Should we be evaluating natural wine differently?

Let me first state that I haven’t had enough natural wine to firmly state whether or not I’m in or out. I’ve had some pretty funky ones that, quite frankly, I didn’t like. I’ve never had a natural red that I liked, but whites have been closer. To me, so many of what I’ve tried had an oxidative sense that tastes and smells like wine that had been open too long or aged way past its optimum drinking window.

With a few recent discussions here and on the CT forums, I started thinking about how we evaluate them. For most (myself included), we seem to compare them to “standard” wines (by which I mean wines with all of the usual treatments allowed / non-natural wines) and I’m not so sure if that’s fair. When I read posts and talk to real natural wine enthusiasts and makers, it seems to me they’re not seeking to make wines or taste wines that smell or taste like their “standard” wine counterparts. Rather, they’re trying to make wine 1.) in a very purposeful way, and 2.) that is somewhat funky, different, interesting. So, should we be evaluating natural wines in a different way? Perhaps we should evaluate them in relationship to a whole different set of standards? I wouldn’t evaluate mead or a fruit wine with the same qualifications of a standard grape wine, so why would I do that for natural wines?

I’m not sure where I stand on this, but I thought I’d throw it out there and could see some interesting discussion coming.

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Maybe we should do the same for high octane wines

Personally, for me, I don’t see a reason to give accommodations for wines I don’t prefer (I have had a number of natural wines that I like and quite a few that I don’t). For example, winemakers put sulphur in wine for a reason - I don’t want to accommodate science experiments in my tasting evaluation. It goes without saying that people should like what they like and drink what gives them pleasure.

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I think all wine should be evaluated using the binary system. I like it or I don’t like it. Of course, you can then expound on why you like it or you don’t like it if you care to.

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Same here.

+1, it’s outliers looking for acceptance. If it’s not good then setting different standards will not make it better.

With a few recent discussions here and on the CT forums, I started thinking about how we evaluate them. For most (myself included), we seem to compare them to “standard” wines (by which I mean wines with all of the usual treatments allowed / non-natural wines)

Brandon - I don’t know what this means. What “usual treatments” are we talking about and what wines would be good examples of those, and what are some examples of alternatives?

Cross off Meiomi, which nobody here buys anyway, and the mass-produced Gallo wines. Those are the wines the “natural” wine people claim to hate.

What else? Togni? Mas de l’Abudància? San Roman? I know how some of those are made and I’ve had “natural” versions of those same grapes from CA and elsewhere. And frankly, the “natural” versions were just shitty wine. The difference wasn’t so much in the approach, it was in the abilities of the wine makers.

You can take Garnacha Blanca and you can bottle a wine that’s cloudy, brown, VA-heavy, and basically undrinkable, or you can take the same grape and make something without those flaws.

I wouldn’t cut someone slack because he or she doesn’t know how to make wine. There is a lot of knowledge these days. The wine making decisions should be based on what they are supposed to accomplish, rather than whether they fit into some belief system.

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either it tastes good or it doesn’t. Pretty simple. Same with fruit wines. Same with high octane wines. Same with AFWE wines.

No participation trophies!!!

I think if I taste a wine and have to resort to “Oh, this must be a natural wine” in order to have something nice to say, then the wine is a failure.

I think I agree with Brandon’s general tasting impressions.

There was an old movie meme that went something like, “Don’t let the vehicle run over the plot.” That’s how I feel about ‘natural wine.’

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Natural wines are often produced in an innocent and less manipulated manner which as a result can be funky, different and “interesting” wines. I applaud the stance and reasoning of the producers who are producing “natural wines” in trying to produce wine in a less manipulated way, but my palate doesn’t gravitate to them from my experience.

Like most things I guess I would have to say “it depends”. If a natural winemaker is specifically saying “this is a Bordeaux wine”, this is “Barolo”, etc., then yes it should generally be identifiable as such. If they are making a vin de france, or from a region where variety is most impt, then it I think more latitude should be given. Even wines from Cornelissen, with all his issues, are still identifiable as Etna (at least to me).

