The first time I tried Gamay, I was 22 and on the cusp of some awakening that would eventually lead me to a career in wine.

Up until that point, my experience drinking wine – and especially red wine – was probably a familiar one to many: full-bodied expressions of Cabernet Sauvignon opened regardless of the season.

Dinners paired, however inappropriately, with bottles from Rioja and Bordeaux and the occasional Chianti, inspired by a trip I took with my family to Tuscany when I was a kid.

So to experience a wine that was delicate and bursting with fruit, whose tannins and acidity worked in perfect harmony, was to open an entire world I didn’t know existed.

Wine professionals and enthusiasts alike often talk about their ‘gateway bottles’ – the first wine they ever enjoyed which revealed with stark clarity the possibilities of what wine could be.

A Beaujolais 2020 from Domaine de la Prébende was my first experience drinking a lighter-bodied, bright and juicy red, and it set me down a path of looking for wines that ignited this same sense of wonder.

The juicy holy grail

Nothing has delivered quite like the elusive, though increasingly popular, Pineau d’Aunis, whose exciting renaissance has not only deepened my enjoyment of wine, but kindled a sense of curiosity for its craft and history.

Pineau d’Aunis, a red grape thought to be native to the Loire, was once very popular across this region, especially during the 13th century when it was purportedly a favourite of England’s King Henry III, who had the wines shipped across the Channel.

But like most European grape varieties, Pineau d’Aunis was heavily impacted by the phylloxera outbreak that swept through France and across Europe in the late 19th century.

Finicky and susceptible to some diseases, it was gradually replaced by the more celebrated (and easier to handle) Cabernet Franc.

Though never entirely lost, Pineau d’Aunis plantings dwindled significantly over the 20th century, reaching their lowest point in the 1970s before the start of its recent revival.

Pineau ascendent

Leading this renaissance were producers like Jean-Pierre Robinot (Les Vignes de l'Ange Vin), Thierry Puzelat (Clos du Tue-Boeuf) and Eric Nicolas (Domaine de Bellivière).

Nicolas has worked with massal cuttings from 100-year-old vines to repopulate Pineau d’Aunis across his vineyard, which he uses in one of the domaine’s signature cuvées, Hommage à Louis Derré, a personal favourite of mine.

Louis Dressner, one of the largest importers of natural wine in the US, has been working with these producers, and more, over the last 20 years, playing an influential role in the rise of Pineau d’Aunis in bars and on shelves across the country. (That being said, it’s one of few grapes on their website which doesn’t have its own designated sorting feature).

Jules Dressner, of the company’s second generation, credits this with the increasing demand for Loire wines generally.

‘There used to be a time when this was an underdog grape in an underdog region,’ he says, ‘but the Loire has legitimised itself as a very important place in France, and so you have more people paying more attention to the region generally and therefore the indigenous varieties it gives us.’

The problem with Pineau d’Aunis, he argues, is that it’s often overlooked and even somewhat polarising. ‘It's much more than a light-drinking red grape.

It's rustic, but charming and complex. The kind of grape that you can turn your brain either on or off too, that can really make you think – if you let it,’ he says.

A moveable feast

And it’s true, each bottle of Pineau d’Aunis I’ve tried has given me something new to chew on: bright and juicy expressions of red fruits like strawberries, raspberries and sour cherries, grounded in an earthy savouriness with notes of white pepper and brine, that balance out its brighter elements.

As the seasons change, I find myself once again turning to wines that are not only fresh and light, but that mark some greater awakening which spring always seems to set in motion.

The following wines capture just that.

Six wines to make you fall in love with Pineau d'Aunis:

Domaine de Bellivière, Hommage à Louis Derré, Coteaux du Loir

One of the domaine’s most elusive cuvées made from its signature variety, this comes from 1ha of 90-110-year-old Pineau d'Aunis grown on heavy clay and silex soils over limestone, across eight tiny parcels.

Sour plum, blackberry and redcurrant aromas are intricately woven with undertones of warm spice like anise and peppercorn and an earthy quality of wet moss and leaves.

Perfectly structured, its tannins are notable yet refined, covering a silky palate that gives the wine fabulous length and elegance.

Clos du Tue-Boeuf, Pineau d’Aunis, Vin de France

One of the earliest bottles of Pineau d’Aunis I tried, this is the kind of wine that lingers well beyond the last sip. In the glass it’s ruby-hued and translucent when held up to the light.

Clos du Tue-Boeuf was established by Thierry Puzelat, who has worked with Pineau d’Aunis for a long time.

This cuvée, however, was first released in 2015 with fruit sourced in small quantities from his neighbouring grower, Valérie Forgues, who organically tends and hand harvests 100-year-old vines.

Aged for six months in old barrels and bottled with zero added sulphur, this wine has a lip-smacking acidity reminiscent of blood orange or cranberry juice, finishing with notes of Castelvetrano olive and a peppery bite like fresh rocket.

Jean-Pierre Robinot, Les Vignes de l'Ange Vin Le Regard, Vin de France

Quintessential Loire freshness and unmistakably Robinot, this wine is zippy, bright and expressive, with a slight effervescence.

Whole-bunch fermentation for three weeks and 15 months of maturation in barrel gives the wine delicate tannins without sacrificing its brightness or high acidity.

Vibrant notes of cranberry and pomegranate on the palate work in harmony with salty and faintly grassy aromas on the nose.

It has a metallic, iron-rich finish, a touch of white pepper and an uncompromising savouriness which begs to be thoughtfully considered.

Domaine de la Roche Bleue, La Belle d'Aunis, Vin de France

Described by winemaker Sébastien Cornille as ‘a thinker, a ponderer, a brilliant wine,’ this cuvée reaches depths Pineau d’Aunis is seldom thought to achieve.

The grapes are harvested from vines that are over 50 years old, planted in the clay-rich soils of Marçon and Chahaignes.

After two to three weeks of semi-carbonic maceration in foudres, depending on the vintage, the wine is gently pressed, then aged for 12 months in barrel.

The result preserves the delicacy and purity of the fruit – think blackcurrant liqueur and raspberry preserve – while layering in warm spice notes of coriander seed and star anise.

Surprisingly robust, it pairs beautifully with a range of dishes like lamb and spring vegetables.

La Grapperie, Adonis Pineau d'Aunis, Vin de France

La Grapperie makes wine from just two varieties: Chenin Blanc and Pineau d'Aunis.

This cuvée, made purely of the latter, uses grapes from a blend of young and old vines planted across the Coteaux du Loir – one of the region’s overlooked terroirs.

But winemaker Renaud Guettier is helping to breathe new life into the area and creating new excitement around the grape.

Here, he balances the natural character of Pineau d’Aunis with the limestone-rich slopes he farms.

The wine shows a harmony of soft earth and spicy minerality, with notes of red raspberry, wild strawberry and cracked pepper.

Striking a balance between brightness and structure, it’s a wine that speaks for itself, but is just as at home shared over a table of meats and cheeses.

