Wine labelling

Honestly, Graham, I see this as a welcome trend. While it will be something of an annoyance for the traditionalists, for the more industrial wineries it will shine some much-needed light into the dim corners of industrial wine production. How many wineries will want to have to list MegaPurple, pectinase and beet sugar on their list of ingredients?

Mark Lipton

Mark: I hadn't thought this through when I posted and I agree with you. As I don't drink the Yellow Tails and 2-Buck Muck, I hadn't considered the short cuts demanded by the MBAs at the heads of these big companies. I wonder if "Foot-pressed" will appear on the labels of some small producers{:-) Graham

I agree that it would be enlightening for us wine consumers to know what go es into the wines we drink. Perhaps even some of us who who consider oursel ves somewhat educated on the subject will be surprised to find out that add itions such as enzymes (like pectinase), potassium metabisulfite (the sourc e of the added sulfites that most wines have), yeast nutrients, fining agen ts, acidity adjustment agents (tartaric acid and potassium bitartrate), dil ution with water and sugar from beets or cane, are common even in wines mad e by very small producers. I think we wine drinkers would simply get used t o the idea that most wine has more than one ingredient. If such labeling be comes common or mandatory it will be a minor nuisance for us wine producers (or not so minor, depending on the public response) because of the time it will take to compile the data for the label and the added expense. We may respond in several ways: (1) Comply and hope people acclimate to it; (2) ch ange our winemaking practices, if applicable, in order to use fewer additiv es; (3) lie. Of course, no one we know would opt for (3), just saying it's possible.

Andy