A lot of Natural wine adherents dislike chaptalization as much as they dislike acidification.
A few I know suggest that chaptalization is less aggressive an addition than an acid addition since the sugars will be metabolized away by yeast, leaving none in the finished wine. Seems like a small, valid point in an otherwise endless argument about what is and what is not natural…
Well, the most natural of all hate the idea of grafted vines and even more, monoclonal vineyards.
True. Though consider that at some point someone planted grape vines that had not always been there.
Natural wine “rules” always go off the rails. It’s just a question of when it happens.
That may be why there aren’t really any rules.
I was raising complaints about the biochemical leveling and terroir-obscuring effects of non-intervention ten or more years ago, and as Nathan points out I was hardly alone. (I think Eric Texier was one of the first and most forceful voices that I read on this subject, but with the benefit of hindsight I know he wasn’t alone either.) I suppose I appreciate that Jamie’s come to find it a compelling enough argument to monetize.
Recently I was reading about various aspects of Sumatra Mandheling coffee (I roast coffee, for myself and a few friends). S M considered a flawed coffee by coffee purists/geeks because its flavor is dominated, to one degree or another, but its processing (rather than origin). The discussion reminded me that if people like it and you can do it consistently (reasonably consistently anyways) then it’s not a flaw.
The rule is pretty much “What I have to do in my particular set of circumstances is permittable. What I don’t have to do in my particular set of circumstances is not permittable.”
At least that’s how some people put it. But, to be fair, that attitude is much most common from various proponents than the actual winemakers.
To that specific question, some people have actually posted “no”. But, of course, see above.^^^
Bruce, I think you raise a valid point. When I worked the street in NYC, one of my natural wine accounts, a young man running a very good organic/biodynamic/natural wine store, told me point blank that if Chardonnay wasn’t slightly oxydized or like cider then it wasn’t correct to him. That’s because he came of age drinking (and enjoying) those types of wines. My mouth hit the floor, as I learned about wine by tasting some of the greatest examples that I could get my hands on. So to him, being “natural” equalled being “good”. Maybe if he tried some fantastic white Burgs, his view might change. I don’t know.
So I think there is an alternative palate being formed around them. The trick is to define what is a correct wine for you while staying away from excessive flaws, I suppose. To paraphrase, flaws are what make wine interesting, but let’s not go overboard.
PS: The Japanese, like the Northern Europeans, have gone whole-hog into natural wine, and they both enjoy stuff I wouldn’t put in my mouth. To each his or her own.
BERLIN is a kind of capital for natural/orange wines. My observation is that most of the sommeliers in Berlin are big fans of this stuff and they are a driving factor. Why, these wines need explanation. So, these sommeliers have a loooong story to tell. 
My argument would be a good wine speak for itself in the glass.
Another observation is that is a kind of generation thing, as many young people between 20-30 years love these wines as they taste different and is clearly an attack to the old stuff which grumpy old men like us drink. That´s okay the young generation has every right for revolution.
And also many young people start with this stuff, so they have no idea how it taste different.
No doubt that there are some really good natural/orange wines on the market, BUT most of them are faulty and
and if they are not faulty they are just too intellectual or for discussions and offer little drinking pleasure in my view.
Like a wine dealer from south germany said to me a couple of months ago, “if the wine smells like grapes nobody want it in Berlin, but if the wine stinks they love it.”
Cheers,
Martin
Nicely put, but while “the punk movement” was here it was definitely a cool kids club after a very brief pure period, and it also had a lot of shitty bands that have thankfully disappeared and left behind a memory of some very important work. But that’s because records and music are easily preserved…something natural wines are not.
If there is a flaw in the movement, beyond the insufferable-ness mixed with ignorance of some practitioners, it may be that the wines are vin de soif. Even in the best examples.
I am very much with you that some things that the “natural” wine movement have articulated, are extraordinarily important and hopefully will be influential in the craft through future generations. However, I think that many of them are already in practice in craft wineries around the world.
Perhaps. Though he has likely killed his chances at all all expenses paid natural wine tour.
As I drink more wine I’m progressively understanding what is likely happening in the vineyard and in the winery. My purchasing dollars still go towards non-flawed wines I like to drink. I’m not sure if I’ve ever had a natural wine…what would I look for on the label? From the article it appears there is no consensus/regulations around what a “natural” wine is so how can it mean anything other than a marketing tool?
