We meet again... brutes! (full sequence included)
We meet again... brutes! (full sequence included)
While finishing up the "answers" section to the recent quiz, I accidentally bumped in to this panel (from Banquet) and was struck by how unique it was.
Now, there have been plenty of times when an overconfident oaf looked to put Astérix in his place, only to be sent skyrocketing to the heavens, but in this rare case we have a solo legionary of mediocre physical build (name of "Spongefingus" in English) who's been worked in to a perfect wrath, eager to take on our Gaulish duo.
Well, what the hey... let's see the backstory:
(previously, Asterix & Obelix on their tour through Gaul happened to gain possession of a 'breakdown' chariot, likely a playful anachronism, altho who knows?)
As usual, Obelix is dreadful at playing along, and now the vendetta is ignited.
Brut: a French word meaning "raw," used to describe a style of wine that's very dry and crisp, with little to no added sugar. In this case, a dry, sparkling wine.
You're gonna give Frenchmen aneurysms by suggesting that adding sugar to a wine is a normal and trivial thing like that. I mean it is in most places of the world, but not there.
Oh?
I don't know much about wine-making and mostly just pulled that definition from some source or other. Generally I supposed that the grapes supply most of the sugar, no?Yes. It is actually illegal to add sugar to wine in France and Italy. They are extremely proud and protective of their wine industry and do not want it to turn into something that churns out boring mass produced products that taste exactly the same year after year. They see value in the differences in the wine years caused by the different weather conditions and the know-how and efforts to create a good wine without resorting to cheap modern shortcuts. Winemakers aren't even allowed to water their vineyards.
The grapes supply all of the sugar, otherwise it's not wine but ... something else.
Brut usually applies to champagne though, which during the "chapelization" phase a "dosage" of sugar is added to aid the fermentation process.
Thanks for educating me on this difference with champagne. I didn't know that.