Darker booze = bigger hangover

See - stick to cheap wine, people:

A new study may help drinkers pick their poison. In a head-to-head comparison, bourbon gave drinkers a more severe hangover than vodka, report Damaris Rohsenow of Brown University and colleagues in an upcoming issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.

But vodka drinkers aren’t off the hook: Drinkers’ sleep suffered equally with both drinks, as did their performance on tasks requiring attention and quick responses. Understanding the lingering effects of alcohol after a night of heavy drinking is important for people who engage in safety-sensitive tasks, such as driving, while hung over Rohsenow says.

The researchers recruited 95 healthy young adults, ages 21 to 33, and gave them caffeine-free cola mixed with bourbon, vodka or tonic water. The drinking ended when participants’ breath-alcohol concentrations hit an average of 0.11, well over the legal intoxication limit. Participants were then hooked up to sleep monitors, which record brain activity, and allowed to sleep it off. At 7 a.m. the next day, the researchers roused the subjects from bed (a wake-up that did not include coffee or aspirin) and asked them to rate the severity of their hangovers.

Overall, bourbon drinkers reported feeling worse than vodka drinkers, rating higher on scales that measure the severity of hangover malaise, including headache, nausea, loss of appetite and thirst. It should come as no surprise that alcohol drinkers said they felt much worse than those who had drunk only tonic water.

One reason for the different effects of vodka and bourbon, Rohsenow says, could be that bourbon contains 37 times more toxic compounds than vodka does, including nasty organic molecules such as acetone, acetaldehyde, tannins and furfural. A good rule of thumb for liquors, she says, is that the clearer they are, the less of these substances they contain.

Both the bourbon drinkers and vodka drinkers slept poorly compared to the nondrinkers, the team found. The next morning, when the participants performed cognitive tests that required attention and quick reaction times, the drinkers performed worse than the nondrinkers, but the type of alcohol had no effect on performance. Both groups of drinkers were impaired equally.

(courtesy Science News)

2008 Yellow Tail Shiraz – $7

Yellow Tail is one of the reasons we started this website. There are so many interesting under twenty dollar wines available, but virtually undiscovered, while Yellow Tail was 1/10th of all wine sales. There is nothing wrong with Yellow Tail Shiraz, for the price it’s fine. It’s available everywhere, cheap and it has a reliable taste, it’s kind of the McDonald’s of wine. Compared to the other mass produced wines it holds it’s own, but put it up against wine that sells for a few bucks more and Yellow Tail can’t compete. So head to your local wine shop, tell the help there that you want a bottle of their best under $10 wine, give it a try, find your new go-to everyday wine. There are some really exciting, well priced wines out there, start drinking your way through as many as you can. If price is the #1 consideration in your wine buying, then Yellow Tail isn’t a bad choice. But otherwise save your pennies and find a wine with a little “wow” factor.

Oh, I almost forgot, the review: The color is deep dark red, the nose is cherries with a bit of alcohol. It tastes of tangy cherry juice with a hint of sour green stick flavor popping up now and again. Even though the cherry flavor is slightly sour the over all taste is a bit sweet. No tannins to speak of and the finish is nondescript. A very drinkable, but simple wine.

Ring in 2010 with a glass of bubbly

New Year’s Eve is the time to pop open a bottle of champagne, toast the old year, and drink to the new. And every chick remembers the douchebag who hit her in the face with the champagne cork – don’t be THAT GUY! Here are other essentials for toasting 2010:

Champagne vs. sparkling wine

Champagne must come from the Champagne region of France to be classified as proper champagne. Wines from other regions or countries are considered sparkling wine. Prosecco is a dry Italian sparkling wine and cava is a sparkling Spanish wine.

Prosecco and cava are occasionally bottled with a metal cap and require the use of a traditional bottle opener.

Brut vs. extra brut

Brut means dry and “extra dry” is actually sweeter than a brut. Sugar is the big difference between brut and extra brut champagnes. Extra brut has fewer than 6 grams of sugar per liter while brut has fewer than 15 grams.

Vintage vs. non-vintage

Non-vintage or more correctly MULTI vintage has a mixture of vintages so that the end product is pretty similar year in and year out. If you get a vintage sparkler (one with a year on it), you could have something very remarkable, depending on the year of course. And they tend to be a bit pricey.

