Oenophobia & 9 other slightly bizarre wine facts
If you're reading this post, we're pretty certain you don't have something called oenophobia, which happens to be an intense fear or hatred of wine. OK, we can understand the fear of spiders or snakes (we say live and let live) -- but wine? I guess OUR fear would be running out of wine!
Once the term oenophobia came across our path, we thought it would be entertaining to list a few of the slightly odd, somewhat bizarre wine facts with you, so here we go!
1. Hammurabi’s Code (1800 B.C.) had a law about wine: Fraudulent wine sellers were to be punished by drowning in a river. Whoa!
2. The primary fruit crop in Napa Valley during the 1940’s was Prunes – not grapes.
3. Ancient Romans believed that seasoning was more important than the main flavor of wine. They often added fermented fish sauce, garlic, lead and absinthe. (FISH SAUCE?)
4. Italy has a free, 24-hour wine fountain (but they don't have Vinny No Neck!)
5. President Lincoln held a liquor license back in his days in Salem, Illinois. For a modest $7 dollars, in 1833, he and his partner William F. Berry got a tavern license that permitted them to sell a 1/2 pint of wine for just a quarter.
6. Your nose knows: wine ‘tastings’ are somewhat inaccurately named – top sommeliers agree that smell is by far the most important sense when it comes to drinking wine.
7. “Drinking to one’s health” started in ancient Greece. The idea was that the host drank the first cup of wine to show his guests he wasn’t poisoning them.
8. We have the ancient Romans to thank for the toast. When Romans would drop a piece of toasted bread into each glass to temper excessive acidity, and our modern CHEERS began.
9. The world’s oldest person attributed her ripe old age of 122 to a diet of olive oil, port wine and chocolate! Sounds great to us -- just add bread & pasta!
And a TIP: Did you know, not all wines improve with age. In fact, 90 percent of wines should be consumed within a year of production.
With that said, come on in to the winery for a tasting!
CHEERS!
sources for inspiration: WIKI, siponthisjuice & purewow
