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Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Material Other Than Grapes in Your Wine

There are been various scares about weird stuff in your wine from birds to arsenic. As per usual when the Internet gets hold of a great headline it can't let go and by the time a story has been shared a few hundred times it becomes The Truth.

Article from the San Francisco Chronicle on trying to dispel some of the wild stories.

The author does skirt around the part about insects in your wine. Per the FDA there are "natural contaminants" in many food items. They have allowable levels for insect and rodent parts in these foods. Obviously, they wouldn't be allowed if they hurt you, but it does seem a bit gross. Grapes do arrive for processing with bugs and other things found in the vineyard (MOG: material other than grapes) and some of these might just get crushed along with your grapes.

Think that's gross? Check out the number of aphids allowed in hops or the crushed bugs that make the red dye used in candies or the number or maggots allowed in canned mushrooms.  Eew. You want your food to be cleaner? Grow your own.

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