Flute vs. coupe

The flat “coupe” glass you get at wedding receptions that was supposedly modeled after Marie Antoinette’s breasts is popular with caterers because it is easy to fill. But champagne spreads out in the glass and carbonation is lost. A flute is preferred to preserve carbonation.

Quick vs. proper pour

When you pour champagne quickly, a froth called mousse develops. Hosts should pour slowly until the mousse is about two-thirds up on the glass. Pause and resume pouring.

Fridge vs. ice cooling

If champagne hasn’t been properly chilled, it should be submerged in a water-ice combination to bring down the temperature. Mixing salt in the ice will reduce the temperature further.

(portions courtesy MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE NEWS SERVICE)

2005 Chateau Tour Bayard Montagne St. Emilion – $20

Most experts agree that the 2005 vintage is the best vintage of Bordeaux in the last 15 years, and this one lives up to the vintage!  Full bodied and bold, this Bordeaux drinks great now, but would definitely age beautifully.  Cassis and blackberry fill the palate in this monster for the price. Gotta put it down as $20 even though we picked it up for $9 at a sale. Jealous? Yeah, we know some people that know some people that robbed some people.

Decant this bad boy before drinking, as it gets better with air, and drink it with a nice steak.  Awesome value!

Wine Glasses – do they really make a difference?

First of all, let me say that I always thought a wine glass was a wine glass was a wine glass, and that the folks at Riedel were freaking geniuses for making us think we need a different wine glass for different wines. But I’m telling you now – it DOES make a difference.

The turning point for me was one holiday season, I realized that the exact same damn sparkling wine was much more enjoyable out of a Champagne flute than out of a Champagne coupe - you know that Margarita glass looking thing that was supposedly modeled after Marie Antionette’s left breast (or was it the right)? You get them at weddings – some are plastic and the bottoms fall out. Anyway, it gets flatter quicker, the bubbles aren’t as much of a factor, and the flavors aren’t as intense. So I started paying attention to other wines with other wine glasses as well. Shapes, bowl sizes, etc. all play a part in getting various amounts of air into the wine and conducting that wine up to your nose and eventually down the hatch.

Now, I’m not saying to act like a douchebag and refuse to drink your Syrah out of anything but the Riedel 403 model 30 Syrah glass, but don’t take my word for it – do your own experimenting. And it’s not like you don’t think there’s a bit of a difference already anyway – otherwise you’d be happily drinking your wine out of a coffee mug, styrofoam cup or favorite Batman glass.

Now, I’ll agree that some of it is marketing. Will I get more out of my Châteauneuf-du-Pape with a crystal Riedel 4400 model 30 glass or am I missing out by using my R2D2 glass or even my IKEA SVALKA 5123 red wine glass? What if I’m such a cool guy that I have a whole bunch of different high-end wine glasses and want to drink that fancy Chardonnay? Do I use a Chablis glass because it’s a WHITE, or a Burgundy glass because it’s a Burgundian wine?

Yeah, don’t worry about it – just do your own experimentation and have fun doing it!

P.S. – For what it’s worth, we here at Cheap Wine Finder use the “Taste of Purple” VINO2 wine glass (pictured). If a wine tasting is from 11-2, you better believe we’re there at 10:30 getting a good spot. Problem with arriving early is most of the wines have just been opened, and if you’ve ever noticed, a wine is much better once it’s been open for at least 20 minutes or so. Well, this wine glass has a strategically designed indentation in the side of the bowl that acts as an agitating obstruction to the wine as it’s being swirled. No more waiting 20, 30, 60 minutes to let the wine breathe and “open up”. The patented design of the VINO2 fully aerates the wine in seconds, releasing the components that make up a wine’s aroma. PLUS – it fits an entire bottle!

A few Christmas Wine Labels

Have a Merry Christmas! Cheers!

2005 Gramona Gran Cuvee – $16

Gramona is the last family owned Cava maker in Spain. The Gran Cuvee is a blend of three grapes, Xarel.lo (that’s right it has a period in the middle), Macabeo and Chardonnay. The still wine is aged one year in French Oak and thirty months “on lees” ( in the bottle while the yeast is doing the second fermentation). Parker gave this vintage 91 points. So far so good, we have a single vintage, estate grown and bottled, 90 point plus Sparkler selling for 16 bucks.

