Why is the term wine not regulated?

I don't quite understand why the term beer is so regulated, hops+malted grain+yeast+water+small amounts of other things, whereas wine can just about anything fruits, flowers, potatoes, cane, beats, mashed, not mashed, converted to sugars with fungus, natural sugars, high alcohol content low alcohol content.

Is this a backwards European cultural thing?

Well one break out is from the Treasury Taxation Beauro(sp?) (TTB) a portion of the IRS/Treasury. They define alcohol as being one of 3 things. 1. Fermented with malt = beer. 2. Fermented without malt =wine. 3 distilled alcohol aka spirits. As usual, check with a lawyer before using this in a legal sense.

But looking over your question I see you are actually asking about the Bavarian beer laws. Well ok, another swag at that, yes it is a left over from the early Renaissance or late Middle ages. I'd imagine that at one point people were putting whatever they could get to ferment into the beer. And the gov't stepped in to set a standard. Probably because beer was so important that it needed a standard. That part of the world would have had beer as the main alcohol source. Wine would have been expensive as grains grow more easily in the colder temps than grapes do.

ACbrewer said:

...at one point people were putting whatever they could get to ferment into the beer.

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Like homebrewers are doing today?

ACbrewer said:

And the gov't stepped in to set a standard.

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Like the government is doing today?

GHBWNY said:

Like homebrewers are doing today?




Like the government is doing today?

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Yes and Yes....

I have a theory. If it is fermentable some has tried it. Probably recently even if not documented to everyone. I'm aware of things like bacon [craft] beer and fermented horse milk.

Jack Keller's wine recipe page has just about anything fruity (watermelon and tomatoes for example) as a recipe for making wine.


As for the german law, wiki [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinheitsgebot] mentions that one reason was to help with competition between North Germany and South Germany (the law was in the south and allowed confiscation of illegal beer). Also they were trying to price fix, and prevent wheat/rye competition between brewers and bakers - it is worth noting that given the choice, fermenting your grain is a decent way of storing it, and people seem to like the side >hick< effects.

5mooth0perator said:

I don't quite understand why the term beer is so regulated, hops+malted grain+yeast+water+small amounts of other things, whereas wine can just about anything fruits, flowers, potatoes, cane, beats, mashed, not mashed, converted to sugars with fungus, natural sugars, high alcohol content low alcohol content.

Is this a backwards European cultural thing?

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My wife is from a famous wine producing area of France and I assure you this really pisses her off. She's so over the top on it she doesn't even think store bought juice can be made into "wine". If you don't grow the grapes yourself it's fermented grape juice, not wine. And don't EVEN mention blackberry, raspberry, strawberry wines. We had this conversation on a road trip and she didn't speak to me for 4 hours. It was kind of nice, actually.

If you're referring to European laws it really isn't regulated. Per ACBrewers comment, only the Germans created a law (Reinheitsgebot) on what is considered beer and that was mostly because beer was competing with bread for yeast and grain and religious orders were concerned herbs used in beer might have pagan origins. (It was a different time)

Today...it's about taxes.

corkybstewart said:

My wife is from a famous wine producing area of France and I assure you this really pisses her off. She's so over the top on it she doesn't even think store bought juice can be made into "wine". If you don't grow the grapes yourself it's fermented grape juice, not wine. And don't EVEN mention blackberry, raspberry, strawberry wines. We had this conversation on a road trip and she didn't speak to me for 4 hours. It was kind of nice, actually.

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What about rice wine, sake? It's made from a grain using a fungus to get amylase, and a yeast to ferment. Why don't they call sake sake? Must be an ignorant European thing.

I think there is at least one other category, mead, or is that just honey wine?

Sake is called sake, and I've never heard of mead wine, just mead(or hydromel)

corkybstewart said:

Sake is called sake, and I've never heard of mead wine, just mead(or hydromel)

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Sake, in Japanese, is just the word meaning any, and all, alcohol. Technically what you refer to as Sake is known in Japan as Nihonshu.

corkybstewart said:

didn't speak to me for 4 hours. It was kind of nice, actually.

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hahahahahah!!!

5mooth0perator said:

I don't quite understand why the term beer is so regulated, hops+malted grain+yeast+water+small amounts of other things, whereas wine can just about anything fruits, flowers, potatoes, cane, beats, mashed, not mashed, converted to sugars with fungus, natural sugars, high alcohol content low alcohol content.

Is this a backwards European cultural thing?

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JimmyC-BYOB said:

If you're referring to European laws it really isn't regulated. .

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Who says wine is not regulated in Europe???

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex:32008R0479

To quote from Annex IV...
"1. Wine

Wine shall be the product obtained exclusively from the total or partial alcoholic fermentation of fresh grapes, whether or not crushed, or of grape must.

Wine shall:

(a) have, whether or not following application of the processes specified in point B of Annex V, an actual alcoholic strength of not less than 8,5 % vol. provided that the wine derives exclusively from grapes harvested in wine-growing zones A and B referred to in Annex IX, and of not less than 9 % vol. in other wine-growing zones;

(b) have, by way of derogation from the otherwise applicable minimum actual alcoholic strength, where it has a protected designation of origin or geographical indication, whether or not following application of the processes specified in point B of Annex V, an actual alcoholic strength of not less than 4,5 % vol.;

(c) have a total alcoholic strength of not more than 15 % vol.. By way of derogation:

&#8212; the upper limit for the total alcoholic strength may reach up to 20 % vol. for wines from certain wine-growing areas of the Community, to be decided in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 113(2), which have been produced without any enrichment,
&#8212; the upper limit for the total alcoholic strength may exceed 15 % vol. for wines with a protected designation of origin which have been produced without enrichment;

(d) have, subject to derogations which may be adopted in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 113(2), a total acidity content, expressed as tartaric acid, of not less than 3,5 grams per litre or 46,6 milliequivalents per litre."