Just like the name Espresso, which is often translated as “” expressed “”.

A lot of alcohol and little acid, that is also the topic of conversation at the first tasting of wines from the “Selection Rheinhessen” in Mainz – these wines have to meet higher quality requirements, which are checked by a jury. Even Riesling wines in this category with prices around ten euros per bottle often do not achieve the freshness of earlier vintages with the 2018. “The 18 is good for everyday wines,” says Alexander Flickaus Bechtolsheim. “In the higher price range, there are seldom really good wines – it was simply too warm.”

The “Selection Rheinhessen” also includes a Pinot Gris from the Laubenheimer Johannisberg site with 15.5 percent alcohol by volume, which can be clearly tasted. “That is our benchmark for a strong wine”, grins winemaker Stefan Leber from Mainz-Hechtsheim. “If a wine has enough body, it can also tolerate 15.5 percent.”

Mediterranean style wines

“The winemakers know that they will have to expect warm, sometimes dry vintages more often in the future,” says sommelier Payne. In some growing regions such as Nahe and Moselle, the wines could benefit from this. “In Rheinhessen and the Palatinate, more precautionary measures are necessary.” After all, it is already warm above average in these regions in the southwest.

“We wanted to wait for the aroma of our 2018 wine to ripen,” says winemakerGerold Pfannebecker from Flomborn in Rheinhessen when he served a Silvaner with 14.5 percent alcohol. “We bought that with a higher alcohol content.” Because alcohol also has a preservative effect, he hopes that his wines will be particularly long-lived and will continue to mature in the bottle. In the long term, the winemaker expects the wines to change: “We’ll get the southern style, whether we want it or not.”

A real whiskey lover doesn’t have a cola in their drink – at best a few drops of water. Researchers have investigated why this can actually improve the taste.

The best premium whiskey

Photo series with 17 pictures

If you dilute your whiskey with a little water, you are not committing a crime, but rather revealing yourself as a real expert. The water ensures that a certain taste-imparting substance tends to stay on the surface and thus provides more taste and smell, as Swedish researchers write in the journal “Scientific Reports”. Your investigation could help to further improve spirits.

In short, whiskey is made from grain mash. After distillation, the whiskey initially has an alcohol content of around 70 percent, explain Björn Karlsson and Ran Friedman from the Linnaeus University Center for Biomaterials Chemistry (Kalmar / Sweden). During the at least three years of aging in wooden barrels, the alcohol content drops to around 65 to 55 percent.

Before bottling, the alcohol content of the whiskey is then adjusted to around 40 percent by volume by diluting it with water. After all, some whiskey lovers add a few drops of water to the glass right before drinking, because this improves the taste. Why this is so has not yet been clear. Karlsson and Friedman have now found a possible explanation for this.

The water droplets have this effect

The exact manufacturing process and the choice of wooden barrel are responsible for the special taste of whiskey. The special smoky taste of many types of whiskey goes back to certain chemical compounds, so-called phenols, above all a substance called guaiacol.

The scientists simulated on the computer which compounds guaiacol, water and alcohol (ethanol) form with each other at different alcohol concentrations. They found that up to an alcohol content of around 45 percent, the guaiacol is more likely to be located at the interface between liquid and air and is increasingly released there. The researchers write that the substance can directly influence the smell and taste of the whiskey.123helpme.me If the alcohol content rises to 59 percent or more, the taste-imparting substance tends to decrease.

This is an explanation for why diluting a fine whiskey can be worthwhile. However, you have to be careful – there is a very fine balance between improving the taste (“dilute to taste”) and ruining the drink (“dilute to waste”).

Whiskey distiller: ” We burn a little cleaner than the Scots ” Culinary knowledge: Quiz: What do you know about whiskey? Expert tips for buying whiskey: Good whiskeys for the home bar

Editor’s note: We use the Scottish spelling “whiskey” for this general guide. The Irish as well as the American “whiskey” are written with an “e”.

Sources used: dpa news agency

Köthen (dpa) – Ten billion people could live, eat and consume energy on earth by the middle of the century. By then, oil and arable land will become scarcer – the question of alternative raw materials will therefore become more and more urgent.

Dangerous germs: Manufacturer calls back pudding nationwide Very easy preparation: Roast crust – ideal for the Christmas menu Pesticide leftovers: Edeka and Marktkauf call back spreads Reasons still unclear: Rossmann calls back disinfectants Caution, plastic pieces: drugstore chain dm calls back gingerbread

Carola Griehl from the Anhalt University of Applied Sciences estimates that mankind still has around 20 years to find suitable alternatives to conventional sources of food and energy. The scientist sees a promising option in microalgae: “Algae are all-rounders.”

Research on microalgae

The biochemist heads the university’s algae competence center and, with her team, researches mainly on microalgae, single-celled organisms that occur almost everywhere. The researchers are not satisfied with essays and other memoranda: They want to make their research usable – as it should be for a university of applied science.

“The special thing about our location is that we not only have our own collection of strains and laboratories for growing the algae, but also a technical center,” explains the professor. “This enables us to transfer the scientific results directly into industrial practice.”

A good raw material alone is not enough, says Griehl. You also have to develop products that work on the market in order to create real alternatives. From basic research through the breeding and processing of algae to product development, production and marketing of algae products, everything takes place in the rooms of the university in Köthen and Bernburg.

Trials in the nutritional field

They have already made cookies and ice cream from algae. At the Green Week, however, the researchers are now showing, of all things, two culinary sanctuaries of the Germans, how versatile algae can be used in nutrition alone: With blue beer and blue bread, the university wants to convince the public of the tiny miracle cells on Saxony-Anhalt Day on Monday .

