Northwest Italian Sweet White Wine Sciacchetrà on Elementary's Breathe

Summary: The coastal northwest Italian sweet white wine Sciacchetrà is lethal when atypical almond scents indicate cyanide in Elementary's Breathe July 30, 2018.

DOC (Denominazione di origine controllata) Cinque Terre wines, including Sciacchetrà; Thursday, Nov. 2, 2006, 15:50: Matt Feifarek, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons

The coastal northwest Italian sweet white wine Sciacchetrà acts as an aggressive assassination aid by allowing almond-scented cyanide into every mouthful in the Elementary procedural drama series episode Breathe July 30, 2018.

Director Christine Moore and writers Robert Doherty, Bob Goodman and Kelly Wheeler broach one of Liguria's vertical vineyard wines in Season 6's 13th episode, 133rd overall. Sherlock Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller) concludes that the aroma at a homicide/suicide scene is that of Sciacchetrà, "a dessert wine, produced exclusively in Italy's Cinque Terre." He divulges, "It's not terribly common in the States, but it's not impossible to find [in wine stores]. Its aromatic notes should include honey, dried fruit."

Sherlock explains the incongruity that "What it should not smell like is almonds. Someone laced it with cyanide. Cyanide poisoning is a painful way to go."

Corniglia, Manarola, Monterosso al Mare, Riomaggiore and Vernazza, five villages in La Spezia province in Italy's Liguria region, fit under the designation Cinque Terre ("Five Lands").

Cinque Terre generates the same-named Italian government quality assurance label and Ligurian national park and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Site. Riserva ("reserve") and vino passito ("wine [from] sun-dried [grapes]") have the quality assurance label Cinque Terre Sciacchetrà DOC (denominazione di origine controllata, "controlled designation of origin"). Sciacchetrà (from the local Ligurian Sciacca! Trà, "Crush [and] pull out!") harvests involve grapes whose proportion is 40 to 100 percent of the Bosco ("wood") variety.

Coastal northwest Italian sweet white wine Sciacchetrà vineyard cultivators sometimes jumble 40 percent Bosco, 40 percent Albarola and/or Vermentino and 20 percent other approved/recommended white-berried grapes.

Vintners (winemakers, from the Latin vīnētārius, "wine dealer") keep all-Bosco grape harvests or harvested Albarola, assorted Ligurian white, Bosco and Vermentino grape mixes on drying racks.

Sun-drying procedures lead to the monikers raisin wine from fermented dried, not fresh-harvested, fresh-crushed, grapes, and straw wine from post-harvest months on drying mats of straw. Cultivation in carbonate-rich, clayey, sandstone soils on dry-terraced, steep-sloped, stone-walled hillsides; desiccation until November 1st; and 12- to 36-month rests from November 2nd make Sciacchetrà sweet. Three-, four-, five-, six- and seven-carbon natural grape sugar concentrations need fully fermented potential and fully rested actual alcohol levels of 17 and 13.5 percent.

The coastal northwest Italian sweet white wine Sciacchetrà offers delicate aromas and flavors of apricots, citrus, figs, hazelnut and honey from high post-fermentation residual sugar levels.

Sunny cultivation and desiccation of grapes and sunless fermentation prevent yeast, at alcohol by volume levels above 16 percent, from processing away all natural grape sugars.

One liter (1.06 quarts) queues up 140 sugary grams (4.94 ounces) after resting in 50- to 100-liter (13.21- to 26.42-gallon) cherry, chestnut or oak caratelli ("casks"). One 350-milliliter (11.84-ounce) bottle results from 15 pounds (6.81 kilograms) of two-month-dried grapes that Sciacchetrà vintners retrieve from 45 pounds (20.41 kilograms) of fresh, September-harvested grapes. Sciacchetrà serves as vino da meditazione ("wine for meditation") for sipping and as wine for cheeses and for such desserts as almond pastries and fruit cakes.

Sherlock triumphs because he undoubtedly knows the difference between the coastal northwest Italian sweet wine Sciacchetrà almond-scented from cyanide and from dunks of Ligurian almond-filled pastries.

The dainty habits of oenophiles help (back left) Sherlock Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller), Joan Watson (Lucy Liu) and (back right) Detective Marcus Bell (Jon Michael Hill) solve a crime with a bottle of exclusive dessert wine, Sciacchetrà, as a clue in Elementary tv series' Breathe (season 6 episode 13): Elementary @ElementaryCBS, via Facebook July 31, 2018

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

DOC (Denominazione di origine controllata) Cinque Terre wines, including Sciacchetrà; Thursday, Nov. 2, 2006, 15:50: Matt Feifarek, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:DOC_de_Cinque_Terre.jpg

The dainty habits of oenophiles help (back left) Sherlock Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller), Joan Watson (Lucy Liu) and (back right) Detective Marcus Bell (Jon Michael Hall) solve a crime with a bottle of exclusive dessert wine, Sciacchetrà, as a clue in Elementary tv series' Breathe (season 6 episode 13): Elementary @ElementaryCBS, via Facebook July 31, 2018, @ https://www.facebook.com/ElementaryCBS/photos/a.151627898295663.14686.151013691690417/1136956969762746/

For further information:

"Breathe." Elementary: The Sixth Season. Los Angeles CA: Paramount Pictures Corporation, July 30, 2018.

"Cinque Terre Sciacchetrà Wine Region." Wine-Searcher > Regions and Appellations > Italy > Liguria > Cinque Terre > 23 May 2018.
Available @ https://www.wine-searcher.com/regions-cinque+terre+sciacchetra

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. London, England: George Newnes Ltd., 1892.

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