Wine Facts & Trivia

It’s always great to be able to share an interesting story or fact with your friends and family while you are enjoying a bottle of wine or having a wine conversation.  Don’t find yourself without wine information; here are some interesting wine facts that are great for sharing.

• If you want to get a taste of “grapey” wines, try a Manischewitz.  This wine is a sweet style of kosher wine from the American Concord grape.  The same grape that we use to make juice and jelly.
• In 1880, California’s first Commissioner of Agriculture brought cuttings from France to California.  He sent his first wine from his vines to the Gran Prix in Paris where it won top honors in 1889.
• The German Gewurztraminer, pronounced “guh-VURTS-trah-mee-ner,” is similar to the White Zinfandel and chances are if you like White Zinfandel, you will enjoy a German Gewurtztraminer.  It is a fragrant white wine with a bit of sweetness.
• If a dry wine is fully fermented, about 40 percent of the sugar will be converted to carbon dioxide while 60 percent will be converted to alcohol.
• Grape skins will rise to the top of the fermenting must and will form a “cap.”  This cap needs to be broken down and mixed back in with the must.  When there is more extract forced from the skins, the wine will be a big and highly tannic wine.
• A wine’s label will be marked with an O or a U inside of a P if the wine is kosher.  This is the sign that the wine has been approved by the world’s largest kosher certification organization.