It's not Rocket Lettuce!

Thank god for irish seasons. Looking out at the sunshine that we have at the minute puts a whole new perspective on a day. Nothing wrong with winter either once you embrace everything it offers.

The body naturally puts on weight in the winter to keep us warm. With a diet of stews,casseroles and bread that is not difficult. The summer is salads and foods that make us feel alive. We naturally sleep more in the winter too. which is not a bad thing. The body seems to know when we need rest.

Nature provides us with more darkness in winter months to allow us to sleep more readily. It seems that nature has many good ways of telling us when it is the right time for many things to happen, It seems to have an answer for a lot more than science gives it credit for.

On Saturday I managed to read an interesting article in The Guardian newspaper. As we change our dietary habits between seasons we also change our social habits too. I find that once summer arrives if I am going to drink a glass of wine I am more inclined to drink a glass of  chilled white and the opposite is true for winter with a glass of Full bodied red on a  cold winter night a perfect partner .

It seems that not only can the seasons affect our choice of wine but the “lunar cycle “ can too. According to a calendar published for the past 47 years by Maria Thun a gardening great grandmother from Germany there are certain periods in the cycle of the moon and stars that seem to affect the wine we drink. She categorizes days as “root” “leaf” “Flower “ and “fruit”. Fruit and flower are the best for tasting  and leaf and root the worst.

It is connected to the concept of Biodynamic farming where decisions of when to sow and prune  are made according to lunar and cosmic rhythms.

But who is paying attention to this. It seems that the biggest hitters in the wine retail market are. Tescos have used the calendar for the past two years only using fruit days for their Thrice yearly wine tasting days for critics. Marks and Spencers have gone further and are informing customers of when best to open their wine. It seems that the reason wine is affected is because it is a living organism.

It seems that nature has its natural cycles that science is only beginning to understand. If anything we should pay respect to these cycles and  just go with its flow. Luckily enough the flow allows anyone fancying a glass of wine or two this weekend to celebrate as from 6pm on Friday through Saturday are both fruit periods.

Happy days indeed.

Steve