Having said that, my biggest problem with the natural wine community is the credulous and uncritical attitude I see with the fans.

This is nearly perfect. The only change I’d make is that the only relevant question is whether I like it, not whether Paul likes it.

You’re going to get a bunch of “old man yells at sky” answers here but I find the question interesting. I’m unimpressed with folks who still want to debate the word natural. We all know what natural wines are and while it may not be the best nomenclature, it’s the one we’re stuck with.

I’ve gone back and forth on this over the last 20 years or so and I think the answer is yes. It sued to make me mad that Dard & Ribo were making a glou-glou wine from Hermitage or that Pacalet was making one from Gevrey. It wasn’t as much of a problem for me in the Touraine (Thierry Puzelat gets to define what menu pineau from there tastes like if he wants) but somehow wines from more “important” AOCs bothered me. I’m not so bothered by that anymore. I really enjoy taking a Dard & Ribo or Pacalet wine on its own merits rather than compare it to whatever the “standard” is for the AOCs.

The other thing that natural wine has done is opened up what aromas and flavors we expect from certain grapes from certain areas. I’ve also learned to accept things that I may have tagged as flaws years ago in order to get some of these other things that I want that only natural wines seem to be able to deliver. There is a certain pliancy on the palate and seemingly extra gears of aromas that my favorite natural wines have. There is a lack of seriousness and conviviality in the glass. Sitting around a table with rilletes and cheese a little bit of VA or cider doesn’t bother me so much anymore. I take these wines as they are.

Now, the boomer pushback will be something haranguing low SO2 (“God put it here to be in wine, dammit!”) and there are wines that are too flawed to be considered wine at all. That’s the thing, making natural wine at all is making things more difficult (and financially risky, which is why the cheap grapes of the Loire were the breeding ground for this movement). What I’ve also noticed is that there are also a lot of vigneron who struggled early on but whose wines have improved.

Last, but hardly least, buying natural wines is really difficult. You can’t just go on wine-searcher and look for the lowest price and ship all over the place. Sometimes I get burned with bottles coming through the 3-tier system where I live. I’ve had better luck in NY and Montreal where the wines come straight over and the best merchants store them really well. Better yet, drink them in situ during a visit to Europe (or CA or Australia). Now all of this stuff may not be worth it, but I think it is. (FWIW, when we’re in Montreal we drink almost exclusively natural wines.)

Last of all, the natural wine set really won. Even the most commercial of regions like Bordeaux and Champage are turning natural. A good chunk of Musigny is plowed by horse with cover crop. Natural wine is increasingly popular with the kids, god bless 'em.

My cellar is mostly conventional but I’ve increased the space in it for natural wines and I don’t evaluate them the same way.

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One of the big debate points is where the line is drawn for which wines are “natural” and which aren’t. Some of the darlings get allowances for their interventions that make them “less natural” than a large number of wines that aren’t identified as natural. In other words, if I make up a number, “If this is your standard for natural, then the actual number of natural wines out there is about twenty times what you claim.” Then, of course, some producers who’ve self-identified as natural occasionally have to intervene and do something they claim they never do. Or, as hearsay says about a few who make those claims, they aren’t doing anything different than the vast majority of small producers.

Anyway, there are stable, age-worthy wines that would qualify as natural, but don’t necessarily claim it. There are also light, ready to drink wines that aren’t “natural”, but aren’t intended to age, and probably wouldn’t age well.

If you want to judge wines, judge them for what they are, for what they are intended to be. It should not be a binary thing with some arbitrary line. A wonderfully aromatic light red can be the perfect wine for certain situations. Would you condemn it for its lack of aging potential? Would you ignore its intent and insist on drinking it with a steak because its red, then pan it for not being a good match?

I think you can judge light reds intended for young drinking as a category. Some may be clean, with unique and exciting floral and fruit expressions (regardless of being “natural” or not); some may have a little bit of wild stuff going on, which you may or may not find interesting and compelling; some may show significant flaws, but still be enjoyable to some people (or not).

