If health came in a bottle, it would create mayhem at the local market. As people threw elbows and ran over one another with rabid shopping carts, bottles of health would fly off the shelves, secured in the clenched grip of hissing customers. People would push, shove, and use props – such as a crying child or a seeing-eye dog – to get their hands on this product. A bottle of health would be a best seller. While it might not be a bottle of health, per say, a bottle of wine is the next best thing.
Those of us who are wine drinkers all know that red wine benefits the heart and white wine benefits the lungs. But, what we might not know is that the health benefits don’t stop there…not even close. The health benefits of wine transcend the human body, refusing to develop a monogamous relationship with any one part.
The following is a list of the unobvious ways wine is helping you or has the potential to help you in the future. They all exist in an underground world of unsung wine benefits, where grapes anxiously wait for their day in the sun.
Extreme Weight Problems: While the term "beer belly" may have given alcohol a bad rap when it comes to weight, wine is actually proven to help the severely overweight. In order for this to be true, dry wine, wine that does not contain sugar, needs to be ingested: four or five ounces are taken at dinnertime or bedtime. In one study, the average weight loss of those who ingested this wine was twice that of those who didn’t. Along these lines, because wine helps with anxiety and ridding the body of tension, it has also helped those who suffer, on the other end of the weight spectrum, from anorexia.
Old Age: Old age is not a disease, but an affliction to our health nonetheless. Still, it’s an affliction those of us in youth hope to someday procure. While growing old can bring about all kinds of problems, wine can aid in their relief. For starters, wine decreases the dependency on certain medications, particularly medications that relax and sedate people. Wine has also proven to increase appetites, self-esteem and social lives of those in old age.
Intelligence: On an average basis, people who moderately consume wine are of higher education levels than those who don’t drink alcohol or drink far too much. This isn’t to say that you should, Merlot in hand, roll your eyes at the idiocy of someone drinking a beer, but it’s reassuring to know wine drinkers are in good, and smart, company.
Bone Strength: Bone strength may be of little concern to those who are young, but it’s extremely important in advanced age: a skeletal build with low density will have a bone to pick with its owner when Osteoporosis sets in. Men and women who are moderate wine drinkers, however, generally have bones that are denser than non-drinkers: the greater the density, the less likely the fractures.
Cancer: Red wine, filled with antioxidants, is proven to be a liquid nemesis of cancer, preventing it before it can fester. Packed with strong compounds, wine is laden with protective affects. In fact, the CDC found that women who averaged 12 glasses of wine per week were rewarded with an 83 percent decrease in endometrial cancer rates.
Kidney cancer, along these lines, seems to have found an enemy in alcohol. According to a study conducted in Sweden by Dr. Alicja Wolk of the Karolinska Institute, women who drank moderate amounts of alcohol had a 38 percent lower kidney cancer risk than those who didn’t. For women 55 and older, the risk of kidney cancer was cut to 66 percent.
Diabetes: Type 2 diabetes, non-insulin diabetes that usually develops with age, is less likely to attack those who are moderate drinkers. Because the majority of people who get type 2 diabetes are women, a study was recently performed by Dr. Michael L. Bots at the University Medical Center Utrecht. During this study it was revealed that women who consumed 5 to 30 grams of alcohol per week were not as likely to develop type 2 diabetes as those who abstained completely.
While it is often lauded for the way it benefits the heart and the lungs, wine, the over achiever of alcohol, doesn’t just stop there. From your mind to your ankle bone, wine provides a glassful of benefits. And, what’s more, these are the only ones known so far. As the wine revolution gains even more ground, and more studies are performed, the benefits of wine may continue to be increasingly known, pouring good health on all who consume it.
Author: Jennifer Jordan. Brought to us courtesy of Caroline Gee!
Thank you Dan & Caroline for highlighting the benefits of drinking wine.
Most evenings we enjoy a glass or two of red wine, especially in winter. Good wine are modestly priced here. Unlabelled wines, known as ‘cleanskins’ are relatively good and cheap at AUD4.99 per bottle. Wine tasting with home-made cheese at the vineyards is just heaven.
I also use wine in my cooking. My favourite dish is chicken thighs in white wine: Seal and brown seasoned chicken thighs (boneless/skinless) with olive oil in a pan. Put the chicken, 1/2 bottle of white wine, red carrot, potatoes, black pepper & salt in a baking dish – pop into oven at 180 deg for 40 mins. Eat this with hot steamed rice…yum!