Domaine le Briseau, Patapon, Vin de France

Produced within the Coteaux du Loir appellation, this cuvée has been intentionally declassified as Vin de France by the winemaker, self-prescribed as 'unconforming'.

The medium-bodied palate defies expectations for a grape often assumed to be simply light and juicy.

The nose is heavily perfumed with aromas of strawberry compote, violets and red cherries, as well as subtle hints of black pepper and damp earth.

On the palate, it’s juicy with mouthwatering acidity, soft tannins, and flavours of tart red fruit, a touch of chocolate and a mineral-driven finish.

The clown on the label serves as both a warning and an invitation: this is a mischievous wine, youthfully spirited.

But hiding behind that veil is something much bolder, more serious, and more thoughtful.

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Seeking reverse gear?

We’ve all seen the headlines blaming health fears and Gen Z sobriety for the fall in global alcohol consumption, not least including wine.

But the reality may be more nuanced. I don’t believe that wine itself is being rejected, but industrial wines.

In this article, I use ‘industrial’ to describe wines that rely heavily on technological and chemical interventions, much like ultra-processed foods.

Some of the high-volume, globally distributed, familiar brands typically found on the lower supermarket shelves have come to define this industrial wine style.

While all wine is, by definition, processed from the moment the grapes begin fermenting, there’s a meaningful distinction between wines shaped by careful, moderate intervention and those engineered for volume, conformity and shelf-life.

I’m firmly of the view that the latter should be clearly distinguished from low-intervention wines (organic, biodynamic, natural, Haute Valeur Environnementale, and so on) and from traditional appellation wines across both the Old and New Worlds.

Based on recent data from the OIV (International Organisation of Vine and Wine), the decline in consumption disproportionately affects industrial wines.

Thirty years ago, when I was editing a wine magazine in Paris, I watched these early ‘gateway’ wines arrive.

Driven by the expansion of North American markets and the rise of New World producers, they were initially welcomed, even in France, as a means of attracting new drinkers.

Today, however, the same types of wine risk turning away new consumers.

If someone’s first encounter with wine is a high-yield, high-alcohol, heavily adjusted style, you could hardly blame them if it were their last.

Might this be determining whether younger drinkers engage with wine long-term?

Global phenomenon

These industrial wines now dominate the global market.

This is easily observable; however, proving it with precision is difficult as the wine trade doesn’t measure what would make it trackable.

There’s no system yet to categorise wine by its degree of processing: only by price (entry-level/premium/fine wine), origin and format (bulk vs bottled).

I would argue that a defined wine category such as ‘ultra-processed’ could be helpful.

It’s a term modelled, in part, on the four-group Nova classification system, developed by a public health unit at the University of São Paulo in Brazil, in which ‘Group 4’ foods are defined by the cumulative use of industrial techniques and inputs to standardise flavour, texture and shelf stability at scale.

The analogy in wine isn’t exact, but it is instructive. We label a bottle as ‘organic’, but not as ‘ultra-processed’.

Certified organic vineyards represent a little above 6% of global plantings, according to OIV’s 2021 The World Organic Vineyard report (across 63 countries, as measured in 2019), placing this category firmly in the minority, while traditional appellation wines make up, at most, a further 20%-25%.

High volume, low price dominance

For a revealing glimpse at the other end, Richard Hemming MW has stated that ‘96% of the wine sold in the UK retails for less than £9 per bottle’ (jancisrobinson.com, March 2018), citing a WSET research paper by Tim Jackson MW (recent comparables are hard to come by, but such price point statistics tend to be fairly static in UK retail, especially in the context of the declining market in general in the period since).

In addition, a 2025 Vinetur report found that eight major wine groups account for 10%-12% of the global market.

E&J Gallo’s high-volume brands alone are estimated to produce around 3% (the Modesto, California-based company does also have premium wines in its portfolio).

There are many more than those eight, not to mention the layer of private-label, bulk and contract-produced wines.

The industry may not measure industrial wine directly, but by any reasonable reading of the data, it dominates the global market, accounting for some 70%-80%.

Health considerations

Can it be said that industrial wines are less healthful? Yes.

Peer-reviewed evidence suggests that some techniques commonly used in winemaking, such as fining, maceration with the skins, chaptalisation and acidification (which can all be termed ‘processing’) have been shown to alter mineral and micronutrient content, in some cases ‘significantly’ (source: Shimizu et al, 2020, ‘Variation in the mineral composition of wine produced using different winemaking techniques’).

And a 2025 report by Pesticide Action Network Europe (PAN) found widespread contamination of European wines with trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a toxic ‘forever chemical’ byproduct of PFAS pesticides.

The report notes that mass-produced wines are often loaded with up to eight different synthetic pesticide residues.

As wine production becomes more industrial, there is a greater reliance on vineyard chemicals – including pesticides and other treatments (to control mildew and vine diseases, for example), which can leave residues – and cellar additives, including colour adjustment, flavour modification, stabilisation, added sugars and higher sulphur-dioxide levels.

Dr Laura Catena (pictured, above) is a Harvard- and Stanford-trained biologist and physician, the managing director of Argentina’s Bodega Catena Zapata and founder of the Catena Institute of Wine.

She notes that large-scale production makes it difficult to tailor the inputs that contribute to a wine’s composition and health profile.

So, if more intervention introduces more inputs, the inverse also holds: wines made with fewer inputs will tend to offer a cleaner, more considered choice.

This isn’t medical advice, but it is an evidence-informed perspective drawn from decades in wine alongside contemporary research.

Pros and cons

Is the global decline in wine sales a marker of healthier living?

Today, daily contradictions assail us. Wine is praised for its potential benefits one moment and condemned the next.

Having scoured dozens of studies, I can say the common denominator is that most ignore context, from the French Paradox theory that suggests certain populations in France have historically exhibited low rates of heart disease despite their regular consumption of wine and cheese, to the world’s seven so-called Blue Zones – regions of apparent exceptional human longevity, where wine is consumed in moderation.

There is criticism of Blue Zones research that has centred largely on the reliability of age records and demographic data, rather than on the lifestyle patterns themselves.

This distinction is important: while the numbers may be debated, the observed behaviours such as diet, social connection and daily activity all continue to shape discussions around longevity.

Most of the literature focuses on ethanol as the sole driver of risk.

Yes, alcohol carries risk. Wine quality and context don’t erase this, but I firmly contend that they mitigate it.

Wine quality shapes how people drink; it contextualises it. And, as 16th-century physician, alchemist and theologian Paracelsus notably observed (originally in Latin), ‘the dose makes the poison’.

Catena concurs: ‘As a physician, I do believe that wine in moderation can be part of a healthy diet and lifestyle, as demonstrated by hundreds of studies showing that people who drink wine in moderation have lower mortality and fewer heart attacks, and those who follow a Mediterranean diet, which often includes light-to-moderate wine, have lower rates of heart disease and cancer.

Generation Z and a return to intentional drinking?

