Grassy, it appears, is quite classy

Tesco supermarkets in the UK launched a series of cheap own-brand wines recently designed to appeal to people looking for a generic flavour profile rather than a particular grape from a particular country.
The wines had names like Summer Pudding, Citrus Squeezer and Jam Pot.
While those might sound all very appealing to some (the words brainless, tasteless and trash spring to my mind) according to The Guardian newspaper, the wine that has actually proved the most popular among British shoppers is a white wine with a little lawnmower on the front calling itself Cut Grass.
No surprises to see that it is a sauvignon blanc from New Zealand, a variety which is known internationally for its uniquely green, herbaceous and grassy characters.
Of course you'll find lime, capsicum and the ever-popular passionfruit in there as well, but it's that classic note of lawn clippings that wine lovers the world over are going crazy for.
"But grass?" you might say. "That's going a tad far isn't it? You wine writers are always whipping out all sorts of wild and whimsical descriptors to try and encourage us to avoid describing wines as tasting or smelling well, like 'wine'. Why don't you try getting real for once."
Well I hate to burst your bubble, but finding "grassy smells" in a glass of sauvignon blanc is actually very real because the sauvignon blanc grape happens to share some of the same genetic gobbledegook as grass.
Flavour chemist Bradley Strange was interviewed by Victoria Moore for theguardian.co.uk and explains: "There are maybe a couple of hundred different aromas in a wine so it depends which are more prominent.
"Grassiness comes primarily from the following aldehydes: hexenal, trans-2-hexenal and cis-3-hexenal, which are formed from the enzymatic cleavage (which for those lacking chemical cleavage knowledge, is when a compound is split under the action of an enzyme) of linoleic and linolenic acids, which are found in grapes and, especially, unripe or green grapes.
"They tend to be reduced to the corresponding alcohols during fermentation. Cis-3-hexenal, in particular, is almost sweetly grassy. But it's the remaining aldehydes that drive the perception of grassiness for the simple reason that they're also found in grass."
So there you go.
And if you've ever wondered why certain syrah and shiraz wines have such a strong black pepper aroma and flavour? Then that would be because the grapes (shiraz and syrah are one as the same) contain the same compound that gives black pepper its spicy kick - a compound called rotundone.
Chemists are discovering that fruits, vegetables and organic matter share the same DNA all the time, so why should the grapes that make our wines be any different.
I've always been curious about the "cat's pee" thing with sauvignon and Strange has an answer for that too.
"That comes from sulphur-containing aroma chemicals," says Strange, "such as para-mentha-8-thiol-3-one and 4-mercapto-4pentan-2-one. They have been identified in sauvignon blanc, blackcurrants, passion fruit, gooseberry and, I'm sorry to tell you, cat's pee."