France is synonymous with fine wine, and health experts have long puzzled over how to reconcile their wine – and cheese – rich diet with their lower rates of heart disease and long lives. This ‘french paradox’ has led to intriguing insights into the health advantages of wine, but also into a closer examination of the wine industry as a whole.
While the health effects of quality wine are now well established, growing wellness consciousness has also led many to consider how the wine industry impacts the planet. Luckily there are companies out there like Palate Club trying to maximise both the health and environmental benefits of the classic french art.
Resolving the French Paradox
Starting in the 90s, health and medical researchers started to get curious about the strange contrast between the classic french diet and the french people’s rather healthy hearts. Longer life expectancy and lower risk of heart disease is not something that intuitively went well with copious cheese consumption
Yet the inevitable research into the paradox revealed unexpected benefits from regular, if moderate, wine consumption. For interested readers the 2019 review “Red Wine Consumption and Cardiovascular Health” by Italian researchers is a great place to start. The health benefits for the heart are especially strong in red wine, but well made vintages of all kinds are starring in bold research around mental or cognitive health as well as other physical benefits like fighting inflammation.
But if a responsible consumption of good quality wine is good for us, is it good for the planet?
Exploring the world of french wine is delightful, doing so on foot is even better. Unless it happens to be during spraying season. France’s vineyards make up only 5% of the country’s agricultural output, but use 20% of their pesticides. This has raised a number of health and environmental concerns, and multiple efforts by the french government and activists groups have been launched to clean up the wine industry.
Unfortunately progress is only incremental. Some winemakers, especially those producing bulk wine, cannot afford to take the time and cost intensive approaches required for successful integrated pest management (required to reduce pesticide use). Others cut corners and produce “organic” wine without artificial pesticides but with three times as many ‘natural’ ones instead. Products like copper sulphates which can still harm our health, and certainly add to our environmental impact.
The success stories are out there, if hard to find. Many artisanal or family owned wineries have a deep and profound respect for the land they work. After all, terroir is an essential component of a wine’s flavor palate. Yet finding these gems is not always easy, and is downright impossible when shopping in the stores, yet some innovators are determined to make the task easier.
Tailored wine selection can solve both problems, and a third
Selecting the right one is key to making better health and planet conscious choices. The tech-y wine innovators at Palate Club are trying to do just that. By carefully curating their selection of artisanal and responsible wines, they are helping to improve the quality of wine we drink, while also making sure we can do so guilt free.
There is an added bonus to all the work they are doing however, and that is the question of taste. In addition to delivering wines well suited to our concerns, they are also delivering the best wines for our own personal preferences. They use a sophisticated taste matching algorithm to learn what kind of wine we like, and send us similar bottles to discover…and further teach their system about our preference.
So not only do they promise better tasting wine, but also healthier and more environmentally conscious choices. That’s a win-win situation if ever there was one.