The relationship that Generation Z (generally seen as those born 1997-2012) has with wine is complex, shaped by social habits, economics and evolving tastes and health concerns.

Industry analysis from IWSR shows that they favour wines ‘aligned with values such as sustainability and authenticity’.

Though the traditional wine terminology and packaging formats often feel outdated to them, moderation trends are also evident.

I have a front-row seat to this shift.

My surfing, weight-training Gen Z sons spend their holidays taking cooking classes with girlfriends in Greece or attending wine tastings on Lake Garda.

I’m not sure they would have survived my gloriously wine-soaked, debauched youth in 1980s Paris.

Still, is it his generation’s more mindful, lifestyle-influenced drinking choices that are to blame for waning global wine sales? Or is it the much-changed wines?

So how did we get here?

Since Roman vintners burned sulphur candles in their barrels and amphorae to keep them sanitised, wine has never been untouched by human hands; it has always existed in a subtle partnership between nature and human intervention.

But the French wine of the early 1800s was a different animal compared to what it is today.

Before phylloxera (the vine root louse that arose in the late 19th century) and pre-chemical, there was no glyphosate – that was invented as a weedkiller in 1970 by Monsanto.

Chaptalisation (the addition of sugar to increase potential alcohol), other additives and sulphur were known and used, but not heavily.

But then we hit the phylloxera era, with its initial peak in the 1860s-1880s – European vineyards were devastated.

As recovery from the crisis began, choices made during replanting using the new, resistant American rootstocks led to high yields, as industrial-scale irrigation and fertiliser use produced vast quantities of cheap wine.

By the early 1900s, the wine industry was in a similar position to what it is today.

How did it respond? With irrigation bans and the introduction of appellation laws, which started in France with laws such as the 1905 regulations on fraud, falsification and geographical origin, and the subsequent 1919 extension bringing additional protections for producers within a given appellation.

The real explosion in chemical inputs occurred after World War II, when agriculture and food production became industrialised through the dismantling by the Allied powers of the vast German chemical conglomerate IG Farben.

This post-war expansion of industrial agricultural inputs fed directly into the wider mid-20th century transformation known as the Green Revolution, which, from the 1940s through the 1970s, combined high-yield crop varieties, synthetic fertilisers, chemical pesticides, irrigation and mechanisation to dramatically increase global food production.

Wine didn’t escape this – these events pushed it into the centre of an incoming imperfect storm and into a new alchemy.

'Parkerisation'

The rapid expansion of supermarket empires, from the 1930s in the US and 1950s in the UK, demanded vintage reliability, consistent flavour profiles, huge volumes and low price points.

The traditional wines from picturesque villages with their mosaics of small plots and local generational knowledge didn’t fit this new landscape.

This new demand favoured New World producers, which weren’t subject to the same wine-production rules and limitations, and in this environment, technology took hold, allowing producers to ‘engineer’ consistent flavour profiles, even from lower-quality grapes.

Irrigation allowed the expansion of vineyards into marginal areas (such as California’s Central Valley) by unlocking deserts and plains, coaxing vines to yield far more fruit than the old dry-farmed hillsides ever could.

Meanwhile, the ‘Parkerisation effect’ arrived.

Wine critics such as Robert M Parker Jr (most prominent in the late 1980s-2000s) elevated lush, fruit-forward, heavily oaked, high-alcohol, ripe Napa Valley styles.

We also saw the large corporations consolidate control and begin to market wine like any other fast-moving consumer product, offering the same taste year after year.

Consistency and consolidation have reshaped the industry into what it is today.

In contrast, the smaller, terroir-driven wines have continued to be marginalised by the convenient and stereotypical narrative that they are unaffordable, unapproachable or complicated.

Connecting the dots: reclaiming wine and wellness

The proliferation of industrial wines and their dependence on irrigation, the declining consumption of the mass-market sector, and Gen Z turning away from wine – these are all part of the same conversation.

Wines that once enticed new consumers with cheap abundance are now driving them away. Wine was never meant to be a generic beverage – its value has always come from ‘place’.

Wine has morphed from a locally produced agricultural product to a mass-consumer product.

This has contributed to the weakening of its cultural meaning and, as in many other sectors, has instigated a reaction against industrialisation.

The historical arc I’ve presented here matters because the pivot being made by the Gen Z demographic toward moderation, sustainability and authenticity raises a profound question: was the mid-20th-century industrial phase a necessary, perhaps inevitable, but temporary deviation in wine’s history?

Are market forces now encouraging a return to lower-input, place-driven practices? Wouldn’t it be nice if this new generation inadvertently brought us full circle? I love this line of thought.

With all the bad news in the wine world at the moment, perhaps we’re creating a happy ending.

Wine, like food, has been swept up in the tide of industrialisation, where tradition is overshadowed by scale and cost, and distanced from its rituals, its terroir and its role in human wellbeing.

Wines made with regard for nature, not against it, will always have a place at my table.

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As I write this, Beaujolais is in a flurry. Its first wines of 2025 – the fragrantly juicy Beaujolais Nouveau – are being sent out across the globe ready for the impending (and inevitably raucous) festivities on the third Thursday of November.

And while the folk from Beaujolais are the undeniable overlords of the nouveau party, they aren’t the only players out there dabbling in this vinous fountain of youth.

When you pull back the curtain, you realise there are people all over Europe, and even in the UK, that make their own versions of these new harvest wines.

A long history

Beaujolais Nouveau is merely the best known (modern) example of a much wider tradition of drinking brand new wines soon after harvest.

Nouveau wine, in its simplest terms, is a young wine that is bottled and released almost immediately after harvest. At times they are little more than fermenting must – such as Federweisser in Germany (known as Sturm in Austria).

In Beaujolais it is made with Gamay, which is low in tannins, using carbonic maceration – where the grape begins to ferment within the berry itself, promoting fragrant, perfumed fruit aromas. It is meant to be light in alcohol, juicy and easy going.

As Beaujolais producer Christophe Pacalet says, nouveau is ultimately an unpretentious wine that you can drink while you play pétanque.

Around France

As an inhabitant of southern France, I was intrigued to see whether this area, more famed for its heady reds, was getting on board with the style.

Jean-Philippe Padié of Domaine Padié in Roussillon has been making a nouveau wine since 2019. It was a bit of an accident; he had a plot of Syrah that went through fermentation quickly and cleanly, offering him a delicious rendition of a nouveau style.

Padié now works predominantly with the indigenous variety Lledoner Pelut, which he says gives an even lighter, crunchier wine, with a hint of something maritime from the vineyard’s coastal location.

Similarly, in the cooler northern reaches of the Loire, Joseph Mosse of Domaine Mosse makes a fuschia-coloured wine called Bang Nouveau from a blend of the pink-skinned Grolleau Gris and Gamay.

And while there is an argument that nouveau wines are best made with lighter-skinned varieties, Romain Le Bars in the Rhône Valley proves that this isn’t always the case. His dangerously drinkable Nouveau Nez cuvée is made from Cinsault, Grenache and Carignan.

