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The Portuguese company Amorim—the leading supplier of cork stoppers in the world—has just come up with what we hesitate to call an innovation: scratch and sniff closures (yeah, no kidding). Part of the company’s new “Top Series,” the scratch/sniffer is supposed to expand consumers’ sensory experiences. The top of the closure is coated with a special varnish impregnated with micro capsules of a fragrance that is released when the surface is scratched. A transparent film laid over the top prevents the surface from being scratched accidentally. Ah, can we just smell the wine, please?

The country with the highest per capita wine consumption in the world is Italy.

Answer: False.

However, nestled within Italy’s capital city of Rome is the true answer: the Vatican City State. Each of the approximately 800 people who live inside the Vatican City consume about 16 gallons of wine a year. The country’s wine usage is partly the result of the Catholic celebration in which bread and wine are consecrated during the Mass. By comparison, U.S. per capita wine consumption is about 3 gallons.

Wine … changing even as we taste it, delivers a message with meaning only in our response. If we are in the right key when we receive it, our eyes will shine and we shall radiate pleasure.

—Gerald Asher
American writer, The Pleasures of Wine

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