So Clos Rougeard is vin de soif? Clos Roche Blanche Côt, L’Arpent Rouge, and Sauvignon No. 5? Baudry Les Grezeaux? Coudert Fleurie Cuvée Tardive? Dirty and Rowdy Skinner Stoney Creek Mourvèdre and Antle Vineyard Chardonnay? Gauby? Emedio Pepe? Roagna? Terroir al Limit? Foradori?
How does your ridiculous overgeneralization in any way counter the ridiculous hyperbole and overgeneralizations of some of the myrmidons of the “natural wine movement”? Or are you just invoking the No True Scotsman fallacy by defining natural wine only as the flawed examples of the type or glou glou wines and ignoring the incredible wines also found in the category?
I’ve been buying and drinking “natural wines” for more than two decades. I don’t make my buying decisions based on process, I buy what I buy because I like them and because in general I find a sense of place in them. I apply the same standard to all the wines I buy. I have never hesitated to call out flawed natural wines, and have long admired my friend Eric Texier for his willingness to do so as he has much more at stake. We don’t need to meet ignorant unnuanced zealotry on one side with more ignorant unnuanced zealotry.
I agree with Mike Evans thoughts, if not what I perceive as his level of anger. It does’t matter what you are trying to promote, if as part of your promotion, you are defending badly made flawed wines, then for me, you have a problem with credibility.
There are great wines made with all sorts of methodologies and allot more garbage made using those same methods. I’ll paraphrase a good friend, who has imported what would be called Natural Wine for more then 30 years. Natural does not mean dirty, you can wash your hands and equipment and still make natural wine. Wines should first be good and sound, then have something to say about where they are from and the people who grew and made them. After that, for me, I would like the wine to be as natural and un-manipulated as possible.
The discussion reminded me that if people like it and you can do it consistently (reasonably consistently anyways) then it’s not a flaw.
This pretty much captures it. People will like it, others will convince themselves they like it, and some will have no reference. It’s like the guy Michel mentioned - I know someone who didn’t have a lot of money when he was learning about wine so he drank awful, tannic, cheap Italian wines. Now he’s a distinguished professor and still has a taste for those wines that many others can’t abide. If he had been told it was cool on top of everything else, he would have been very pleased.
Many people want their food to be unmanipulated. But they eat Pringles and Oreos. I always wondered what would happen if P&G or Nabisco or whoever makes those things would put “natural” on the carton. Unmanipulated Pringles.
Thread drift but I always hated that coffee Eric. I had no idea it was all about the processing. What do they do to make it different?
Coffee Thread Drift (sorry for the length): Coffee beans are the seeds of coffee cherries. The seeds are surrounded by parchment, a thin shell that protects the seeds from getting harmed/etc. The seed/parchment is surrounded by the fruit…the fleshy part.
Processing coffee involves removing the fruit/flesh and parchment. There are two common ways of doing this. The oldest and simplest is dry processing. The cherries are laid out in the sun for several weeks to dry. The dried flesh and parchment is then mechanically removed (simple to do once dry). Sorting out the poor/defective beans are a bit of a pain with this method, since it’s completely based on workers visually inspecting the processed beans for defects…hence ‘triple picked’ for some of the better dry processed coffee.
The other method is wet processing. With this, first most of the flesh is removed mechanically (a specially designed grinder basically). The remainder of of the flesh is removed in a water bath…either by fermentation (microbes) or by enzymes. An advantage here is the under ripe beans tend to float (and the ripe beans sink), making it easier to a lot of the sorting. Once the flesh is removed, the seeds, still in their parchment, are dried. Once dry, the parchment is removed. I’m not sure when wet processing originated, but it’s much more recent than dry process.
Sumatra uses a variant of wet processed, called wet hulled (or Giling Basah). The seeds are removed from the parchment while still wet (rather than waiting for them to dry first). The seeds are then dried. Without the parchment to protect them, the seeds absorb flavors/aromas in the processing environment…and Sumatra is a humid place, so flavors/aromas are typically present.
The amount of rain and humidity in Sumatra is a driving factor in how they processing. Dry processing isn’t an option…with their humidity it’d take significantly longer than a few weeks to dry, and they’d likely get rain during that period. Even with wet processing, you need to dry the seeds in parchment…which takes a fair bit longer than drying the seeds out of the parchment (separating the seed and parchment is called Hulling, hence wet hulling is the term for Sumatra’s approach). So it’s all about managing their conditions/environment.