Traditions old and new

Nouveau wines are popping up across France. However, there are other countries that have a deep-rooted history with this style of wine – Spain, for example.

Specifically in Rioja, where the wines are called cosecheros. Last year saw the launch of the first cosecheros tasting in London, hosted by Ben Llewelyn of UK importer Carte Blanche and writer Tim Atkin MW.

Here producers work with Tempranillo, foot crushing the grapes and using carbonic maceration. Like in Beaujolais, it is a style that is embedded in the culture, despite also falling prey to the tools of mass production such as thermovinification and commercial yeasts.

And while the Spanish perhaps don’t partake in the annual country-wide festivities, the Italians certainly do. Also released in early November, Italy’s answer is vino novello, also made with carbonic maceration and with a host of different grape varieties depending on the region.

Perhaps the most iconic in this mix is the Bardolino Novello from Veneto, which brings much joyous celebration to the shores of Lake Garda.

Sandridge Barton in Devon, UK, has been making its own nouveau wine since 1995. Spurred on by a disruption in Beaujolais supply during the outbreak of mad cow disease, they decided to try their hand at making one themselves.

Intriguingly, their nouveau was – and still is – a white made from the grape Madeleine Angevine (affectionately known as Mad Ange), chosen because it’s their earliest-ripening variety, going from vine to glass in just six weeks. This year spells their first release of a red nouveau made with Pinot Noir and carbonic maceration.

Balfour Winery has also adopted this new wave British tradition with its Essex-grown Pinot Noir Nouveau. Following the stellar conditions of the 2025 vintage, the estate’s head of wine Fergus Elias was keen to show that ‘English Pinot Noir has the ripeness, the fruit and the finesse to stand on its own’.

This is only the second vintage of nouveau, but with such excellent fruit to hand, they’ve made a wine that is ‘playful and purposeful’.

Down with the kill-joys

There are pessimists who want to put down nouveau wines simply as a marketing stunt or something to bolster cash flow. If that is indeed the case, then good on them. Hopefully everyone getting involved is making some much needed cash and shining a light on their region.

But I think it is so much more than that. As Llewelyn says, nouveau wines have historical relevance and value. In Rioja, they show the diversity of their grapes and region, they regulate supply – especially important in a place like Rioja where ageing requirements can extend up to five years – and they give affordable access to quality wines.

Isabel Fernández of Rioja’s Bodega Abeica says that these wines have been part of Rioja’s culture ‘since time immemorial’. Traditionally, they were made to be consumed within 18 months of harvest.

Her family has been making a cosechero wine for four generations, and she believes they can have good longevity and weight, so she uses a parcel of 100-year-old Tempranillo for her cuvée.

Echoing the sentiments of others I spoke to, she says that the crux of making a quality nouveau wine comes down to the quality of the fruit and the stems, especially when working with carbonic maceration and with low intervention cellar methods.

The biggest challenge facing nouveau producers? Poor quality fruit. Because in the end, the joy of nouveau – wherever it’s made – lies in its immediacy. It is a snapshot of a harvest that ultimately takes no prisoners.

Playful frivolity

From conversations with winemakers, it’s clear that these wines are moving into a realm of quality and artisanship. Climate change has brought riper grapes and earlier harvests, and as a result we’re seeing more of these wines made without manipulation – a gradual phasing out of what Jon Bonné, in The New French Wine, calls ‘industrial pop wine’.

For years, the market had grown used to nouveau wines tasting of candied banana and bubblegum – flavours I once assumed were a natural byproduct of carbonic maceration, but which in fact come from a specific yeast strain, 71B, which is no longer used to the same extent as it was in the 1980s and 1990s.

While I am a lover of Beaujolais Nouveau – especially in its newer, more natural iteration – there is even more scope for playful frivolity and experimentation in other regions and countries.

In an industry that can err on the side of stuffy and get bogged down in rules and labels, nouveau is a perfectly imperfect antidote for us to share abundantly and joyously.

Like my friends Greg Lane and Sarah Adamson of Scout Wines in New Zealand said of their Pinot x Pinot (a blend of Noir and Gris) take on a nouveau, they made it for no other reason than enjoyment, ‘to keep the house happy’.

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• The marvellous world of orange wines: Everything you wanted to know explained by an expert

Hanging out at a neighbourhood wine shop in Amsterdam last weekend, I overheard this interaction…

Customer: ‘Hi, I’m buying a bottle as a birthday present for a friend.’

Assistant: ‘Okay, what style are you looking for? Red? White?’

Customer: ‘I was thinking maybe something orange. I know she likes natural wine. She’s into everything organic – that sort of thing.’

The young customer happily admitted that he knew nothing about wine.

But he was more than familiar with the term ‘orange’, and he – or his friend – automatically conflated it with all things natural and organic.

It was a great demonstration of how orange wine has permeated popular culture, in a similar fashion to kombucha, flat whites and sour beers – all specialities that have become familiar, if not necessarily well understood.

Notes and scores for 15 orange wine recommendations listed below

Orange wines are now sold by supermarkets and major wine retailers. Wine-savvy restaurants list them in their own separate category.

They have a significant niche following and, particularly for a younger generation of drinkers, orange is now simply part of the canon.

Nonetheless, orange wine’s rise from obscurity hasn’t been straightforward.

Two key issues, both aptly distilled into that customer exchange, still prove challenging.

One is incessant bickering about the name. The other is that confusion between orange and natural. Are they joined at the hip? Are they the same thing?

Troublesome terminology

Let’s tackle the nomenclature first. Why can’t the wine world agree on a single term?

Pedants insist that we should call them ‘skin contact wines’; presumably that includes reds as well.

Some assert that ‘orange wine’ makes no sense because the wines aren’t always orange in colour; I wonder if they’ve ever set eyes on a white wine that was high-gloss white.

The history buffs earnestly maintain that we must call these wines ‘amber’, out of respect for the popular Georgian name and the technique’s ancient roots in the Caucasus.

I have no particular axe to grind, but ‘orange wine’ has undoubtedly won the popularity contest. And justly so – it’s a short, memorable phrase that slots well into the paradigm of white, red and rosé.

The Oxford Companion to Wine adopts it, as do countless restaurants and winemakers worldwide. Why confuse people with unnecessary jargon?

A related issue is the winemakers who, Groucho Marx-like, don’t want to be part of any club that celebrates them.

In far northeast Italy, Paolo Vodopivec, one of Friuli’s iconic orange wine pioneers, got quite sniffy with me a few years back when we discussed terminology.

He felt that the orange tag aligned him with growers making rustic or faulty natural wines, when his own style is elegant and precise. He added: ‘For me, skin contact is not the end result. It’s just an instrument to allow me to express the grape.’

Not necessarily natural

That brings us to point two. Why is ‘orange’ so inextricably linked with ‘natural’?

Having hitched a ride along with natural wine to global hipsterdom, orange wine is the movement’s poster child.

