Once upon a time in Austria: The scandal that shook the wine world

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What do an aromatic Sauvignon Blanc from Styria, a refreshing Grüner Veltliner from Wachau, and a spicy Blaufränkisch from Burgenland have in common? All from Austria. And they can be really good. So good that they get top marks in specialist publications and major awards in world championships.

With around 4,000 wineries, Austria is now a popular wine producing country. About 20 percent of wine is exported, and Switzerland is one of the largest buyers of Austrian wine after Germany. There is also a dark page in the success story of our neighboring country. It has been almost 40 years since the Austrian wine industry virtually came to a standstill overnight.

Antifreeze as sweetener

If the weather is too cold during the growing season, the grapes will not mature fully and their sugar content will be too low. About 40 years ago, wines with a slight trace of sweetness, such as the German Liebfrauenmilch, were very popular. So why not artificially make the wine sweeter with a sweetener? An Austrian winemaker thought so and mixed their wine with a small amount of antifreeze diethylene glycol.

The last part of the word “glycol” comes from Greek and means “sweet”. The addition of diethylene glycol transformed ordinary table wine into a supposedly sweet quality wine that brought a higher price on the market. But that’s not all: Using diethylene glycol, artificial wine can be produced that looks, smells and tastes like wine, but without the use of grapes.

The scam remained undetected for a long time until one of the rogue viticulturers wanted to optimize their taxes by deducting large amounts of antifreeze from their taxes. However, he had only one tractor where the indicated amounts of diethylene glycol were unrealistically high.

In January 1985, glycol was detected for the first time in an Austrian wine. However, it took several months for the Austrian Ministry of Agriculture to inform the public. As a result, almost all Austrian wines were withdrawn from sale at home and abroad, and exports collapsed almost completely. The health hazards of wines to consumers are unknown.

Recovery followed shock

After thousands of house searches and several jail terms for the viticulturalists involved in the scandal, the Austrian wine landscape had to reinvent itself. Today, the country has one of the strictest wine laws in the world and has a firm foothold in the world of top wines.

Especially in the last 20 years, Austrian exports of fine wine bottled in Austria have increased significantly, while less cheap wine is exported, transported and bottled in containers in the destination country. Our neighboring country has thus successfully escaped the glycol wine scandal.

Source : Blick