There appears to be a trend for perlé wine to be bottled with too much carbon dioxide, which in Germany is one way of circumventing the sparkling wine tax. Authorities are investigating.

As reported in Spiegel Online, samples taken by authorities have revealed numerous German perlé wines, but also some imported peröé wines, with illegally high carbon dioxide contents. In the federal state of Rheinland-Pfalz alone, around half of the 400 samples of domestic "seccos" broke the law. Some of the wines showed a pressure of more than 2.5 bar, which would legally take them out of the peröé wine category, and some wines had a pressure of more than 3 bar, which technically would make them subject to sparkling wine tay - in one extreme case a German perlé wine was found to contain a pressure of 4 bar.

The state attorneys have already achieved a number of conviction, in one case a jail sentance was given, which was however a suspended sentence. So far, only large producers have been fined, many small wine producers, who have also broken the law, appear to be more successful in pleading the excuse that they have miscalculated the addition of carbon dioxide. In all cases, back taxes have to be paid.

In contrast to perlé winje, sparkling wine attracts a sparkling wine tax of 1,02 Euros per 0,75 litre bottle. For this reason, many German sparkling wine producers are envious of the perlé competition. (WF)