We read in these histories that wine ( and beer ) were safer to drink than water by the Middle Ages . Even further back , the histories describe wine as the preferred medium of medicine delivery . The heady Bacchanalian festivities of the 5th century B . C . E . described by Euripides recount parties so wild that the wine must have been laced with some of other “ medicines .”
Fermented foods have long been among the staples we put in our winter pantry ; the fermentation process neutralizes pathogenic bacteria that would harm us . The sour or bitter tang of yogurt , kimchi or wine normally warns our taste buds of poison — yet we also learned that some bacteria function as our allies in survival , and our taste for them follows . Think the tolerance for bitter coffee versus the adrenal lift it provides . We have always been quick learners .
When wine was not to our taste , we added things to help it fit . Aromatized wines helped deliver medicine as well as provide flavor .
The Romans had a famous blended wine , Hippocras , blended with sugar , cinnamon and other herbs . In places it is recorded as being heated — sounds suspiciously like the German Glühwein we see offered every year . The English may know it as “ mulled ” wine , delicious and warming on a winter night . In the Roman era it was praised for its aphrodisial qualities , as are most things that need selling .
Their other famous wine concoction was conditum paradoxum . By some accounts it was sweetened with lead ( yes , you read that right ) and contained a list of ingredients that probably hid a thin , low-alcohol wine with sharper vinegar-y tendencies very well : pepper , sugar , mastic , spikenard , bay leaf , honey , charcoal , dates and saffron among others . Histories and intact amphorae assure us that there were well-regarded , unblended wines of the era between 500 B . C . E . and 400 A . D .,
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