Watering down the wine miracle?

The church clearly has nothing to fear from the invention of a gadget to turn tap water into wine, though France and other oenophile nations may well have a thing or two to say about it. Jesus, after all, turned water into wine with a mere wave of his hand, while this modern take on the Biblical miracle needs a sachet of ingredients, a special receptacle and a three-day fermentation time. While there is every reason to believe that chemicals can now mimic everything —including a $20 bottle of wine, from any of six regions as this instant brew’s inventors assert — whether that will miraculously draw aficionados to it is quite debatable. Especially since many mass-market labels resort to chemistry to enhance their products anyway and their wines cost the same as the sachet.

Experts have famously been deceived into believing plonk to be vintage wines enough times over the years, so this invention may just add another bit of “complexity” to the matter. However, considering “terroir” — the soil, micro climate and other area-specific variables — is what apparently makes all the difference between ordinary and great wines, will mundane, localised factors such as the quality of tap water, not to mention the ambient kitchen temperature, affect this ersatz tipple as well?