Dirty

A negative description of wines with chemical or microbial “off” odors and flavors usually resulting from faulty winemaking. The implication is that something is present in the wine that shouldn’t be.

Millions of grape vines were uprooted in South Africa after World War I in order to grow alfalfa.

Answer: True.

South African grape growers uprooted some 10 million vines after the war in order to plant alfalfa to feed—can you believe it?—ostriches. Ostrich feathers were highly fashionable in Europe during the Roaring '20s. The change from grapes to alfalfa was due to economic hardship. South Africa had established a cooperative system at the turn of the 20th century to keep the wine industry from going into economic depression. Although a dozen co-ops were formed, many were unsuccessful. Grape prices plummeted, causing the wine industry to enter another depression after WWI. That's when, seeing an opportunity in feathers, grape growers turned to alfalfa.

“On more than one occasion in recent years, I’ve opened a wine list in a trendy restaurant and been a bit stumped. A lot of choices, but on the entire list, I may recognize about half the wines. I cannot imagine how a customer with less knowledge about wine than I, if such a person exists, feels reading an obscure wine list like that. Except intimidated. Which is not normally why a human goes to a restaurant. That’s why you go to church.”

—Ron Washam, The HoseMaster of Wine

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