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From Inside Science News Service, Christian Science Monitor
and MinnPost journalist Sharon Schmickle
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    Red wine, white wine, fish and science

    By Jim Dawson | Published Thu, Oct 29 2009 6:11 am

    WASHINGTON, D.C.  -- The long-standing rule of matching wine and food -- red wine with red meat and white wine with fish -- actually has a scientific explanation, according to two scientists working for the Mercian Corporation, a Japanese producer and marketer of wine.

    The research, published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, found that the small amounts of iron found in many red wines caused those who eat fish to have a strong, fishy aftertaste.

    Researchers had wine tasters sample 36 red wines and 26 white wines while dining on scallops. The wines varied by country of origin, variety and vintage, but the samples that contained irons were consistently rated as having a fishy aftertaste.

    When the scientists increased the amount of iron in a particular wine, the nastiness of the aftertaste increased. The reports of the bad aftertaste went away when a substance that binds to iron was added to the offending wines.

    Fish were then soaked in high-iron wine and several compounds related to the "fish" taste increased measurably.

    Jim Dawson reports for Inside Science News Service.

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    Scientific Agenda reports on important and interesting developments from the world of science in Minnesota and elsewhere. Coverage includes reports from MinnPost journalist Sharon Schmickle, who has won many awards for her science journalism. She has also taken part in several science fellowships, including the Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowship at Cambridge University in England, the Knight Science Journalism program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Latin American fellowship sponsored by the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing Inc. in New York.




    Scientific Agenda also features material from other sources, including Inside Science News Service, a Washington, D.C.-based news service, which is supported by the not-for-profit American Institute of Physics, a publisher of scientific journals.

    Recent Scientific Agenda posts