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duncang

(1,907 posts)
Sun May 14, 2017, 08:28 AM May 2017

How Shipwrecked Champagne Is Changing Winemaking

Thought this was interesting. I wonder if they will run lab tests to see if there is a change in the chemical compounds.

"Connoisseurs have long suspected that wine ages differently underwater. Analyses from a 10,000-bottle-capacity cellar off the Spanish coast by a company called Bajoelagua Factory show that factors like atmospheric pressure and water currents change the chemical compounds in wine.

Napa’s Mira Winery conducted its own taste tests on 240 bottles in Charleston Harbor. When the first case was pulled up in 2013, a sommelier told owner Jim Dyke: “You’ve turned a 2009 cabernet into a 2007 in three months.” "

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2017/04/explore-wine-aged-underwater/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=Social&utm_content=link_tw20170514ngm-underwaterwine&utm_campaign=Content&sf77939315=1

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How Shipwrecked Champagne Is Changing Winemaking (Original Post) duncang May 2017 OP
What pressure? The wine is bottled! I suspect it's rather the temperature. DetlefK May 2017 #1
I wonder if putting it a deep cold lake would do the same mitch96 May 2017 #2
An embarrassment to National Geographic JayhawkSD May 2017 #3
Follow-up: FDA told Dyke his 'ageing' process may be dangerous muriel_volestrangler May 2017 #4
I wonder if it is the pressure. duncang May 2017 #5

DetlefK

(16,423 posts)
1. What pressure? The wine is bottled! I suspect it's rather the temperature.
Sun May 14, 2017, 09:10 AM
May 2017

The speed of chemical reactions depends on the temperature. My guess would be that storing the wine really cold changes the relative speed of chemical reactions with respect to each other, leading to a slightly altered chemical composition over time. And that's why the final product varies.

mitch96

(13,817 posts)
2. I wonder if putting it a deep cold lake would do the same
Sun May 14, 2017, 10:33 AM
May 2017

I read where un opened wine/champagne was found on sunken ships and it tasted wonderful!!
m

 

JayhawkSD

(3,163 posts)
3. An embarrassment to National Geographic
Sun May 14, 2017, 11:09 AM
May 2017

Or, it should be but probably isn't, based on the hack the NG has become. "You turned 2009 into 2007 in three months." Oh, please.

At best, the cold might keep it from turning into vinegar, but the pressure has zero effect on it inside the glass bottle. Glass is not compressible.

muriel_volestrangler

(101,150 posts)
4. Follow-up: FDA told Dyke his 'ageing' process may be dangerous
Sun May 14, 2017, 11:21 AM
May 2017
It looks like Mira Winery's days of ocean-aging wine could be over. A pioneer in the ocean-aging game, Mira has submerged bottles off of Charleston harbor, dubbing the process Aquaoir. But now, according to The Post & Courier the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in conjunction with the the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) have issued a warning regarding the practice.

The FDA has advised us that aging wine in a way that bottle seals have contact with
sea or ocean waters may render these wines adulterated under the FD&C Act in that
they have been held under unsanitary conditions whereby they may have become
contaminated with filth or may have been rendered injurious to health (21 U.S.C. §
342(a)(4)). The specific issue:
“gasoline, oil, heavy metals, plastics, drug residues, pesticides, as well as various types of filth, including waste materials from biological sources, sludge, decaying organic matter, runoff from farms, effluents from sewage treatment plants, and bilge waters from vessels,”


We spoke to Mira Winery President Jim “Bear” Dyke Jr. this morning, and he calls the warning a manufactured crisis. "You're telling me Charleston Harbor is filled with sewage, but it's OK to swim in?" Dyke says. "It's basically the description of water after a hurricane. If the water is as they described, the least of their concerns should be eight cases of sealed wine."

Dyke adds that Mira's ocean-aging enterprise was never meant as a for-profit venture anyway. "The point was to engage in an experiment," he says, adding that the FDA has yet to do any chemical analysis on Mira's aquaoir bottles or examine the seals post-harbor aging which Mira has done and never found an adulterated seal.

http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/Eat/archives/2015/03/20/mira-winery-president-responds-to-fda-warning-about-ocean-aging-wines

His problem is that either it's just the temperature, or the seal is less than perfect, in which case the FDA's concerns are valid.

duncang

(1,907 posts)
5. I wonder if it is the pressure.
Sun May 14, 2017, 01:59 PM
May 2017

Normally wines age at a set temp. And the water kept it cool. But not under pressure. I know the glass doesn't compress. But a natural cork is permeable. Gases may escape at normal atmospheric pressure. One description mentioned a muddy taste. Maybe that cork that leaked through more then others? Would just tossing it in a chilled pressurized chamber result in what they are wanting to achieve?

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