As a category, it represents the biggest point of difference from the mainstream wine world, where such deeply hued and textured white wines barely exist. But just because it’s orange doesn’t mean it has to be natural.

The term ‘orange wine’ describes a technique, not a style or a creed. That technique – skin-fermenting white grapes (see box, below) – can be deployed to create a multitude of different profiles, from cidery swamp juice to elegant fine wine.

In this respect it’s no different to skin-fermenting red grapes, a technique that’s also used for both mass-produced supermarket lines and quirky, low-intervention styles. While orange wine is a technique, natural wine represents an overarching philosophy of minimal intervention.

Connecting dots

Again there are links. For the winemaker who wants to work without packaged yeasts, sulphites or controlled temperatures, skins are damn useful.

They contain tannins, and thus phenols, that work as antioxidants, and they harbour yeasts native to the environment of the vineyard they grew in. Spontaneous fermentation is simply quicker and more reliable with skin contact.

Tom Lubbe, winemaker-owner of Matassa in Roussillon, explains that he started skin-fermenting his Muscat in 2008 for just these reasons.

Some winemakers feel that white varieties show better origin and varietal characters if the entire grape, including skins, is used.

Among them is Gernot Heinrich of Weingut Heinrich (pictured, above), who uses skin fermentation to allow his white grapes to better express the limestone and chalk soils of the Leithaberg hills in Burgenland, Austria.

Should that surprise you, consider this: if the region’s Blaufränkisch planted on the same soils can express itself better as a red wine (skin-fermented) than as a rosé, why should it be different for the whites?

Heinrich’s first orange vintage was 2011, just over a decade after a group of iconoclastic growers on the Italy-Slovenia border reignited interest in the technique.

Joško Gravner, the late Stanko Radikon, Dario Prinčič and many of their neighbours in Friuli’s Collio region are now world famous.

What is orange wine?

Orange wine is made from white grapes that were fermented with their skins – in essence, it’s a white wine made like a red.

The length of skin contact isn’t the decisive factor, but rather the inclusion of the skins during some or all of the fermentation process, allowing a deeper colour and more intense flavours and aromas to be extracted from the skins during fermentation.

Note that macération pelliculaire, otherwise known as pre-fermentation cold soak, is a different technique that doesn’t generally result in the same flavour, aroma or colour profile.

Meditation wines

A lot has changed in the last two decades.

Gravner was originally inspired by the 8,000-year-old Georgian tradition of fermenting skins, stems, seeds and juice together in qvevris (huge clay pots that are buried underground). His wines, and those of his acolytes, pay homage to this style.

With many weeks or months of skin contact, they have a deep amber/gold colour and serious structure. Flavours tend towards the more savoury, herbal or autumnal. Italians might speak of ‘meditation wines’.

This more substantial style of orange defined the category during the first decade of the 21st century.

Many of the wines from Goriška Brda, the part of Collio on the Slovenian side of the border, occupied a similar stylistic realm. But as the fashion for skin-fermenting white grapes has spread across Europe and beyond, the stylistic range has widened.

Heinrich and his Burgenland colleagues have popularised a more fruit-focused style. Look to Claus Preisinger (pictured, above) or Gerhard Pittnauer for more examples.

Typically based around blends that include aromatic varieties such as Muscat, these wines seduce you with soft tannins and juicy acidity. Skin time is typically short, perhaps a week or two.

This precisely executed, fruity style has spread across central Europe to countries such as Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Zsolt Sütő of Strekov 1075 and Milan Nestarec are two names to know.

Even in the orange heartland of Slovenia, there has been a move away from heavier, more structured wines, as noted by Valentin Bufolin, one of the country’s top sommeliers, now working in wine distribution.

He feels that Slovenian winemakers have upped their game, too: ‘We’ve seen a shift from this archaic type of production to a more modern, cleaner style.’

Serving and enjoying orange wines

For all but the lightest orange wines, serve slightly warmer than your average white. Start between 12°C and 14°C but let your personal taste be the ultimate guide.

Warmer temperatures and a larger glass are recommended for fuller-bodied, tannic styles, such as Georgian ambers or examples from Friuli or western Slovenia. As with heavier red wines, they often benefit from aeration or decanting.

The combination of freshness from white grapes and the structure from the skins makes orange wines extremely versatile on the dinner table. Aromatic oranges are a match made in heaven for intensely flavoured, spicy dishes from Thai or Szechuan cuisines.

Rich or fatty foods such as a meaty lasagne or spare ribs also pair well with tangy, acidic orange wines, the tannins helping to cleanse the palate between each mouthful. And the herbal, earthy or spicy flavours found in many oranges combine perfectly with umami-rich ingredients, such as soy or field mushrooms.

Spectrum of styles

In countries with a more embedded tradition – think Georgia, Slovenia, Italy – the stylistic range is now vast, from rustic and wild to classical and polished.

Ancestral-method styles (bottling wine before it fully completes its fermentation) have emerged from the woodwork in many Italian regions – look to Emilia Romagna or Veneto for a plethora of lightly macerated bubbles.

Winemakers in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the US eagerly took to skin-fermenting their whites, harnessing the textural advantage to offset riper fruit profiles.

Archaic macerated winemaking methods in Armenia, Portugal, Chile and Bolivia have also stuck their heads above the parapet, realising they can now hold them up proudly.

Added to this are ever more major mainstream wineries that have decided to dip their toes into the category, such as Gérard Bertrand in the south of France and Cramele Recaș in Romania.

Some stick to the minimal intervention ethic, others don’t. This can be irksome for the pioneers, especially when these wines appear at budget prices on supermarket shelves.

But imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and if a cheap, mass-market orange wine encourages even the tiniest proportion of drinkers to explore the category, then it’s surely a positive.

A new nebula

Wherever your preferences lie, the diversity on planet orange is now as broad as that in its neighbouring galaxies of white, red and rosé.

But orange has the advantage when it comes to the eternal ‘white or red’ dilemma, as Doug Wregg, marketing director and buyer at UK importer Les Caves de Pyrene, explains: ‘I’m either in a mood where I want tension and acidity, or I want texture and layers. Orange wine is a great intermediate. It gives me everything I want from a red wine, when I don’t actually want to drink a red wine.’

The wines I’ve recommended here are designed to showcase as much of that diversity as possible.

You don’t need to be a card-carrying natural wine fan to enjoy all of them. The modern-day spectrum of orange wine has something for everyone, whatever you decide to call it.

Planet orange: Woolf ’s pick of 15 wines to try, across all styles

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In April last year I went to the annual show of the VinNatur association at Gambellara in northern Italy to test a quote from a biodynamic producer in Puglia that ‘natural wines don’t stink’ and I came away substantially persuaded by the affirmation.

Had I been over-enthusiastic, perhaps uncritical? I went back this year to double check.

Scroll down for Richard’s pick of more low intervention wines

To set my parameters, I attended a workshop on identifying wine faults, organised by VinNatur. There was a mixed audience, which included producers and other wine professionals, as well as visitors to the show.

