Now a glass of white wine a day can be just what the cardiologist ordered.
By Daniella Ashkenazy
The discovery some two decades ago that red wine is good for your health was prompted by European insurance companies, who noticed that the population of southern France lived longer than their European neighbors, though enjoying a diet rich in saturated fat. Their longevity was linked to regular consumption of red wine, but it was only in 1995 that biochemist Professor Michael Aviram unlocked the secret of the red wine "antidote" to traditional French cuisine.
Aviram, head of the Lipid Research Laboratory of the Technion Faculty of Medicine and Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, discovered that red wine consumption by healthy volunteers impeded oxidation of "bad cholesterol" (LDL). This prevents deposition of LDL in the arteries and consequently lowers the incidence of cardiovascular disease among those who consume a daily glass of red wine. However, until recently those who preferred the sweeter
and lighter white wines did not benefit from the same attributes found in the reds.
Aviram explains that this is due to the difference in the production of the two types of wines. Both red and white grapes contain flavonoids (types of antioxidants); however, the fermenting process of red grapes involves continuous contact of the grape skins with the juice for two to three weeks, while with white grape varieties, the grape skins are strained out within hours. The prolonged period in which the red grape skins are in contact with the juice not only accounts for the hue and distinct flavor of red wine, it also allows the flavonoids to be present in far greater amounts than in white wine.
Following his discovery, Aviram joined forces with Amram Surasky, head vintner and enologist at the Binyamina Winecellars and Distillers, with the aim of creating a similarly "healthy" white wine. It was not a simple task: they were aware that the skins of the white grapes must be removed prior to the fermentation process, in order to preserve the flavor and color of white wine. Surasky and Aviram managed to delay the fermentation process for up to 18 hours by keeping the mixture at a constant temperature of 20? Celsius. The result was the world's first white wine with the same healthful benefits as a full-bodied Cabernet - a superb light 2000 vintage Chardonnay.
The technique for producing the wine, which was debuted in Europe last year and awarded two prestigious prizes - was subsequently copied by wineries around the world. However, the concentration of flavonoids in the white wine produced this way was still three times lower than in the reds, meaning that one needed to drink three glasses of the "healthy" white wine to have the same beneficial effect of one glass of red.
Surasky and Aviram therefore set about to "enrich" the concentration of flavonoids in white wine. They realized that they needed a way to extract more flavonoids from the white grapes without adversely affecting the taste of the resulting wine. The method that proved most effective was to add concentrations of natural grape alcohol (up to 18%) to the white grape mixture. The natural alcohol caused robust and rapid extraction of the taste and aromatic materials in the skins, yet little fermentation took place due to the low temperature at which the mixture was incubated. The skins were filtered out after 18 hours and the juice was fermented for two weeks, in the traditional manner of white wines. The result: the Binyamina Winecellar's 2001 vintage dessert wine - made from Alexandrian Muscat grapes - which will be bottled in mid-November and on the shelves by December. The dessert wine contains five times more flavonoids than the 2000 vintage, with the same healthy benefit as in the red wine - meaning that lovers of white wine can drink not only to their health, but also for their health. Aviram and Surasky are now working on the production of a dry white wine with the same beneficial punch as the Muscat dessert wine.