Antioxidant Booster

It is the ultimate French paradox. How is it that the French eat the richest foods on the planet but remain so slim? The answer may lie not in what they eat, but what they drink. Red wine it seems is a rich source of antioxidants – a natural antioxidant booster if ever you find any. So no matter how much you eat, as long as you consume enough red wine with it, you should be okay.

But, there’s a catch. It’s only red wine. Not white. Definitely not white.

Studies have shown that the amount of antioxidant boosters in red wine is higher in comparison to those present in white wine. It has something to do with the fermentation process they say and also on the type of grapes used. Grapes used for making red wines have naturally high levels of antioxidant boosters which in turn make red wines great antioxidant boosters.

But, new information has just been released. Researchers in Israel say they have developed a method to increase antioxidant booster content of white whine so that it has health benefits similar to red wine.

Traditionally, white wine is made without the use of grape skins, which provide for their crunchy, thin taste. Red wine on the other hand is made by fermenting the juice along with the skins. Grapes, like any typical fruits, have the most concentration of its antioxidant boosters found in its skin. So because, white wine doesn’t include grape skins, it makes sense then that it doesn’t have as much antioxidant boosters as red wine. The skins give red wine its coloration and contain the highest concentration of polyphenols, which are potent antioxidant boosters. The research theory was that antioxidant booster capacity of white wine could increase by extracting more grape skin polyphenols during processing.

In order to conduct their research on antioxidant boosters of white wine, the researchers obtained whole squeezed grapes. They let these incubate for up to 18 hours in the presence of alcohol before they removed the skins. The effect was a significant increase of white wine polyphenols up to six times the normal level. The antioxidant booster exhibited antioxidant activity similar to that of red wine.

The study used about a quarter of the polyphenol content found in red wine. But even so, the researchers will able to find that even at one-quarter, white wine polyphenols exhibited the same antioxidant booster activity. This suggests that of the two wines used for study, white wine contains those varieties of polyphenosl that have higher antioxidant booster activity.