The tests we did together confirmed that I have an average threshold of perception for volatile acidity and brettanomyces, and a comparatively high threshold of tolerance for both these faults.

On the other hand, I realised that I have a heightened sensitivity and zero tolerance towards goût de souris – ‘mousiness’.

After the refresher on wine faults, I then went to taste and to talk to producers.

Best of the best

Over two days, I tasted just under 150 wines, with some truly outstanding examples: VinNatur brings together many of Italy’s top natural winemakers.

There are historic figures such as Filippo Filippi from Soave, who was making wines naturally long before anyone thought to call them ‘natural’, and the president of VinNatur, Angiolino Maule, one of the founding fathers of the natural wine movement in Veneto.

Marinella Camerani’s Corte Sant’Alda estate in the Val di Mezzana was one of the first (possibly the very first) to adopt biodynamic viticulture in the Veneto, while Camillo Donati was one of the first producers in Emilia to demonstrate that Lambrusco could be both natural and serious.

In Alto Adige, PIWI pioneer Thomas Niedermayr is recognised as one of the country’s leading experts on disease-resistant grape varieties, and in Piedmont, the association counts among its members Fratelli Barale, one of Barolo’s longest established and most respected traditional producers.

And iconic Marsala producer Marco de Bartoli was at the show with the first vintages from its new estate on Mount Etna.

Producers of this calibre make wines which stand up in any context – one approaches them with high expectations, and it is rare for them not to be met. However, VinNatur is not only about the big names of the natural wine world.

One of the association’s most important roles is to offer a platform to micro-producers who would have difficulty gaining visibility in other contexts.

There were just over 200 exhibitors at this year’s show, and I counted 90 who work with less than 6ha of vines. Among these are guardians of heritage such as Etnella, which nurtures 100-year-old vines on Etna, and Pasquale Bonamici from Mamoaida, who is saving rare native Sardinian varieties from extinction.

Others have achieved cult status for highly sought after productions, like the 16,000 bottles of Alto Adige whites made by Rock in the Val d’Isarco.

Small demands more

Small can be beautiful, but it is also more demanding. If there were technical inconsistencies, it was mainly among the small artisan producers that they tended to emerge.

The vast majority of the wines I tasted in this category were faultless, some were very exciting, but I also found a certain number which, to a greater of lesser degree, I considered to be spoiled.

Some had what I thought was excessive volatile acidity, and others had a bit more brettanomyces than I could cope with.

Cases of mousiness were rarer, but for me they were the most insidious. There were bottles that I thought were imperfect but had redeeming qualities, and a handful where I found glaring faults which masked everything else.

There were also a number of ‘difficult’ wines, which were complex and multi-layered but had unfamiliar flavours and aromas within the folds that either intrigue or alienate (for the most part, I found them intriguing).

Take up the challenge

I discussed these impressions with Maule.

He is not an apologist, and when I put it to him that on the evidence of my tastings, natural wines need not stink – but some do – his response was that the association recognises that there are areas for improvement, and it works with producers to reduce the incidence of the most common problems.

This is achieved on one hand by offering technical support to its members, and on the other by funding programmes of research into specific areas related to natural winemaking.

As Maule says: ‘It is ten times more difficult to make natural wines’.

Working with spontaneous fermentation, with minimal manipulation and without additives (beyond perhaps limited doses of sulphites) exposes wines to more risks than those made following conventional oenological protocols, but we have moved on from the days when faulty wines could be justified as ‘natural’.

We should not expect stinky wines from natural winemakers today, but ones which are transparent expressions of their terroir, with the kind of vitality that inspires producers to take up the challenge of making them in the first place.

Italy’s natural wines: 12 more to try

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Fewer than 10 domaines in the world produce wines made entirely from the white grape variety Gringet from their own vineyards.

Six are located in Ayse, the grape’s Haute-Savoie homeland.

Despite its scarcity, if you mention Gringet to somebody with deep knowledge of French wine, you will be met with a knowing smile and the name of one man: Dominique Belluard.

Belluard’s conviction

Belluard’s Gringet wines took the international wine world by storm in the 2000s and the 2010s.

Rajat Parr, ex-sommelier and now winemaker and farmer at Phelan Farm in Cambria, California, remembers: ‘The first time I drank one of Dominique’s wines in 2012 in Paris, I was deeply moved; so much so, that I began to seek out his wines all the time. I didn’t yet know how rare Gringet was, I was just captivated by the true magic and deliciousness of the wines.’

After visiting Belluard at his domaine in 2018, Rajat decided to plant one hectare of Gringet at his own domaine on the other side of the world.

When they finished planting, he opened Belluard’s Les Alpes 2010 to drink with his team, pouring some of the wine onto the soil of the vineyard itself: ‘For so many years I’ve been drinking Gringet. It’s an amazing feeling to finally put these vines in the ground.’

A unique variety

First mentioned in writing in 1766, Gringet is however likely to be much older. It was once cultivated widely across Haute-Savoie.

Due to phylloxera, migration of people away from the countryside to cities, and land demand for housing, Ayse’s overall vineyard area dwindled from about 600ha in the second half of the 19th century to just 30ha today, and around 25 of those are planted with Gringet.

Many believed Gringet to be either related to or a clone of the also-ancient Savagnin variety from Savoie’s neighbour, Jura.

Dominique Belluard, however, remained steadfastly convinced that Gringet was unique.

DNA testing for grape varieties changed everything.

Dr José Vouillamoz, a grape geneticist, travelled to Ayse to meet Belluard in 2007 to take cuttings.

Testing proved that Gringet was indeed a distinct variety with no relation to Savagnin.

Additionally, as Vouillamoz has argued very recently on the back of his research, Gringet is likely the parent of two other Savoyard varieties, one of which being Molette, the other being the obscure Roussette basse de Seyssel; meaning it is certainly very old.

This means that Gringet was historically prized, as it was purposefully re-propagated for centuries.

Vouillamoz rang Belluard to inform him. Belluard was a man who José describes as having been modest and reserved, and he received the news in the same manner.

It was only two years later, at the Les Vins des Alpes symposium in Chambéry, that Vouillamoz and indeed the audience could see how much it meant to Belluard.

He spoke with tears in his eyes about how this discovery had changed his life, giving meaning to all the years he had spent working to save the variety.

Epigenetics

A historical gem, Gringet simultaneously gives us hope for the future.

‘One of the solutions to mitigate effects of climate change is to revive old, often forgotten indigenous varieties in their birthplace,’ says Vouillamoz, ‘for the sake that they have survived several past climate changes since the Middle Ages and even earlier.’

Vouillamoz explains that as Gringet vines have been propagated for centuries in the same terroir, they benefit from ‘epigenetics’ (genetic modifications that impact gene activity without changing the DNA sequence, in other words how the environment can cause changes that affect the way in which genes work).

