Your Wine Should Never Bug You

For the serious winemaker, a description of a finished product reading, "notes of black currant and apricot, a grassy nose, and a hint of ladybug taint" would ideally be avoided.

And while we prefer not to think about such things while we're savor our favorite big, jammy zinfandel, the fact of the matter is that many natural products will incidentally incorporate other natural products.

Grapes entering the wine making process can often have some small quantity of insect shells in the mix that, while not harmful, can impart some undesirable components to the flavor profile of the wine as it ages.

Developments in packaging design however may have uncorked a solution to the flavor problem of ladybug taint, the trade term given to the unpleasant vegetable taste that can arise from insect stowaways.

The flavor culprit is a class of organic compounds called alkyl-methoxypyrazines. A study recently published in The Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, and featured on the New Scientist website found, surprisingly, that wine boxes -- yes, boxes -- whose construction included a thin, aluminum lining were more effective than bottles at reducing the concentration of these unwanted flavors.

The corked bottle will assuredly remain king of containers for the serious collector, but the box, it turns out, is not just for squares.