The public's ignorance-I had two very amusing comments this weekend regarding wine and thought i would share it with you. In a country like South Africa were our rugby players are gods, one such a former World-Cup-winning player is Cobus Wiese. Over the weekend while consulting for a wine store in Fourways, a lady came in and asked for Weisser Riesling. I then showed her our local slection and she chose the Hartenberg which she then told was owned/made by Kobus WIESE. I said "No 'mam this is not so, I know the winemaker and the owner and it's not Kobus Wiesse, to no avail, she left with a bottle of WIESE-Riesling and I'm sure the winemaker will be happy he made a sale. Hopefully she will like the wine and continue buying it when she one day realizes her mistake, if ever!

Another amuzing incident was in the local newspaper in the area were i live where I have to admit wine knowledge is very sparce. The article went along the lines of two people who got very sick after they discovered "glass" in their wine. I personally thought that the volume of wine caused the vomiting not the glass but to any event the winefarm answered the query by stating that when wine goes through temperature flactuations christals can be formed in the wine. They were of course talking about tartrates which are mostly found in white wines that have been overchilled and on the corks of red wines especially ones that have matured in the bottle. So no, I doubt if the two sick gentlemen were sick from drinking wine and the article ends off with the negative connotation that what happens if others drink wine and get glass in their wine! As if we don't already have a shrinking per capita consumption of wine!!

As I said at dinner on Sunday, it is our responsibility as wine lovers to educate this world on wine and that includes your ignorant friends.

Happy teaching.

Maud