It's a sad truth, but there is a lot of fake wine out there

The Guardian ^ | Thursday 18 February 2010 | Guy Woodward

[nickcarraway]

E&J Gallo being hoodwinked by French vignerons is funny and depressing, but not surprising

The news of E&J Gallo, the world's biggest single wine producer, being hoodwinked by a group of errant French vignerons is funny and depressing at the same time. It isn't, however, surprising.

The comedy comes from Gallo's clumsy attempt to ride the post-Sideways pinot noir craze by peddling Red Bicyclette as an authentic French pinot when it turned out to be anything but. It doesn't say much for Gallo's professionalism that its buyers couldn't tell the different between pinot, merlot and shiraz.

It is a sad truth, however, that there is a lot of fake wine out there. We're not talking here about bottles of first growth Bordeaux that may or may not have belonged to Thomas Jefferson (wines auctioned as such for over $100,000 are currently the subject of court cases in the US). While sophisticated counterfeit bottles are a growing cause for concern at the top end of the market, wine fakery is just as common lower down the chain.

Italy is the prime exponent – to such an extent that, in 2007, 25 police officers qualified as sommeliers in order to combat the problem. For years a blind eye was turned to the containers of gutsy wine from the south making its way to the more rarefied north – Tuscany, Piedmont and Verona.

SNIP

Ultimately, though, nothing will ever compare to the taste of the Bolivian "wine" discovered by customs officials in Bulgaria last year. The content of the bottles? Liquid cocaine.

[VampireStateNY]

Mogen David over vanilla ice cream with strawberries is a great dessert!

I've done that with flavored port before - yum!

[VampireStateNY]

Depending on how sweet you’re looking for, red Zinfandel might be a good place to start. Some of the bigger, fruitier California ones are sweet enough to taste like dessert wines (to me, at least)!

[Hoffer Rand]

Lindeman’s is a good Aussie label and not in the over $30 category.

[Lurking Libertarian]

My taste is red wine and generally sweet. Any suggestions??

Red Zinfandel.

[caww]

Thanks so much for all your suggestions. A neighbor had some Mogen David Blackberry wine left from her nieces...gave it to me to try...a bit bitey I thought, but can see it would be great over icecream to smooth out the bite.

I have super sensitive taste buds when it comes to anything with a bite. Can’t even put a sweet pickle in my mouth! And I can taste the tin from canned food containers. So the smoother the wine the better.