‘This recent field of science is still largely unknown in grapes,’ says Vouillamoz, ‘but my hypothesis is that old vines and indigenous varieties in their birthplace have kept the “memories” of past vintages, enabling them to adapt their physiological reactions to meteorological contingencies.

‘In short, an indigenous vine that has already undergone several severe drought vintages will be better equipped to resist the next one than a recently introduced foreign variety.’

Although there is no concrete evidence yet, it’s a topic that is keenly being explored.

A fitting tribute

Tragically, Belluard lost his life to suicide in 2021. He is immensely missed by those who knew him and by the wine world at large.

Jura winemaker, Jean-François Ganevat, went to Savoie to ensure the 2020 wines in the cellar made it to bottle safely.

From the 2021 Gringet harvest, several French winemakers bought the grapes and made Gringet cuvées: Anne and Jean-François Ganevat, Nicolas Jacob and Zeroine in the Jura; Jean-Marie Berrux, Théo Dancer and Maison Glandien in Burgundy; Jean-Claude Lapalu in Beaujolais; and Franck Balthazar in Cornas.

They are all beautiful expressions and homages to Belluard’s work.

When it came to selling the domaine, Valérie Belluard, Dominique’s wife, decided that young winemaker Vincent Ruiz, with his partners Miguel Sarzier, Raphaël Bennour and Cornas vigneron Franck Balthazar, would be the ones to continue Dominique’s legacy.

They are doing exactly that, under the newly named Domaine du Gringet. Farming regeneratively, this talented, dedicated quartet perpetuates Belluard’s vision, shining a light on Gringet, the Ayse terroir, and the ethereal white wines the combination creates.

Ruiz says: ‘Our Gringet vines are heritage vines; we feel so fortunate to tend to them.’

They note how well-suited Gringet is to Ayse, even when faced with the challenges global warming brings. It copes well with heat stress, and is not too susceptible to powdery mildew – a rarity.

In the past, it sometimes struggled to ripen, but with a warming climate, as Belluard proved and Domaine du Gringet continues to prove, it now consistently produces world-class still wines.

Equally, it continues to produce world-class sparkling wines. If you find yourself in Haute-Savoie, buying the exquisite sparkling wines made by Le Coteau du Môle – which sells its entire production directly from its cellar – is a must.

Ensuring a future for Gringet

The future is bright for Gringet. It is also being embraced further afield. Jean-Yves Péron has planted it in Savoie, and makes a striking macerated example, and Domaine Curtet has also planted it for use in blends.

In the Jura, Domaine de la Borde will soon release the inaugural 2024 vintage of a blend of Gringet and Savagnin from a vineyard planted in 2020.

In Oregon, Gringet forms a small part of HIYU Wine Farm’s Pandion cuvée, and LoFi Wines in California’s Santa Barbara also planted a small plot in 2024 from Phelan Farm cuttings.

Savoie in a bottle

When I finally made it to Ayse myself, I stood among the native Savoyard vegetation and wildflowers rooted next to centenarian Gringet bush vines, looking out at snow-capped mountains.

The herbal mountain scents in the air were exactly the same as those I have found, and continue to find, in Gringet wines.

I couldn’t help but think that these wines are a microcosm for the very notion of terroir. This ancient variety is the vehicle able to transport Haute-Savoie to the bottle.

How lucky we are to experience it.

Five Gringets I can’t stop thinking about

Dominique Belluard, Monsieur Gringet, Savoie, France 2020

A moving bottle that gives you an insight into Dominique’s life work. One of his last wines (finished by Jean-François Ganevat), this is a blend of individual hillside parcels La Paille (white marl), Chez Edouard (limestone scree) and Le Feu (red marl with iron). It was matured for 18 months in concrete eggs, and the label was chosen by Valérie Belluard and designed by artist Michel Tolmer. The wine showcases perfectly the complex saline and wild herb characteristics of Gringet across multiple terroirs.

Domaine du Gringet, La Bergerie, Savoie, France 2022

This cuvée exemplifies the textural potential of Gringet: fresh and delicious, while having real structure and density simultaneously. A highly versatile wine.

Domaine du Gringet, La Paille, Savoie, France 2022

From bush vines planted in 1929 and 1930. A wine that manages to combine concentration with finesse – its salty, dried chamomile and snow-like minerality lingers forever on the palate. There are so many layers to unfurl. A true showstopper that will open anybody’s eyes to the oxymoron that is the joyful seriousness of Gringet.

Domaine Béléma, Imago, Allobroges, France 2022

Made by Yann Pernuit, who spent many years working with Belluard, this is yet another striking example of Gringet from Ayse. With the same saline core, this has lovely fresh lime pith and apricot stone qualities. Highly moreish, impossible not to love.

Dominique Belluard x Jean-Claude Lapalu, Feu Follet 2019

A sparkling wine that was vinified by Belluard and finished by his good friend and one of Beaujolais’ most talented and dedicated winemakers, this is a delightful expression of sparkling Gringet. Full of life, with lemon and a touch of bitter herbs, it is highly invigorating.

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Ever more mainstream, the long-held stereotype of natural wine as flawed and funky is full of more holes than Swiss cheese these days. As wine consumers have continued to embrace these wines for a combination of their farming and winemaking ethos, their punk rock bonafides remain intact.

‘I believe our awareness of climate change, the need to act more sustainably overall to alter our lifestyles and reduce our footprint has led to the popularity of organic, biodynamic and natural wine,’ says Marko Kovac of Karakterre, the natural wine salon highlighting Eastern and Central European wines.

‘If we’re choosing EVs over gasoline-powered cars, why not do the same when we consider what to consume? Beyond just environmental issues, we want to be healthier. Organic, biodynamic and natural wines, being free of many chemicals used in conventional farming, are indeed healthier – though we can’t escape the reality that they are alcohol in the end and should probably be consumed in moderation.’

A natural evolution

‘Yes, the movement has seen a significant shift from what in previous years has been perceived as a bunch of underground weirdos drinking the funky stuff – and that’s a great achievement,’ Kovac admits.

‘In the early days, there was a need to fight for the place at the table, being laughed at by the conventional wine industry and professionals, hence the notions of wine needing to be cloudy, without any sulphites added, and even welcoming of certain wine faults. It was maybe the only way natural wine could have made a name for itself.

‘However, we must admit that, in many cases, those same wines were in some cases truly undrinkable. In a way, everyone needed to grow up: the winegrowers, the industry, the market and the consumer. It was just such a radical message.

‘The formula obviously worked. Today, you find organic, biodynamic and natural wines on many tables across the globe. It is not an isolated movement anymore. It’s not just a trend. Everyone has “evolved”: the winegrower trading the faults for a more sensible product, the professionals adopting the category, and the market asking for these types of wines.

‘Of course, on both sides, one still sees extremes – wine professionals who refuse to enter the category and winegrowers who refuse to use sulphur. But the two worlds have come closer than ever. That’s evident through global wine lists and how even conventional wineries are shifting to more sustainable production.’

