No, Mega Purple contrary to what you might think, is not the worst super-hero of all time!
Mega Purple is 100% grape juice concentrate that is supposed to darken the color of a wine without adding flavor or aroma. It comes in white, pink, red and purple versions, and believe it or not, you have definitely consumed Mega Purple before, whether you’ve known it or not! This especially true if you’ve ever bought a bottle of grocery store Pinot Noir that’s under $10.
The main benefit behind the use of Mega Purple as an additive, is that you can add a small volume to wine without listing it on the label. Mega Purple is manufactured by Constellation Brands from not so well-known grape varieties such as Rubired and Royalty.
Now before you get all up in arms over Mega Purple and rioting in the streets, bear this in mind: YOU (the consumer) are the reason wineries use Mega Purple!!!
Imagine, if you will, that you’re a winemaker. You’ve just finished making your $25 retail Cabernet and it’s one of your best in recent vintages. But there’s one small problem: the color! Sure it looks fine to you as a winemaker, but you know full-well that American consumers are stuck on the idea that for wine, darker is better. So as a winemaker you have two options: add a smidgen of juice from some dark-skinned grapes (and depending on the quantity, be legally required to list it on your label and tech sheets), or buy some “Mega Purple” and save some cash!
In this example, we’re talking about a winemaker making a $25 retail bottle. But what about the guy making the $6-$9 retail bottle? Which option do you think he would choose..?
Mega Purple to the rescue!
There is another reason why wineries decide to use Mega Purple. States such as Texas that have a problem with grapes not fully ripening (due to a short growing season), can (of they wish) find a small amount of salvation in these types of products. That doesn’t mean to imply that all wineries in the colder States are using a wine additive such as Mega Purple, but the option is available to them, should they choose it. However, if a winery can’t get enough color in California, they are probably doing something wrong (picking their grape too early etc.) or using poor quality grapes (as with a sub $10 grocery store Pinot Noir). But wineries aren’t satisfied with enough color — they want Inky Black! Actually more specifically, the wineries don’t want it, the consumer is demanding it!
Personally I am divided on the use of Mega Purple. All too often, when I am pouring Pinot Noir at a tasting, I hear; “Wow, this is awfully light in color, isn’t it!?!?” It doesn’t matter what I say from that point on, the customer already has the perception that the wine in lacking in flavor due to the light color.
The other side of the coin is that undeniably there’s a certain amount of deception going on by any winery that uses Mega Purple, which opens a whole other can of worms regarding labeling ingredients. But I’ll save that for another time…
Renard
It most definitely is not neutral, as a concentrate you are adding a significant amount of residual sugar – in essence sweetening your wine.
Kris Chislett
I might has mis-read that part (of my own writing), but I don’t believe I said it was neutral. Either way, I don’t know if 99% of consumers would care if they found out a “little extra sugar” was in their wine. Maybe I’m wrong…
heidi witherspoon
You crack me up! You’re also about to be the rainmaker of a sh*tstorm. I’ll have the umbrella ready (PS – NOT used by my employer).
Phillip Anderson
I’m not sure that you meant to imply that Texas is a colder growing region. Either way, we hit 104 F in April last year & have multiple days in a row over 100 F every year, with highs around 108 F. If that is a colder region, I would hate to see a hot one. Our problem is usually acid, rather than ripeness. If we have a color problem, Ruby Cabernet is our back up plan. We don’t always use it, but it can add color & we don’t have to use much at all. Drink Texas!
Douglas McKesson
Quote: “bear this is mind: YOU (the consumer) are the reason wineries use Mega Purple!!!”
Really? Are you saying that the consumer is the reason why wineries are using Mega Purple? Get real. We should really ask the question “why aren’t wineries who use this additive required to label it? Because the wineries are fighting the proposed labeling regs and the regulators who are trying to inform the consumer of the use this and other unnatural additives.
Kinda like blaming the victim of an assault for dressing a certain way, isn’t it?
Douglas McKesson
Sonoma, CA
Kris Chislett
:) Tell me about it! The most interesting thing to come from this article is that I now have some Mega Purple and Mega Red being sent to me from California, so that I can conduct my own experiments with it.
Kris Chislett
Philip, thanks for the correction.
I knew as soon as I mentioned Texas, it would come back to bite me. New York probably would have been a better example…
Since I’m speaking at the TWGGA in under a month, make sure you attend one of my lectures and heckle me accordingly! :)
Kris Chislett
Douglas, cheers for the comments.
I can’t say that I’m just pointing the finger at the use of Mega Purple.
