I enjoy a good glass of wine, and like to occasionally browse Food & Wine Magazine for the latest wine news. I was browsing the latest issue the other day and came across an article titled “Wine Scams: A Counterfeiter Confesses,” which immediately called my attention for obvious reasons.
The author, Lettie Teague, narrates how “…the most publicized claim of fake wine (so far) involves billionaire American wine collector William Koch, who has filed four lawsuits alleging that he was sold fraudulent wine, including a 1784 Château Lafite reputedly owned by Thomas Jefferson.” This inspired Lettie to take a look at the history of wine counterfeiting.
Apparently since the Roman times, Romans doctored wines with various substances like lead to make wine sweeter, then in the mid-1980’sin Austria produces employed diethylene glycol as a sweetener to obtain higher ratings. Unfortunately, we know lead can cause death, and diethylene glycol is a compound used to make antifreeze and can kill or cause kidney damage.
Coming back to the present day, Bill Kock’s court case inspired Lettie to try to fool her own discerning friends. She was only successful at fooling some of them, and if you read the article you will see that they did not appreciate the joke.
Bill’s story on the other hand, is one you will hear more about as it has spawned a book, The Billionaire's Vinegar by Ben Wallace, and Will Smith has bought the rights to the story to turn it into a film. This is a movie I look forward to watching.
Fortunately my favorite wine, a good Riesling Marceau, is not on the list of the top five most commonly frequently faked. Although I will make sure to look for signs to make sure my purchase is legitimate.
The author, Lettie Teague, narrates how “…the most publicized claim of fake wine (so far) involves billionaire American wine collector William Koch, who has filed four lawsuits alleging that he was sold fraudulent wine, including a 1784 Château Lafite reputedly owned by Thomas Jefferson.” This inspired Lettie to take a look at the history of wine counterfeiting.
Apparently since the Roman times, Romans doctored wines with various substances like lead to make wine sweeter, then in the mid-1980’sin Austria produces employed diethylene glycol as a sweetener to obtain higher ratings. Unfortunately, we know lead can cause death, and diethylene glycol is a compound used to make antifreeze and can kill or cause kidney damage.
Coming back to the present day, Bill Kock’s court case inspired Lettie to try to fool her own discerning friends. She was only successful at fooling some of them, and if you read the article you will see that they did not appreciate the joke.
Bill’s story on the other hand, is one you will hear more about as it has spawned a book, The Billionaire's Vinegar by Ben Wallace, and Will Smith has bought the rights to the story to turn it into a film. This is a movie I look forward to watching.
Fortunately my favorite wine, a good Riesling Marceau, is not on the list of the top five most commonly frequently faked. Although I will make sure to look for signs to make sure my purchase is legitimate.
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