Pale yellow in color, it looks very elegant in the glass. The nose is buttered toast, hints of butterscotch and a bit of lemon zest. The taste is sharp green apples on your tongue and fresh baked apple pie in the back of your palate with  that champagne nutty, yeasty note evident; cool, different levels of flavor. It has both a tart citrus component and a creamy almost buttery element. This a very classy bottle of wine, delicate and varied. The bubbles are light and fleeting, but the taste makes a statement. This is a sparkling wine that will hold it’s own with sparklers far more expensive.

Cheap Wine is Recession’s Finest Fruit

Recession’s fruit: Big wine bargains

Americans are buying more wine than before, but they’re shying away from higher-priced bottles. That’s making it tough on the industry but creating deals for consumers.

Wine lovers, listen up.

Consumers and restaurants have cut back on purchases of high-end wines as the recession has weighed on Americans. That has caused an oversupply, which in turn is driving down prices.

Some wineries and grape growers have been suffering an “inventory-induced recession” since distributors and retailers late last year started radically reducing high-end inventories, said Robert Smiley, the director of wine industry programs of the University of California, Davis, Graduate School of Management.

Sales of wines above $25 a bottle, in particular, have taken a big hit: Those wines slumped 12% in the year’s first quarter compared with a year earlier, even though total U.S. wine sales rose about 5% in terms of volume, said Jon Fredrikson, an industry consultant with Gomberg, Fredrikson & Associates. Through June, sales of high-end wines were down 11%, according to Silicon Valley Bank’s state-of-the-industry report.

And market research group Mintel is forecasting a 2.1% increase in total wine sales this year, to $27.6 billion. Sales fell 3.2% in 2008, when the financial markets collapsed.

Though the glut in high-end wine is tough for wineries, it’s a great deal for wine-loving consumers. “For the next two to three years, the consumer can expect deals on higher-priced wines,” Smiley said, noting that those wines usually start at about $15 a bottle.

“The $100 bottles of wine are just not selling,” said Kevin Zraly, the founder of the Windows on the World Wine School and MSN’s Delish wine blog. “Even before this recession, the greatest values in the world were not under $10. They were and are in the $10 to $25 range. That is where you are going to get your best value for your money right now.”

A dilemma for growers
Prices of grapes on the spot market have plunged, exacerbating the already tough economy for many grape growers. Chardonnay grapes are going for about $500 a ton, down from $2,500 two years ago, and pinot noir is down about 43% from last year’s $3,000.

“The longer we went into the season after the harvest began, prices became weaker,” said Nick Frey, the president of California’s Sonoma County Winegrape Commission. The plunge in spot prices has forced growers to decide whether to take a low offer — one that may not cover the cost of the harvest — or possibly leave their fruit on the vine to rot.

“It’s been hard to find a buyer. If you’re a small grower and you don’t have a buyer, you essentially lose 100% of your production costs,” Frey said.

“It’s the toughest in my 15 years,” Northern California grower Joe Reynoso told the Santa Rosa Press Democrat. Reynoso said he intends to custom crush his grapes, store the product and sell it as bulk sometime in the next two years rather than accept lowball offers or leave the grapes to rot.

“I’m surprised at this point that there haven’t been more wineries that have gone out of business,” Zraly said. “Some of these wineries are not going to make it.”
More from MSN Money

Trouble for wineries
Difficulties abound across the board.

“As a rule, wineries that rely on distributors are having a hard time. Buyers for the retail stores aren’t buying the top-priced wines. Restaurants aren’t stocking them,” Vic Motto of Global Wine Partners told Decanter.com.

Some wineries will likely have to put themselves up for sale, according to Steve Fredricks of Turrentine Brokerage. “It’s going to continue to be challenging for smaller wineries,” particularly those that make only a few thousand cases, he said.

Next year will be the tough one for many wineries, when “the little guy is in bigger trouble,” said Ian Dorin, the wine director of WineLibrary.com. The vineyards that have strong brand recognition or long waiting lists are expected to weather this storm. The big companies such as Constellation Brands (STZ, news, msgs), whose brands include Robert Mondavi and Ravenswood wines, and Diageo (DEO, news, msgs), which makes Beaulieu Vineyard wines, should also be just fine.

Years before a return to old pricing
“I don’t know if it’s ever going to go back to what we called normal,” Dorin said.

Wine distributors are discounting the price of existing inventories to retailers, offering price cuts as large as 30%, according to a Sonoma County wine report by Moody’s Economy.com.

As Americans cut back on high-end dining, restaurant wine sales declined by 5% in 2008, according to market research company Nielsen, in contrast to a 7% increase in retail wine sales.

