WISH your Two Buck Chuck were just a little smoother? Now, as crazy as it sounds, there's a simple pour-spout gizmo that claims to take the edge off cheap wine -- with magnets. The gadget, available in wine shops and online for about $30, is making waves -- and raising some eyebrows -- in the wine world.
When you place the BevWizard, as inventor Patrick Farrell has named it, on the business end of a wine bottle and pour through it, the wine becomes rounder, softer and less tannic, as if by some miracle someone has taken a power sander and smoothed out the rough edges of the wine. In certain wines, the effect can be dramatic.
But while nearly everyone can detect a difference using the BevWizard, not everyone falls sway to its magic.
Sommeliers and other wine purists look upon this sort of manipulation with suspicion. But retailers think it just might get people afraid of robust tannins to be a little more adventurous when buying.
Farrell, a physician who lives in Huntington Beach, has been demonstrating the powers of his gadget at wine festivals and events such as Hospice du Rhone, in Paso Robles last month, and even Vinexpo, in Bordeaux, France, where Farrell showed a prototype last year. It was there that Robin Kelley O'Connor, president of the Society of Wine Educators, first encountered it being used on some coltish Bordeaux barrel samples.
"Farrell was using his pourer and saying, 'Try this one, try that' and asking us which we preferred," recalls O'Connor, "and the wines poured through his contraption were so much smoother, and the aromas weren't affected."
The secret of Farrell's device is powerful magnets that are molded into the plastic sleeve of the BevWizard. Magnets, according to Farrell, can change the molecular structure of a wine's tannins. Tannins are compounds found in the skins and seeds of all grapes, and in oak, that turn up in red wines and some whites too (as well as black tea and coffee).
Tannins structure the wine, and their natural astringency is a very important aspect of how a wine feels in the mouth and how it finishes. Though they're said to have no taste, tannins seem to greatly affect flavor; they can, for example, contribute a sensation of bitterness, pleasing or not, to the wine.
Most wines with a lot of tannins feel more tannic in their youth, but tend to soften with age because with time, the tannin molecules bind with each other for a softer, more burnished mouth feel. Farrell's gizmo accelerates that process dramatically. The magnet encourages the binding process and wines taste softer.