Yum-Seng!
Mary Lee (from Perth)
Dear Mary,
U eh really make me envious of U all! Here we’re struggling to make ends meet. U drinking wine every evening.
Dun let yr hubby drink too much! R sure it’s gd for yr BP.
Serious, not being sour grapes, tho wine are made fr grapes
ha…
My dear Catherine,
My late mum would say in teochew, lee-buei-tek. Sometimes, it is good to put your feet up and relax – sip red wine and pop in crunchy cashew nuts with fried garlic and dried figs.
Ha-ha, will get hubby to drink one instead of two…
Mary Lee (from Perth)
There was a tv program I watched once about a wine-grower in PRC. He was quite successful, hence the tv program. He related his ‘theory’ of Chinese affinity to wine.
Most Chinese, because of their relatively light diet (as compared to the heavier, high protein, meatier Western diet) would prefer a sweeter wine. Hence there were many stories of PRC Chinese mixing 7-UP with their wines, not because of diluting or cheapening the wine, but because some thought wine, like whisky or brandy, should be mixed with 7-UP to make it more palatable. Of course this would be impossible or unheard of, for serious drinkers, but it was the practice for many then in PRC and even here. So when the next fashionable liquor came to China (wine) they automatically thought it was de riguer to follow the same principle, ie mix it with 7-UP. The practice caught on because, like he says, most Chinese have an affinity for sweeter drinks.
Also because of the lighter diet, most of us don’t need the tannic acid in most reds to help us digest the steaks in most Western diet.
That said, I cannot but also confess that I have an aversion to the more tannic reds and prefer sweeter drinks like dessert wines. How many of us here have the same affinity? I think the PRC wine-grower is not wrong as he is quite successful and is intent on making more sweeter wines from his vinery.
Interestingly I also noticed a lot of sweet wines in Xinjiang too. I hope someone will bring in more such wines from there in the future.
For those who are interested in sweet wines, choose rose, muscat, any blend of muscat, dessert wines from France or Germany, like ‘Sauternes’ or sweet German Reisling. There are of course others but these are good for a start. There are also some good, cheaper Hungarian wines, (can’t remember the names now). Top of the list are the ‘ice wines from Europe and Canada. Don’t drink these yet as once you start, it will be difficult to back track.
So, enjoy.
Charles Chua,
Now I know why I prefer sweeter wines to the more acidic wines which seem bitter to my taste buds. It’s because I’m Chinese! Why didn’t I know that? ;-)
And to think that I’d always been secretly ashamed of the fact that I “don’t know how to appreciate ‘good’ wine”.
So now if I get someone saying that to me, I’m going to cock him a snook and simply say,
“Why, it’s because I’m Chinese.” So, there! Hehehe.
Hi Mary C,
“It’s because I’m Chinese! Why didn’t I know that?”
You don’t know you are Chinese eh? Mixing with too many ang mohs eh?
One way to get rid of the tannic acid, which causes the ‘siap’ taste or after taste, is to let the wine ‘breathe’ or percolate for half an hour or more. That’s why some say wine tastes better with conversation, it’s because the tannic acid and alcohol is evaporating away during the long conversations.
Reds is the more healthful wine with the benefit coming from the skin of the grapes. “Reds with meat” boils down to an acid-aided meal.
Singapore business man, Mr Singgih Gunawan (left) splashed out HK$1.89 million (S$332,640) on 12 bottles of 1990 Domaine de la Romanee-Conti – described as the scarcest, most expensive wine in the world. This is the highest price the wine, from France’s Burgundy region, has ever fetched at an auction.
There are wine investments for the man-in-the street. Remember to hedge your Euros or AUD holdings for better yield. This is a derivative and practically non-drinkable investment. You have ownership to bottles stored abroad.
For the drinkable type, we have people importing selected wines and selling it through wine cafes like Scorebot. They normally appreciate wine themselves and hold wine tasting parties and events. A specially designed meal with ambience and music to go with a selection of wines is a truly memorable event. If heaven’s like this, I’ll give everything to charity and die today.
It is a really nice lifestyle business for those who appreciate wines. We have a few people doing this with us including two young enterprising and attractive girls.
Before you let your fantasy go wild, they call me “uncle”.