It could take years before prices make their way back to where they were just a year or two ago. “It’ll last until people return to restaurants and return to their old buying habits,” UC Davis’ Smiley said.

A good deal for wine lovers
However, the wineries’ troubles mean a deal for oenophiles. Last year, the 28 brands that sold at least 2 million cases each in the United States grew by a combined 1.1% in sales volume, according to Impact Databank’s 2009 report on the U.S. wine market. And those 2 million case wines were priced 35% below the industry average, according to the report.

Consumers are “going to go where they can get a good bottle of wine at the best cost. Anytime that someone can pay less, they will,” Dorin said.
But Americans still love their wine.

There’s still positive growth and consumption, said Frey, of the Sonoma County growers commission, and “the industry will come back. You may trade down in wines, but you remember how good some of the ones you used to buy were. As people get more money in their pocket or more confident that the money in their pocket won’t be needed for an emergency, they’ll continue to buy wine. People appreciate fine wine.”

The bottom line, Zraly says, is that “it is a great time . . . to buy wine. There’s a lot of good wine out there at the right price.”

(courtesy MSN Money)

Now Check Out The Lighting Scheme Of The Next Wine Bar You Visit

Drinkers’ brains are tricked into thinking a glass of white wine is better and more expensive tasting when exposed to the red or blue background lighting than those in rooms with green or white background lighting.

And connoisseurs are warned to be wary of unscrupulous bar owners who try to pass off cheap plonk in trendy lit bars.

German researchers gave drinkers the same bottle of Riesling in the differently lit environments and asked for their feedback.

They found the same wine was perceived as being nearly one-and-a-half times sweeter in red light than in white or green light.

Its fruitiness was also most highly rated in red light.

Drinkers in a red or blue set room were also on average prepared to fork out as much as one euro (70p) per bottle more for the same tipple.

Dr Daniel Oberfeld-Twistel, of the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, said: “It is already known that the colour of a drink can influence the way we taste it.

“We wanted to know whether background lighting, for example in a restaurant, makes a difference as well.”

He concluded ambient lighting influences how wine tastes, even when it has no direct effect on the colour of the wine in the glass.

He said: “The extreme lighting conditions found in some bars can undoubtedly influence the way a wine tastes.”

Dr Oberfeld-Twistel said more tests were needed to establish exactly why the colours had the effect on the taste of the wine but early indications was that it was to do with the mood they put people in.

“We thought it was simply that colours that people found agreeable would put them in an agreeable mood,” he said. “However early tests seem to show that it is not as simple as that.

“We still believe however that it is something to do with the mood they put people in. For some reason some colours put people in a more positive mood.

taken from Telegraph.co.uk http://tinyurl.com/ycwzqst

Wine Bottom Line

With the death of investment banking and the collapse of the housing market, Americans have had to be that much smarter when it comes to spending their precious few remaining almighty dollars; even when it comes to wine the bottom line has become more about cost than, well, anything else.

As a wine newbie myself I was pretty static in my wine selections, sticking with $9-$12 Shiraz like McWilliams and Woop Woop,  as my ventures into the less expensive wine arena (Charles Shaw, Yellow Tail, etc.) were disappointing across the board.

Who has been my financial savior in 2009, saving me from death by 2-buck Chuck and cubed-wine?  Walmart!  Ah, the Evil Empire of Arkansas is sly and clever, and knowing no one would buy Walmart Wine they cleverly manifested the Oak Leaf Vineyard line of inexpensive wines, the only catch being that Oak Leaf Vineyard doesn’t actually exist as it’s really The Wine Group and Oak Leaf Vineyards serves as merely a marketing/label storefront.   Diabolical, I love it!

Regarding the Oak Leaf Vineyard wines, the Shiraz and Chardonnay are both quite pleasant and one would normally have to spend 3x as much (read: $9) for an equivalent value, and the other offerings (PinotG, Cab, Merlot) are certainly serviceable for the price point.  My point here is simply this:  at $2.97 the value proposition is saving 3x+ on what you throw into your cart when shopping at your local grocery store or Target, so stop doing it!  If you’re like my household and consume 4 bottles of wine per week (be honest with yourselves now), the value proposition translates to $12 (4 bottles of Oak Leaf) * 52 (weeks) = $624 vs. $40 (bottles of $10 so-so wine) * 52 (weeks) = $2080, the difference being we are now on track to spend $1456 less per year in household wine, which is a bottom line I can live with.

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