I’m sensible to sweet botrytis wines (BA, TBA, Sauternes …) - a bit too much and headaches are programmed.
No problems with fortified wines (Port etc) though.
That suggests a sensitivity to histamines, not sulfur.
Right.
I recommend drinking a lot of water with (not in 
) the wine(s).
Sorry I’m not finding the timestamp but there was a really interesting discussion of this issue here:
Seconded.
This ZBiotics stuff seems brutally expensive… like 8 dollars per bottle on Amazon? So you’re paying 8 bucks to avoid a hangover?
It is expensive. I am fortunate that I don’t get hangovers unless I really get smashed, but I do run hot and sleep poorly if I drink a lot. Z Biotic (or to a lesser extent FlyBy and Cheers pills) lets me sleep much better.
If I were someone who got hangovers and were going to be drinking more some evening, $8 to not have a hangover and splitting headache would be well worth it IMO.
But you are right it’s not cheap.
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Agreed. I guess it’s prohibitively expensive if you’re thinking of it as an everyday solution, but I don’t drink every day. For me its use is on a Friday or Saturday night when I suspect I might drink more than a glass or two. In those situations $8 is a small price to wake up feeling good the next morning.
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Not challenging anyone’s personal experience, but my understanding is that almost all processing of alcohol to acetaldehyde is done not in the gut but in the liver, where a probiotic like Zbiotic would have no effect.
That people experience reduced hangover symptoms might be explained by borderline excess acetaldehyde production dropping below the sensory threshold by eliminating the small percentage produced in the gut in cases where drinking is only “slightly” to excess. Maybe enough to “run hot and sleep poorly” but not enough to be “really smashed” as Chris put it. In an uncontrolled setting, things like confirmation bias can also have more impact than physiological effects.
It would be relatively simple, though no doubt costly, to design and carry out a controlled study. I wouldn’t do that if I were running the company unless I was highly confident in a strongly positive result. I suspect they know that’s unlikely.
That said, I’m tempted to try it myself. I so rarely drink enough to have hangover symptoms it might be a while. I could put in some extra effort. 
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Heck with it, I ordered some of the bottles. I know pretty accurately what my limits are and only exceed them in exceptional circumstances – such as if there is an expensive bottle of Cab at a restaurant that I can’t bear to see go to waste. I suppose I’ll have to test this soon.
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The probiotic in Zbiotics is definitely good for hangover prevention.
That said, I’m not so sure it would have any effect on red wine sensitivity, since the probiotic only metabolizes acetaldehyde, not the histamines and other allergens responsible for red wine headaches.
There’s another product I’m trialing that may be good for this, more to come on this in the next week or two.
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So I have been testing this product called “the wine fix” for a couple weeks and have found it pretty effective in mitigating red wine headaches and hangovers. I used it during/after the big wine dinner I hosted in NYC (> 2 bottles per person) and through that weekend where there was quite a lot of drinking, and found that I felt pretty good in the mornings and didn’t have any headaches. It works by treating the effects of quercetin and decreasing acetaldehyde, and seems to be quite effective.
I’m attaching my affiliate link below for those interested in reading more about it or giving it a try.
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Depends on the red. I had a fairly inexpensive French red made mostly of Malbec and the resulting headache was terrible, but I’m thinking the winemaker was at fault, not the grape itself (whatever additives may have been put in there). Aside from that, I try to mitigate by boosting with precursors such as zinc and amino acids, along with b-vitamins.
I definitely notice that I get more headaches from Cabernet based reds than Pinot and other reds.
Interesting - have any thoughts as to why?
Cheers
I still am not sure that there is any ‘link’ between ‘less expensive wines’ and more issues - unless, as I assume much of the time, that since the wine is ‘less expensive’, perhaps more is consumed? 
The people who make this product hypothesize that it’s because there is more quercetin in wines with more tannins. I don’t have any data to back that up though.
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So we should then add Nebbiolo to the list of suspects. It probably also doesn’t help that it packs a ABV at 14-15%. it definitely hits me harder than Pinot Noir.
Could it be just the fact that generally Cabs have more alcohol than Pinots?
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