What I meant to imply was that if a wine is too light in color, i.e. based on other examples seen be the “everyday wine drinker” (with Pinot Noir for example), the winemaker has some serious decisions to make. Namely, leave their wine a “natural” color, and devote a good amount of time on marketing and education for the consumer; or, add a little something to “bulk it up,” whether that be Mega Purple, Mega Red, or other grapes. (which as I said, they’re required to label on tech sheets), and have less risk of their wine being rejected.
I have first-hand experience of the lighter wine being rejected by the consumer. So if I was a winemaker, I know which one I’d choose! With 7 years running a wine bar, I witnessed this scenario on an almost daily basis…
The interesting thing to have come from this is that I’m being sent some Mega Purple and Mega Red so that I can conduct some of my own blind tasting experiments. It will be interesting to see what the outcome is…
JoeLeTaxi
Doug,
If you’d ever had a wine label printed, you’d know that they need to be approved ahead of bottling. If you’d ever made wine, you’d know that you can’t wait until it is ready to be bottled, then make the label, then wait for TTB, then the printer, etc. before you bottle it. LABELS ARE NECESSARILY SUBMITTED WELL IN ADVANCE OF THE WORK OF WINEMAKING BEING COMPLETED. Accordingly, listing ingredients is pretty much impossible because a lot of the time you aren’t sure if you’ll need to add a bit of acid at the bottling line, or perhaps de-acidify (by adding potassium or calcium carbonate which precipitates out) if malolactic doesn’t soften the wine enough.
And when it comes to Mega-purple? Who cares? Honestly – at that price-level folks are just looking for a buzz with dinner. And it is just grape juice, after all. And wine is just grape juice, so what would we list? Grape juice plus 0.05 percent added grape juice concentrate? In that case those wineries would just turn to a few gallons of Malbec, perhaps. Or Syrah. And many already are. Could you tell the difference? Would you really benefit from knowing?
The idea that “ingredients” labeling in wine would be beneficial is laughable. Here is a universal label template for probably 99.99 percent of the wine in the world: Grape juice, fermented with yeasts that were either floating around the winery and/or vineyard or were purchased after being captured at some other vineyard/winery, malolactic fermentation bug either added or floating around the winery, perhaps acid that came from other grape juice, perhaps sugar that then converted into ethanol that is indistinguishable from the ethanol that was created through fermentation of the grape juice (or in California, perhaps nearly flavorless Thompson seedless grape juice concentrate in place of sugar), some essence of oak (typically from oak barrels but sometimes from dominoes or dust), sometimes a minute amount of fining agent (although this would likely be so minuscule that it could be left off since the fining agent isn’t really in the product), perhaps a de-acidifying agent (potassium or calcium carbonate) which precipitated out and isn’t found in the finished wine, the essence of a few hundred fruit flies, and maybe a ladybug part, and in hot vintages where there is dessication of the fruit some water – added either before harvest through irrigation or after harvest through the same garden hose.
Now if some of those boxes are ticked, would you somehow feel safer or enjoy the wine more? Would winemakers just irrigate so they wouldn’t need to say they added water? Would fining be replaced by filtration? Would certain wineries make a lot more crappy wines crappier just so certain ingredients didn’t need to be listed on the label? Are we really talking ingredients listing, or are we talking a winemaking practices listing? Finally, would the perceived benefit from this useless ingredient labeling outweigh the downside – i.e., that there would necessarily be a dramatic reduction in the number of wines available to the consumer and the fact that reasonably priced small lot wines would pretty much disappear and you’d be looking at maybe a dozen SKUs instead of hundreds since the “factory wines” would hold the upper hand?
The ingredients labeling agenda is being pushed by the hard alcohol makers because they want to displace wine with their factory-made spirits – they seek parity of pre-mixed drinks with wine at the grocery store.
Pop a chilled canned margarita with dinner if you are worried about the ingredients in wine.
Have a nice day.
WineCurmudgeon
Yes, the last problem we have in Texas is ripening — we often start harvest at the end of July.
Skip Coomber
I had the opportunity to get to know a Master Sommelier, Eddie Osterland, who said that he worked for the French government, rating wines from the various regions, for some period of time early in his career. He said that they did all of their tasting in black Riedel glasses so that they couldn’t see the color of the wine. But, we know that the consumer expects inky black Cabernets. Re taste: As a winemaker, I’ve observed in tests that MegaPurple seems to take a bit of the tannin sensation out of the wine. Can make it a bit more “rounded” or “soft”.
Kris Chislett
Cheers for the comments. Very insightful!
Kris Chislett
…and I think that what the majority of people are looking for when it comes the average grocery store wine brand. Round and smooth.