How American Is Your Wine?
When you drink a French wine, you can be assured that the grapes are all from France. Heck, you can be confident that they all come from an appellation the size of Rhode Island.
However, when you buy an American wine, can you be guaranteed that all the grapes are American? The answer is a shocking no. Federal law allows up to 25% of a wine to be foreign in origin before it can no longer be termed American! (However, this is not true of Californian wines protected by a 1942 state law.)
I find that kind of nuts, though I honestly can’t think of any examples that show this rule has been abused. Plus, I’m too lazy to do so. Anyway, the California Association of Winegrape Growers is preparing a petition to the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to change the rules. Will they succeed? We’ll find out after they cut through all the government red tape. Then again, the wine industry has loads of cash, so maybe it’ll happen sooner than we think.
