and Beaujolais were popular. Champagne and rosé sales also grew strongly. According to some sources, regular wine drinkers spent on average £133 per transaction, up from £123 the previous year. The survey of 1,000 regular wine drinkers in the UK, carried out by Wine Intelligence on behalf of the Wine and Spirit Association (WSTA), found that consumers would rather cut their spending on sweets, chocolate, beer and soft drinks. More than 60% did not consider wine to be a high priority for cutbacks, while less than half of those surveyed did not believe that wine had become more expensive in the past six months. This was in stark contrast to their perceptions of other categories, such as bread, fish, poultry, cheese and coffee. But the survey comes as wine prices are being forced up by a combination of excise duty increases and escalating production and supply chain costs.
As global warming threatens to change the land, vintners have relied – sometimes for centuries – on established wine growing regions around the world, and are deploying techniques old and new to adapt. That’s because by 2050, the world’s premier wine-friendly zones could shift as much as 180 miles toward the poles. In theory, that will make northern Europe or New Zealand more grape-friendly than Bordeaux or the Australian valleys.
Climate and market forecasts, and studies of grape behaviour, suggest that during the next two generations – not a long time in wine terms – vintage Kent and Chinese or Canadian chablis could occupy as much supermarket shelf space as Bordeaux , Rioja and Napa ’s finest. In addition to creating new wine regions, the warming trend is changing established ones. To keep their vines cool, Argentine producers are planting them closer to the Andean slopes and in Patagonia. In South Africa, winemakers have moved sauvignon blanc vines to higher altitudes and sought patches open to cooling sea breezes.
In arid Australia , winemakers who have long depended on irrigation have been parched by the country’s worst drought in a century. And with government estimates predicting a sharp increase in dry spells in coming decades, industry experts say investment could shift from hot places such as Barossa Valley to the southern island of Tasmania.
In France’s sun-roasted Languedoc, where winemaking dates to the 5th century B.C., once-sacred rules against irrigating vines are being relaxed by the government to slake the vines’ thirst, while growers in the U.S. are experimenting with genetically modified heat-resistant grapes. In many vineyard areas of inland and southern Spain , viticulture soon could be unsustainable without irrigation. Farmers today grow vines in untrained bushes far apart to allow each a chance of surviving on scarce underground water. Higher temperatures also mean grapes are more sugary, meaning more alcohol when fermented – too much, in fact. Climate scientists say global warming has brought heavier than usual rain to some regions – which leads to more fungus outbreaks and attracts new pests. A recent Italian study suggested increased intense rains are a threat to Tuscan wine quality.
A nearly eight-decade-old rule that delineates the official Champagne zone is about to be changed to include new territory, potentially allowing farmers like Petit to sell grapes for Champagne with the French seal of approval, the “Appellation d’Origine Controlee,” or AOC. Traditionally, Champagne could be grown only in a part of the Champagne region. But with global demand for sparkling wine soaring, putting pressure on limited supplies, the French authorities are opening what could be the largest wave of expansion of Champagne vineyards in nearly a century. Potentially, the expansion could increase annual production by 100 million bottles, to 430 million. The current Champagne growing region encompasses a patchwork of territory sprawling over 87,000 acres in 319 villages. In March, a team of experts appointed by the French government approved more than 40 more communes, or communities, to add to the Champagne territory.
Monolithos Monthly News
Summer brings with it a series of vineyard tasks. As the grapes flourish and blossom, so do the weeds. It’s important to clear this competition from the producing grape vines because it will affect the quality and quantity of the harvest. Competition can be removed by keeping up with mowing between rows and by clipping the young seedlings or “suckers” by hand. Summer is a critical time in the vineyard. Fruit set has occurred, sprays recommended for pre-bloom, fruit set/post bloom and subsequent sprays should not be neglected. A general principle is that disease management must be done in a preventative mode, while for the most part, insect management should be based on application of a suitable insecticide.
At the winery cleaning, sterilizing and preparing all equipment and getting ready for the new harvest is underway. Summer wine sales particularly of white and rose labels, are at their peak. The winery is opened to visitors most weekends. 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 Pete Sermond
“If I remember right there are five excuses for drinking: the visit of a guest, present thirst, future thirst, the goodness of the WINE, and any other excuse you choose!”
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