My 1st in Finland Birthday Party

The Sacher cake - It was delicious!

Last Saturday, the 25th February, one year ago I arrived finally in Finland. And since then I had an awesome journey into a culture and mentality that caught me from the very first moment and still hasn't lost my fascination! I am very thankful to every special moment I had with my Finnish friends and looking forward to more of these "nights and white days to remember!!!" This is a SPECIAL THANK YOU to all of you, ladies and guys!!! Kiitos paljon for making me feel like home here and integrating me into your culture!!! :) 

Getting the Bday Party ready

So last Saturday I was celebrating with some of my Finnish friends my 1st year staying in Finland. Unfortunately not all of them were able to show up at my party, however I know those who couldn't attend were mentally there! Plus one of my best friends from Germany, Benjamin, showed up for the weekend. It was great to had all you at my party. First my friends and I went to Sauna followed by an evening of funny games, conversations and a lot of laughs and party in Tiger at Kamppi until the very end!

When my friends came they also brought some nice presents along, a Sacher cake and - of course what else? - a bottle of red wine. The interesting fact about the bottle of wine is that this one doesn't contain any sulfite. Sulfite? Sulfite? What isn't that the yellow stuff that you can find near volcanoes, you might ask now. Correct that is sulfite and normally when it comes out of volcanoes it isn't very healthy. But why is it in wine? Good question and the answer is quite simply. Sulfite is used to stop the process of wine fermentation.

The present:
Pura Sangre

Finnish Party Mood ;)

Sulphur has been used for centuries or more than a couple of thousands of years. In older time a small stick of sulphur was lighted before it was thrown into the wine. While it burns the sulphur becomes sulfur dioxide (SO2) which further reacts in the wine with the water molecules (H2O) to sulphurous acid (HSO3-). Okay enough of the chemical things now. However the sulphurous acid will instantly kill all microorganisms (good or bad ones for the wine) and stop the fermentation process. The concentration that is used for the wine is so less that it is NOT IN ANY WAY HARMFUL! So no worries. However the sulfite can be tasted and smelled as a slight - let's say - "fruity" compound in the wine. I am barely able to smell this (only when there is a little bit more used) and sometimes only able to taste it. But of course the sulfite might influence the taste and smell of the wine a bit and might also be able to cover other nice "tastes".

So in this case it raises the question how to stop the fermentation otherwise. Well there are different possibilities. One way is that the concentration of the alcohol within the wine increases to a level that the yeast will die or when the nutritions for the yeast runs out (latter one more rarely). Another way are physical methods like heating up the tank to a certain temperature or cool it down for a longer time. At least when it comes to the "heating" up I am very sceptically and not very much positive that this won't influence the wine... anyway. 

Capt. Kimmo

Now I will looking forward to taste this wine. I don't know where they got it, from Alko or somewhere else and I also won't start looking for it even it is good. I don't actually need or even want to know what my friends invested into this bottle, because for me it's not about the money. For me it's about the act of friendship to come up with such an idea! Thank you so much!   

At the end of this post today I wanna say once more thank you for this Birthday party: Benjamin, Kimmo, Teemu, Tommi, Emma, Vera, Paulina and Anastasia. You made it very special to me! 

Thats it for today. À bientôt mes amis!

- “The wines that one best remembers are not necessarily the finest that one has ever tasted, and the highest quality may fail to delight so much as some far more humble beverage drunk in more favorable surroundings.” - H. Warner Allen