(NYMag)  - Like millions of Americans, New York Knicks forward Amar’e Stoudemire enjoys a few glasses of wine each week. But Stoudemire isn’t drinking those merlots and cabernets — he is bathing in them. Last Wednesday, he posted a photo on his Instagram account in which he was covered up to his neck in what appeared to be red wine. The Insta’s caption read, in part, “Recovery Day! Red Wine Bath !!”

Speaking with reporters last Thursday, Stoudemire revealed he has been practicing vinotherapy, a process involving immersion in wine-grape branches, vines, leaves, and skin (basically everything that doesn't make it into the bottle), on his off days for the past eight months or so. His 40-minute baths — a mixture of red wine and water — are “a rejuvenation … [allowing him] create more circulation in [his] red blood cells,” according to the Daily News. While vinotherapy may seem like a mom-joke — “Oh goodness, I spilled my glass of wine in my bubble bath, but I feel more relaxed than before” — the treatment’s history stretches back to the early 1990s and there is scientific evidence — well, sort of — that wine might do more for your health than simply by enjoying a glass with dinner.

Here’s a brief explanation of why some people are taking long, relaxing baths in vats of red wine
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When and where did vinotherapy start?
In 1993, Mathilde Thomas was giving a tour of her parents’ winery in Bordeaux when one of the guests asked what became of the red grape branches, vines, and seeds. That guest was a professor from a French university, and he claimed to Thomas, who was then finishing business school with plans to work for a plant and oil extraction company, that the oils from those red wine grape seeds were ten times more effective at preventing wrinkles than vitamin E. 

That chance encounter led Thomas to found Caudalie, a French skin-care company. Because Caudalie was the first to realize the potential health benefits of red wine and patent products related to vinotherapie, it’s the field’s leader (a brief aside: The company has trademarked vinotherapie, which includes their products and methodology, while the broader practice is known as vinotherapy).