Those who love to get a taste of the different types of this alcoholic beverage know that, usually, the longer a wine has been kept saved up, the better it should taste, as it's gone through a longer process of fermentation ... but was this the case with the 151 year-old Civil War wine?
Four years ago, a bottle of Civil War wine was discovered from the Mary-Celestia shipwreck, a blockade-runner that sank near Bermuda way back in 1864 - although way over a century had passed, the bottle was found entirely intact, though the contents didn't look exactly enticing.
According to The Independent, the Civil War wine wasn't any color tasters are used to as it wasn't red, white or rosé, but rather grey, not very rare considering it had been underwater (with all the atmospheric pressure that would mean) for almost 150 years.
All the same, as Yahoo! News reports, a South Carolina food festival (or rather, an event hosted by Charleston Wine and Food and entitled "From Deep Below: A Wine Event 150 Years in the Making") decided to give the Civil War wine a taste all the same, bringing a few expert sommeliers to give the very vintage wine a taste.
Around 50 people bought tickets for the event, as they watched wine experts decant and taste the Civil War wine over the past Friday, uncorking it in Charleston way over a century after it had drowned along with the Mary-Celestia.
Unfortunately, according to ABC.net.au, the wine didn't meet anyone's expectations - though the grey color alone could have been the first tell.
The liquid, between yellow and grey, apparently smelled (and ultimately tasted) as a very unappealing mix of gasoline, salt water, vinegar and crab water, with mild hints of alcohol and citrus - certainly no wonder.
The expert wine tasters said that, way back in the day, the Civil War wine could have been a spirit, medicine or a Spanish fortified wine - but the taste had been long lost as it sat in the depths of the sea for over a century.
