Fwd: What's in your wine?

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pelagus

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 10:18 AM

What's in your wine?

 

 

What's in your wine?

Proposal to require labels to ID presence

of allergens such as eggs, fish, milk, wheat used in winemaking alarms

industry

By KEVIN MCCALLUM

THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070114/NEWS/701140375/1036/BUSINESS01#more

 

 

Most folks know white wine goes well with fish.

 

 

Far fewer are aware that wine is often made with fish.

 

And milk.

 

And eggs.

 

Confused?

 

That's

exactly what the wine industry says will happen if the government

requires wine labels to state when these and other potential allergens

are used in the winemaking process.

 

"If people read, 'This wine

contains milk, fish and eggs,' they are not going to know what hit

them," said Wendell Lee, legal counsel for the Wine Institute, the San

Francisco-based trade group that opposes the new rules.

 

But

that's exactly what the federal government, which is responsible for

approving the labels on alcoholic beverages, is proposing.

 

It

has drafted new rules that require wine labels to state if the wines

are made with one of eight major food allergens: milk, eggs, fish,

crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat and soybeans.

 

What's that got to do with the fermented grape juice?

 

Everything. Or nothing. It depends on whom you ask.

 

Winemakers

often use fining agents to clarify wine before it is bottled.

Byproducts of at least three of the eight allergens on the government's

list are commonly used in making wine.

 

They include egg whites;

a milk protein called casein and isinglass, a substance derived from

the inner membrane of the air bladders of sturgeon.

 

That's right - fish guts.

 

No wonder winemakers aren't excited about printing this fact on their

labels.

 

But

their opposition goes beyond just being worried about grossing out

consumers. They're worried people will be confused and misled by the

warnings.

 

To say the wines "contain" those products is wrong

because fining agents are filtered out before bottling, according to

the Wine Institute and other opponents of the proposed rules.

 

Fining

agents work by bonding with whatever particles the winemaker wants

removed, such as yeast, bacteria and excess tannins. This creates a

larger molecule that sinks to the bottom of the barrel or tank and

leaves the wine above it clearer.

 

"It's kind of like sweeping

the wine," said Bill Nelson, president of the wine lobby Wine America.

"You're putting in something that holds onto those particles in

suspension."

 

Since the fining agents are filtered out after they

do their job but before bottling, it would be misleading to tell

consumers the wines "contain" those substances, Nelson said.

 

But

the government is placing the burden of proof on the wine producers -

and brewers and distillers - to demonstrate their products don't

contain allergens, Lee said.

 

That's proving to be a tall order.

 

While

there are proven tests for peanuts, "there are no such methods

available for testing the presence of eggs, milk, wheat or fish in

wine," according to the Wine Institute's written comments.

 

Wheat-based

glues are sometimes used to seal wine barrels, raising the issue of

whether the wine comes into contact with a wheat product, Lee said.

 

Anecdotally,

the wine industry says there is no evidence these potential allergens

make it into the final product. If they did, people would have been

having bad reactions to wine for years.

 

"In 400 years there's

not been a single documented case of someone getting a fish allergy

(reaction) from wine," said Russell Robbins, manager of the Napa-based

U.S. operations of French wine supply company Laffort Oenologie, which

sells most of the common fining agents used in winemaking.

 

The Wine Institute made a similar argument in its comments.

 

"Fining

agents such as eggs and milk have been used in wine production for

millennia with few, if any, substantiated complaints from allergy

sufferers," it claimed.

 

Without any evidence of a problem, many

winemakers question why they should go through the expense and hassle

of changing their labels. Wine America estimated it could cost wineries

$2,000 to $5,000 per label to redesign their labels.

 

"I think

it's a solution in search of a problem," said Pete Downs, vice

president of governmental affairs for Santa Rosa's Kendall-Jackson Wine

Estates. "I kind of feel like its Shakespearean in nature. It's much

ado about nothing."

 

Others disagree.

 

The latest debate

about allergen labeling has been brewing since 2004, when a Harvard

University scientist, Christine Rogers, petitioned the government to

add an allergen warning to alcoholic beverages.

 

Rogers claimed she was allergic to eggs and had noticed her own

allergic reactions when she drank wine.

 

Lawmakers saw sufficient reason to be concerned, as well.

 

When

they passed the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act

later in 2004, lawmakers cited studies that showed food allergies

affect 2 percent to 5 percent of children, send 30,000 people to

emergency rooms every year, and kill 150 people annually.

 

Ninety percent of food allergies are from the eight major groups cited

in the law, lawmakers found.

 

Proponents of allergen warnings say the information is critical to

helping them stay healthy.

 

Fremont

resident Catharine Alvarez supports the new rules for wine because she

knows just how hard it can be to protect her children from foods they

are allergic to. Alvarez's 4-year-old son is allergic to eggs, while

her 7-year-old daughter is allergic to peanuts, she said.

 

While

she's not worried about their drinking wine now, they will someday, and

she uses beer and wine in cooking today, she said. She thinks wine

companies and other producers have an obligation to be transparent

about how wine is made and let consumers make up their own minds.

 

Those

who don't care about allergens won't be scared off by a small warning

on the back label, she predicted. And those who do care will appreciate

the additional information and feel more confident in their purchases,

she said.

 

"There are a lot of people I know who are willing to

pay extra for products that they know to be safe," said Alvarez, one of

45 people, companies and trade groups who submitted comments to the

Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, known as the TTB.

 

The

deadline for comments, which was extended at the request of the wine

industry, passed in December. Federal officials hope to publish a final

rule by the end of 2007, TTB spokesman Art Resnick said.

 

Several

groups are asking the TTB to hold off on implementing the proposed rule

until the science of testing for allergens improves. Others urge

patience and a global approach that allows consistency across all

wine-producing nations.

 

"A scenario where the exact same product

is being labeled as containing allergens in one country, but not

another country, serves no interests," stated one letter signed by

eight alcohol groups in the United States and Canada.

 

For an industry that touts the health benefits of its products, yet

another health warning on wine concerns many producers.

 

Their labels already carry two prominent warnings.

 

The

phrase "this product contains sulfites" has been required on most wine

labels since 1986. The naturally occurring compound is added to wine to

help it age, but some people are allergic to it and claim it gives them

headaches.

 

In 1988, a surgeon general's warning was added to

alcoholic beverages, citing the risk of birth defects, impairment of

people's ability to drive, and the catch-all "and may cause health

problems."

 

Yet another warning worries some winemakers.

 

Fining

agents, while used far less today than 15 years ago, are still an

important part of the winemaking process, said Nick Goldschmidt,

executive winemaker of Beam Wine Estates, which owns some of the

best-known Sonoma County wine brands, including Geyser Peak, Clos du

Bois and Buena Vista Carneros.

 

"We like to be able to have those tools available to us if we need

them," Goldschmidt said.

 

If

it comes down to a choice of using a fining agent that would trigger a

warning or finding another technique, Goldschmidt said it's too soon to

say what he would do.

 

"I actually think it's a healthy conversation for the industry to

have," he said.

 

 

 

 

 

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