The humidity has a plus side tho, which is aged coffee. For most of the coffee world, green coffee beans have a shelf life of ~1 year. After (or before) that they lose their appealing flavors and gain unappealing (‘baggy’) flavors. Sumatra otoh has the conditions to age beans into a fantastic/interesting coffee, and the humidity is a big part of this. The difference between aged & regular coffee is roughly similar to aged wine. I have ~1 lb left of a 2011 Sumatra atm…I’m hoping I find some more soon.
There are taste differences between wet and dry processed coffees…if half a lot of cherries were dry processed and the other half wet, for example. But those differences are minor compared to Sumatra’s wet hulled. Wet processed coffees are generally considered to be the more ‘pure’ terroir based coffees…I think this is more of an opinion/assumption than anything else tho.
Also, the parchment is why ‘poop’ coffee (Kopi Luwak et al) isn’t as scary as you might think (poop coffee is basically a wet processed coffee where the animals digestive enzymes/microbes digest the cherry fruit). Don’t buy poop coffee tho. I’ve had it a few times and it’s mildly interesting but not more than that, so imo not worth the incredible price that’s generally charged. More importantly, the animals that are used to process the coffee are tortured.
Remember, we’re putting our American perspective on a French term. So, think the philosophy behind the wine making. Think especially how the wines express themselves. Light, expressive, ready to drink, and a bit wild. One of the things we’ve gotten hung up on, and is noted above, is that there have always been technically natural wines made in CA. That if you go down the lists of “natural” practices and add more equivalent interventions they don’t list (often more impactful), there are many CA producers that are more “natural” than many producers who are dubbed natural. The wine has to seem natural in its expression. Just not being late picked, not being oaked up, down being weighted and dulled down by sulfur aren’t enough. There needs to be something else. That something else can be an expressiveness wine can have without sulfur weighing it down, dulling the aromatics and darkening the palate. Some less common grape varieties can make the difference, too.
Price is a factor. These wines tend to be quite affordable, so compare favorably against grocery store plonk the enthusiasts likely have as their benchmarks to contrast these wines to.
Site is a factor. Since these are usually cheap wines from off-the-beaten path, there may not be much site expression to be had in the first place. So, a little wildness adds interest to what may otherwise be a boring wine, the same way winemakers may use oak or blending grapes to add interest to a simple wine.
Sour beer and wild cider have their fans. Some of these wines align with those tastes. That’s a niche, a preference. Perhaps it’s the same way some “purple drank” consumers may otherwise not be wine drinkers if not for the wines of that style. One wine niche catering to people who’d otherwise be consuming cocktails, another to those who’d otherwise be drinking sour beer and wild cider. It makes our world bigger and more diverse.
My bolding.
If you take the whole post from Markus, he’s making that very same point when referring to craft wineries. A case of violent agreement ![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}
I know this is a bit of a drift, and may come off as harsh or ironic, but is meant as honest questions, are more then a few of us really willing to say "If there are people out there that like it, then it is good wine? How many people have to like it to make it good? If flaws aren’t flaws then how do we judge quality?
By this logic wines like Yellow Tail that don’t taste like anything or anywhere in particular are good because allot of it is sold, so people must like it. A table wine that is fizzy, cloudy and smells like a full diaper pail but some people like, is just as relevant as a sound wine, that tastes like what it is and where it’s from. ![[scratch.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/4/42a16863a8714da3c1604419e3eb9206bb87aa50.gif "scratch"){kind=small}
![[shock.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0b1dcf699ec319f43254f92e3f145786dcd93904.gif "shock"){kind=small}
Mike: Seems to me this discussion follows closely with ones about brett…esp from regions with a lot, or occasional brett. If you hate brett, or don’t like it enough to spend much money on, then it’s a fail. For a lot of folks, it’s a win. As for the ‘how many people’ question…imo the answer is 1 (me, or me as a consumer). If it continues to be made and I can afford it, I’m happy.
Imo, natural wine would be better off with a broader focus on sulfur. I’ve had bottles that I enjoyed on the second/third day (& not on the first), but I’m uncomfortable cellaring low/no sulfur wine for much time. And I think there’s a place for ‘moderate sulfur natural wine’.