DragonOfTheAerie
Vala
I am sure that somebody in Medieval Europe or before had the idea to pour some honey into their wine and mix it, and yes it must have been done sometimes but it was not a common practice. The usual procedure was to dilute the wine with water, and also to spice it, because they used loads of spices in their food back then.
Yeah, loads of people combine their wines with sprite and other sodas. Even in wine-loving Spain this is done a lot, but the idea behind the practice (or at least the general effect that the combination has on the wine) is not to sweeten it. Sprite is not sweet enough to cause a dry wine to go sweet, at least not in a 50/50 mixture.
What happens is that even a tannic and aggressive wine becomes more beer-like, easier and faster to drink.
You are adding sugar to the wine, but at the same time you are adding a lot of water and so you are diluting the wine more than sweetening it. At least to me, a 50/50 combination of a dry white with sprite results in a beverage that is sparkly and pleasant, and it's easy to drink and there is sprite flavor in it but it's not particularly sweet.
Now I am curious, and the next time that I get some tetra brick wine I am going to mix some of it with honey just to discover how sweet it can be made, look for changes in color and also to decide how pleasant the final result is.
And yeah, I agree with you Russ that using a fine wine for mixing is a very sad thing.
Chessie and Joe: Thanks for the replies. As far as I know underage drinking of wine is more accepted in England than at the other side of the Atlantic, but it seems that in the U.S. underage drinking is far more serious than I imagined. No offense really, but sometimes I am happy that I was not born in the U.S. because of things like that.
Something else that could be of interest to a Fantasy writer wishing to portray wine in a medieval society:
Today the wine lovers look for fine and expensive wines that must be kept in their cellars for years so it can evolve and become better, but centuries ago the wine that everybody appreciated was young and fresh wine, the more recently made the better. This was because wine manufacturing was simpler, and wine just went bad quickly instead of evolving.
Even today, few wines are destined to be kept at cellars and really age and evolve for a long time. The idea that all wines become better with time is a common misconception.
Despite being serious, underage drinking is super common in the U.S. Especially among college students it seems.