Below The Beltway

It may help you live longer:
Red wine may be much more potent than was thought in extending human lifespan, researchers say in a new report that is likely to give impetus to the rapidly growing search for longevity drugs.
The study is based on dosing mice with resveratrol, an ingredient of some red wines. Some scientists [...]

There have been several studies that have come out over the past several years that purport to show that wine consumers really don’t know what they like and end up buying the most expensive wine on the menu because they think it’s better.
Well, it’s a little more nuanced than that:
One of the studies was devised [...]

Apparently, moderate alcohol use is good for your heart:
Middle-aged non-drinkers can quickly reduce their risk of heart disease by introducing a daily tipple to their diet, South Carolina researchers say.
New moderate drinkers were 38% less likely to develop heart disease than those who stayed tee-total, a four-year study involving 7,500 people found.
Those who drank only [...]

Or at least, people think they do:
RESTAURANTS charging inflated prices for wine could be doing their customers a favour. A study has found that people who pay more for a product do enjoy it more.
The researchers discovered that people given two identical red wines to drink said they got much more pleasure from the [...]

The Boston Globe recently challenged four wine experts to a blind taste test, and it yielded some pretty inconsistent results.
Jonah Lerner points to this and other experiments to support the argument that wine tasting is a purely subjective experience that is influenced by more than just what the wine tastes like:
What these experiments neatly demonstrate [...]

The New York Times reports that wineries in New York are starting to face a problem that has long plagued wineries in the Napa Valley, and even here in Virginia, they’re becoming too popular and too crowded:
AQUEBOGUE, N.Y., July 3 — In the 35 years since vines began sprouting out of its sandy soil, the [...]

Today’s New York Times has an interesting article on the Mondavi family:
On his own, Robert [Mondavi], aided by his children, Michael, Marcia and Timothy, created the Robert Mondavi Winery, arguably the single most important event in the recent history of the California wine industry. From its first vintage in 1966, the Mondavi winery stood for [...]

Karen DeCoster at LewRockwell.com has a few recommendations for cheap, but good wines, here are a few of my own:
Red Diamond Merlot: A great Washington wine, in both Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, but their Merlot is my favorite. And we can get it at our supermarket for under $ 10 a bottle.
Kunde Merlot: A Sonoma [...]

Ernest Gallo, one half of one of the most successful commercial wineries in America, died this week at age 97:
BERKELEY, Calif. — Ernest Gallo, who parlayed $5,900 and a wine recipe from a public library into the world’s largest winemaking empire, died Tuesday at his home in Modesto. He was 97. “He passed away peacefully [...]

It seems wine is becoming more popular in China:
More and more Chinese drink wines, because it’s fashionable and a kind of social status,” said Zhou Ning, market strategy manager of a Beijing-based real estate company whose ads often feature young couples drinking wine or beautiful women lounging with a glass of wine. “We include wine [...]