Hi all
Someone reported a problem accessing the link to the HRH Jancis article above. If the link doesn’t work, might be worth a google search for Jancis Robinson lightstrike
Regards
Ian
FYI, I had no problem accessing the full article with that link.
Well if lightstrike is the culprit seems an after market tint/uv screen on the cooler door is an easy fix
Have you tried these wines over several days? Also have others taste them and see what they think.
Maybe we should go back to the title of the thread - “wine cooler”
Do your wines have a tinny taste?
Seriously, people think this thread’s scenario is a light strike issue?
Photo from pour most recent wine tasting: What we lost in stemware we made up in savings on tin foil wrap and Sharpee.
Please: “Light can damage wine irreversibly in as little as one hour.” But, perhaps that will shut people up who say wine doesn’t change in the glass.
“Clearly, days sitting on a brightly lit supermarket shelf are going to take their toll, but if the wine remains in its case until the last minute before being opened, surely it should be fine? Not necessarily. It may have been exposed to harmful light before it was boxed up at the winery.”
I can’t wait until people start sending wine back in restaurants because they detect light strike.
Pardon for hyberbole, I am sure setting a wine on the windowsill is not great for a wine, but “sitting as little as an hour…”?
But, Dorian was headed for Alabama, so some folks will believe anything.
I was “struck” by those statements too, Anton. An hour under store lights results in stinky sulfur, cabbage and TCA-like wet cardboard aromas? Maybe an unwrapped bottle of Cristal sitting inches from a big fluorescent bulb…
There have been a lot of studies on this, especially by the Australians. But if your French is decent, there are studies that were done back in the early 1980s and 90s specifically with Champagne and sparkling wines, which is when I first heard of it.
Short wavelength radiation is believed to be what causes damage and the thinking is that wine pigments and various amino acids may be damaged when exposed to short wavelength radiation.
It’s an issue with beer and there’s a lot of literature in the beer world, but it’s also an issue with food and drugs. With wine, the flavor of lightstrike, or more elegantly, goût de lumière, largely comes from volatile sulfur compounds that get created, and interestingly, also from vitamins like riboflavin. It was an issue with Champagne and sparkling wines because by stirring up the lees, they get more amino acids floating in the wine.
But -
Studies in labs are conducted with the artificial light source maybe twenty or thirty inches from the wine. The closer the light, the more radiation. The intensity of the radiation falls of rapidly as distance increases and it’s not linear. So the radiation from a bulb two feet away vs a bulb up in the ceiling is very different.
Direct sunlight provides over 4000 times the UV radiation as fluorescent lamps, which, as mentioned, are usually in the ceiling. Also, the light spectrum from fluorescent lamps contains specific wavelengths, not a continuous distribution. Finally, you can get lamps of various “temperatures”, whereas sunlight provides a continuous distribution across the entire visible and UV spectrum.
Different yeast strains and fining with things like bentonite or charcoal are super effective in reducing the likelihood of light damage.
Finally, while it’s easiest to measure the effects on lighter wines like whites and rosés, which is where a lot of studies are done, red wines have tannins and pigments that prevent light damage and they’re also in darker glass.
So I think it’s a theoretical problem more than a practical one. Very few people put their wine in direct sunlight for hours or days. And unless people want to hunt for wine in pitch-black stores illuminated by small flaming torches, we’re going to be shopping in illuminated venues. But since we’ve all purchased wine and drugs and other goods from stores with lights on, and they’ve all been perfectly fine, I can’t see it as an issue. I’d be worried about heat far more than light.
I wonder if we can start to sell “wine swaddling” so people can get their wine home or safely to an “out of cellar” tasting.
On the plus side, now I know why the wine list at “Opaque” in L.A. seems to have such awesome wines.
This happened to me too. Maybe only 3 weeks but it really sucked. It’s a thing.
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More snark, eh?
How do you feel about wine kept on glass shelves, each one with fluorescent tubes directly underneath, or in glass cabinets with lights, or shops that offer for sale bottles from their window display? These are not made up examples, and there is no way I would buy those wines. Dimly light shops, I certainly would use. But then there is a range of in between levels of illumination where I would be more or less concerned.
This probably does a better job, with actual data and what at least on its face appears to be a controlled experiment. Note the color of glass matters a lot:
Nah. Did the newbie thing of posting a response without reading the rest of the thread.
Just find someone who is local on the forum and invite them over to have a second opinion, at least to confirm your tasting notes is accurate.
I was just playing.
You, I love!
There’s a store in Greenwich Village with little incandescent string lights along the shelves, right next to the bottles, warming them as the light soaks through the bottles. Acker Merrall has some fluorescent lights awfully close to some expensive bottles. And the old K&L store in SF (on Bryant?) had a skylight that allowed direct sunlight to hit the wines.
Really amazingly stupid!
More profit in selling used, burnt out light bulbs as “wine safe.” And very energy efficient!
I believe light damage is a thing, and wouldn’t buy from a place with bottles sitting under fluorescent lights or in direct sunlight. Just having a bit of fun at the expense of the exaggerated risk implied by the way the Jancis article is written.