We get flaws in wines that aren’t natural. People have their tolerances and preferences for things like brett, VA, EA…

Something else to note is the various natural wine shops and bars each have their own standards, preferences and tolerances. Different focuses. So, one may have a high tolerance for flaws, while another be sensitive to that sort of stuff.

Sincere question: how much are the makers and consumers of natural wine (1) actually desirous of those outcomes (oxidized, cloudy, bretty, volatile), versus (2) how much are they into the idea/philosophy/pose/whatever of making wine that certain way and according to those strictures, and then the outcomes are just what they are?

If the answer is (1), then I guess it makes sense to consider them partially in that light. In the way that one might say “I don’t like the Prisoner, but for those who like jammy, opulent, lush reds, it might be the perfect thing for them at that price and availability.”

If the answer is (2), that the point is the process and method and image, not really to create wines that end up like that (e.g. they’d actually like to make a pinot that tastes like a 1er Cru Burg, or maybe a slightly eclectic version of a 1er Cru Burg, but brown, bretty, cloudy and with VA is just what ended up happening), then I guess the answer is no.

Anyone know how much the outcomes in “natural wine” are intentional, and how much the people who buy them want wines to taste like that (versus wanting to support the ideas/processes/image of how they are made)?

Low/no intervention wine making inherently often results in cloudy, funky, barnyardy wine due to little to no additives or manipulation that the majority of wineries use like acids, filtering materials, sulfites…There is a reason much of the wine we drink uses some sort of intervention other than drinking straight up fermented grape juice.

Let’s use a 1 point scale.

0 - I wouldn’t drink.
1 - I would drink.

" I’ve never had a natural red that I liked"

find 2011 Paolo Bea Piparello Riserva, as just one example; mind, changed.

If you can’t find one, try any G. Rinaldi or Cappellano.

Chris, I think it’s more an exploration in one way or another for producers and consumers.

For consumers, think mostly young people who’d only had fuddy-duddy grocery store plonk, then found some craft beers, then Belgian-styled ales, then someone suggested if they like those… Look at Nathan’s post. These wines aren’t all flawed. There are all sorts of aromas and flavors you don’t normally encounter in conventional wines. (You can, if you know where to look, but that’s another niche.)

Sulfur compounds can dull or mute aromatic compounds in a wine, they can interfere with our perception of them, they can make a wine seem darker and heavier. Sulfite in a ferm inhibits a lot of microbial activity which would likely add to complexity. Nuking a wine with SO2, then inoculating controls (more or less), narrows and focuses what compounds are produced by the yeast. A natural ferm is likely to produce a more complex array of aromas.

A lot of the young folks who go into this are inspired by the wines they tried. They operate on a shoestring budget. So, they’re sort of pioneering new ground. I’m sure some are like some conventional winemakers, in what I can the “good enough” camp. No particular palate. They like to drink and are quite content just continuing making wine the same way as their first vintage. No intellectual curiosity. Others, as Nathan notes above, are exploring, and you often see their wines get better over the years. The flaws either go away or are kept in check.

Some older wineries just always used certain practices, not changing when the institutions were advocating new “quality control” practices that all the new wineries adopted.

To a good degree, things a modern understanding of cleanliness, better knowledge of the chemistry, easy-quick-affordable lab results and a great understanding of yeast nutrient needs and how to employ them, and how to address and eliminate deficiencies in the vineyard, have brought down the need for SO2 and eliminated the clumsy over-use. It’s made natural ferms much less risky, and ferm issues much more manageable. So, a lot of conventional wineries have moved towards natural.

The wine quality appeals are real, so that may be a sort of Holy Grail for some winemakers. If you can reach the full expression potential and the minimal needed SO2 doesn’t interfere with that, you are there.

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I don’t think that you’ve seen this here

See posts 2-8, 11 and 16.

I love the participation trophy rhetoric. I’m not a millennial, but that’s rather rich coming from boomers.