The bread was developed by three ecotrophology students in a practical seminar. A baker from Barleben approached the university after Green Week 2019 with the idea of blue bread. The students took on the matter, tried around with the algae in spring and summer and, piece by piece, developed a recipe for a sourdough bread and a baguette. Just the tip of a knife of a dye obtained from the microalgae spirulina is enough to color a whole bread bright green-blue.

The blue beer, on the other hand, was originally only intended as a gag. Griehl and her colleagues wanted to surprise guests at an information event. The brew, which was also blued by spirulina – the exact recipe remains the university’s secret for the time being – was so well received that the algae researchers continued to brew.

In January alone, Griehl received two inquiries about several hundred liters of the drink, which the researchers dubbed “Real Ocean Blue”. But you can’t brew all the time, otherwise research and teaching would be neglected, says Griehl. Especially since the capacities in the university brewery are limited. The algae center is already in contact with a brewery that is supposed to produce larger quantities.

Big potential

“We want to economically install the progress that we have developed at the Anhalt University of Applied Sciences here in the region,” says Griehl. The scientist sees the time for algae slowly but surely: “The time for it is definitely more mature than it was 20 years ago. People think more environmentally conscious, many young people are vegetarian.”

But microalgae are much more than just vegetarian: the tens of thousands of different species contain countless different ingredients from which food, medicines or plastics can be developed. They grow 15 to 20 times faster than most plants and take up very little space. The Anhalt University of Applied Sciences grows its algae in bioreactors, which are reminiscent of the shape of fir trees: Transparent hoses through which the water containing algae flows are wrapped around a conical structure. In this way, the single-cell organisms can make optimal use of the incident light.

In just 14 days, a whole batch of muddy biomass grows from a few algae cells, water, light and CO2. It is then dried with hot air and is ready for further processing as a fine, green powder. The university’s facility is not sufficient to supply the masses with food, fuel or plastic. A farm for mass production is to be built in Saxony-Anhalt this year. If you want to try beer or bread made from algae beforehand, you can do so on Monday at the Green Week at the Science Stand in Hall 23b.

Rome (dpa) – Passion is difficult to put into formulas – even when it comes to espresso. In any bar in Rome, the national drink of Italians comes in series on the bar counter. But it is often celebrated with a grand gesture like something unique.

The brown-black espresso smells fine and tart, and with the first, quick sip, the coffee drinker can taste whether the mix of aromas meets their own preferences. Given so much emotion, it seems strange that researchers in a new study want to get closer to the secret of espresso preparation with mathematical models.

Standard for making espresso

But it is so. A group of scientists from the USA, Great Britain and Australia, among others, started this in 2015. Their goal was to develop a standard for making espresso in machines. The drink should always taste the same. The researchers headed by chemist Christopher Hendon from the Universiy of Oregon (USA) focused primarily on the coffee industry: how it can save time and raw materials and reduce waste.

“We want to find ways in which the industry can save money, while the espresso becomes even more popular and more people drink it,” argues the 31-year-old Hendon. To do this, the team used models to calculate how the water moves through the coffee bed when the beans are finely or coarsely ground. And how quickly the product can absorb how much of the full aroma. Then they compared models and reality in tests in Brisbane, Australia.

As a result, presented in the specialist journal “Matter”, the advice came out to grind the beans a little coarser than is widely used for espresso. And shorten the cycle time. “We are presenting a method to reduce deviations,” says Hendon. And, as if hearing espresso fans protest, he adds: “We understand that we are not trying to improve the taste of the espresso.”

Regulations from Italy

Because for this, for the secret of the aroma, there are rules. Primarily from Italy, for example from the Consortium for the Protection of Traditional Italian Espresso, CTCEIT for short. The dark roast of the beans and the first commercial steam pressure machines are said to have their origins in the Mediterranean country. Just like the name espresso, which is often translated as “expressed”. The Italians simply say “un caffè” when they order the little black dress.

He thinks the Italians would find the economy great, even if the coffee tastes different according to his method: “Instead of two servings per minute, you can make four,” says Hendon.

Giorgio Caballini di Sassoferrato, 73 and President of the CTCEIT association, however, becomes very clear when it comes to a quick run: “Time is a key factor in a good espresso,” he says. “The extraction of the aromas takes around 25 seconds for quality, maybe a few seconds more or less.” A ten-second dink? “It’s not an espresso.”

How much coffee goes in

His association has written down further standards: 7 to 9 grams of coffee are recommended for a cup – although there are differences between northern and southern Italy in how thick or thin most people love their caffeinated stimulant. The optimal temperature is 90 to 96 degrees. And: the crema. Espresso is considered “perfetto”, perfect, if the fine-pored foam remains for two minutes.

Enjoyment guidelines also have their supporters in Germany. The Italian Giovanni Burgarella (43) heads the local training center of the coffee company Illy, which calls itself “Università del Caffè”, in Munich. He does not know the new study and cannot comment on it. But Burgarella describes the espresso culture with passion.

“The basic pillars when preparing a good espresso are traditionally the four big Ms: Mixing coffee, grinder, machine and man.” Humans have to carefully clean the machine’s sieves, otherwise the flow rate and taste can change. The person, in the barista’s restaurant, adjusts the settings if the coffee is too sour or too bitter.

And people pay attention to the crema: “When the espresso flows out of the machine, it should look like a mouse’s tail, like a coda del topolino, as they say in Italy,” explains Burgarella. “Then it’s right, then the crema will be hazelnut brown and fine.” Similar to the after-effects, this stands for quality: “A really good espresso, the aromas of which you can still taste in your mouth 30 minutes afterwards.” / P