local council re-cycling

[Igurisu]

Pondering this. Mr Trapperjohn (who continues to have a good sense of humour, I hope) is fond of a glass or ten of Australian wine, which cheers up the wet climate of Lancashire. Wine is basically about 85% water, the rest being alcohol, sugar and numerous flavour and other compounds. The main wine areas in Oz are short of water. So numerous litres of water are shipped half way round the world from a drought area to Lancashire. How about they reduce the flavours to a syrup (ribena would work well), ship in dry form, save a fortune, and then it could be reconstituted with water and alcohol here.

I know this was lighthearted Charles but there is something in what you say.

I watched a TV program a couple of years ago about the environment decline in certain parts of Africa. It basically came down to European supermarkets farming large areas so they can provide us wealthier western Europeans with fruit and veg out of season.

The example I remember in particular is Stawberries, a weakness of mine. The program showed whole valleys and the villages/towns in those valleys devastated. It is due to the strawberries taking the water to grow but then being harvested and taken out of the climatic area so the rivers were/are drying up. Essentially their water is being exported to Europe in the form of fruit and vegetables. I now only eat English strawberries in season as a result and try to apply logic this to other fruit and veg.

 

[Charles Morgan]

Vinegar...

My problem with most commercial wine is I'd rather drink vinegar - it has an acid backbone and lacks the sweetness too much of the former has.

I admit I am probably not representative of normal tastes in this regard.

 

[Dieselman]

I'm quite happy with an acidic red, but was once given a gift bottle of white in a silly ornamental bottle and it really was like vinegar.

I suspect the bottle was worth a lot more than the contents.

The only amusing part was that it had been given to a number of customers...

 

[Charles Morgan]

About the only white wines I know that are intended to have a pronounced rancio (vinegary) flavour are very old (mid 19th century) dry Madeiras or Chateau Chalon wines. I have had an 1847 of the latter which tasted like an immensely powerful malt vinegar, it was so concentrated, yet dabbed on the wrist it had the most glorious perfume.

If you got one of those (bottled in a clavelin) your giver was either a rare collector or loopy in the extreme.

Most though are just off.

 

[Dieselman]

Charles, it wasn't a special wine and the bottle was just tat.