A place at the table

As the movement has taken up space on shelves in well-pointed bottle shops and fine dining wine lists, it has found champions in the kitchen who are true believers.

These chefs see a direct connection between the embrace of care and stewardship in the farming that goes into their ingredients in the kitchen and the like-minded practices in vineyards and cellars of natural winemakers.

Ana Roš of Hiša Franko

‘Personally, I’m drawn to natural wines because they align with my philosophy of staying close to nature,’ says Ana Roš of the three Michelin star Hiša Franko in Slovenia.

‘Just as I prefer minimal intervention in my food, I appreciate wines made with as little interference as possible. It’s important to me to know what I’m putting into my body, and natural wines provide that sense of integrity.

‘For the past 25 years, I’ve been drinking natural wines. It’s a legacy from my ex-husband’s (Valter Kramar) father, Franko, who opened Hiša Franko in the early 1970s. At that time, when natural wines were often called “wines with mistakes”, Franko was already collecting wines from pioneers like Valter Mlečnik and the Batič family. This passion for natural wines was carried forward by Valter, an ardent advocate and drinker of natural wines who has always believed in their importance.

‘At Hiša Franko, this legacy thrives. Our wine list is now almost entirely natural, and we offer two distinct wine pairings. The first, “Classy”, features refined, elegant wines with a more polished character. The second, “Funky”, celebrates the wilder side of natural wines – those that Valter loves most. It’s fascinating to see how guests divide themselves into these two distinct groups of preferences.’

Daniela Soto-Innes of Rubra

After famously leaving the iconic New York restaurants that she founded with chef Enrique Olvera, Cosme and Atla, Mexican chef Daniela Soto-Innes unveiled her long-awaited Rubra in Nayarit, Mexico last autumn. Located on the coast in Punta de Mita, the restaurant hosted its first wine dinner with pairings from Austria’s natural wine rockstars, Gut Oggau.

‘Wine has been one of my growing passions through the years,’ Soto-Innes explains. ‘The level of spiciness in my cooking, for example, has gone down a lot because I want the food to pair well with wine. I want the two to sing together.’

As a chef in New York City, she learned and discovered new wines in the city’s eclectic wine bar scene. Just before opening Rubra, she’d been on a whirlwind tour of the natural producers of Alsace and counts among her favourites Pierre Frick and Domaine Lissner.

‘All of our guests on the first evening were intrigued by the Gut Oggau wines. We selected them for our opening because their wines, like our food, are fresh and alive,’ says Soto-Innes, who works with her beverage director, Andrea Hernández, former sommelier at Quintonil, a two Michelin star restaurant in Mexico City.

Hernández curates a list focused on organic, biodynamic and low-intervention wines.

‘While not completely natural, 90% of our list are producers who work organically or biodynamically and our largest producer farms 60 hectares, so we’re supporting small, family farms. It’s a niche for our Mexican guests, and that’s exciting to show them something new,’ Hernández explains.

‘Natural wine goes so well with Mexican cuisine. Like our food, it expresses place, and the acidity frames our flavours and spices, much better than big Riojas or California wines traditionally served in Mexican fine dining.

‘Chef Dani and I are both spiritual people, and we both believe we have a responsibility to the environment and how we source food reflects that. So it makes sense that we’re drawn to natural producers connected to the land like Gut Oggau. We want to partner with people like that, who feel that greater sense of the world around them.’

What goes with Gaggan?

An experience dining at Gaggan in Bangkok‘s southeastern Watthana District is much more like a performance than a meal. Set up as a theatre in the round, guests sit in pitch black as Gaggan Anand and his culinary team perform under black lights, and a booming, curated playlist is picked to accompany the menu.

A neon sign in red cursive script on the restaurant’s far left wall captures Gaggan’s ethos. ‘Be a rebel,’ it reads.

How did one of the world’s most iconic chefs, who needs only go by one name, come to have a 100% natural wine list at his eponymous restaurant and nearly as famous Indian-Mexican fusion joint, Ms Maria & Mr Singh, just upstairs?

‘We needed a wine programme that would respond to my “madness” in the kitchen, to be honest,’ Gaggan tells me. ‘We thought, hey, we are doing all these crazy, highly personalised, progressive dishes, so our wine programme should follow this madness! It’s worked.’

Alongside his well-known and controversial dishes, like ‘Lick it up’ and ‘Rat’s Brains’ an array of the world’s top natural wines are paired.

‘Like the food, the wines we feature are equally personal and made by small family farmers just like those we get our ingredients from. And both our food and the wines are natural! Today, Gaggan is a rare upscale restaurant with a fully natural wine list, well it’s not a list per se, as much as a curated part of the dining experience.’

Sommelier Vladimir Kojic runs the entirely natural programme at both restaurants.

‘Vladimir will take you along on the wine journey as our chefs and I take you through each dish, aiming for the perfect accompaniment. In our minds, the wine is on equal footing with food.

‘We hope to help people understand that wine, like food, is deeply personal! It’s an expression of a person, a place, something integrated into our lives, not separate from our experience.’

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A devastating fire swept through the 800-year-old cathedral in April 2019, destroying the roof, the steeple and some of the vaulting. Workers have spent the past five years painstakingly rebuilding Notre-Dame Cathedral at a cost of €700m (£585m). The restoration is now complete, and the grand reopening will take place on Sunday 8 December.

The Archbishop of Paris has selected a natural wine made by Régis and Anne-Reine Anouil in the Loire Valley to serve as the sacramental wine during the ceremony.

Their wines were previously poured for Pope Francis when he visited Marseille in October 2023, and he enjoyed the red over dinner with Bishop Jean-Marc Aveline, the Archbishop of Marseille.

Régis Anouil contacted Bishop Laurent Ulrich, the Archbishop of Paris, a few weeks ago to suggest that their white blend could serve as the mass wine for the ceremony.

He said: ‘I explained to Bishop Ulrich that our natural wines correspond to what the (Roman) Congregation for Divine Worship requires for the consecrated species: the wine must be fermented grape juice and nothing else.’

He noted that billionaires such as LVMH founder Bernard Arnault and Kering founder François Pinault played a major role in funding the restoration of Notre-Dame Cathedral.

‘These two personalities are owners of some of the most renowned wines of our country: Yquem, Cheval Blanc, Clos des Lambrays, Château Latour, Clos de Tart and many others,’ said Régis Anouil. ‘Why then choose our wine, from the Domaine de La Bénisson-Dieu, rather than the wines of personalities who have, in their bag, such iconic wines?

‘No doubt because Bishop Ulrich was sensitive to our approach, to the fact that our young estate is run by convinced Catholics, eager to implement viticulture and winemaking that is particularly respectful of life.’

Régis Anouil was formerly the editor-in-chief at an information agency run by a Catholic missionary organisation in Paris. His wife was the chancellor of the diocese of Nanterre.

They both retired in 2017 and decided to become winegrowers. The couple moved to an eco-hamlet in the Loire Valley called La Bénisson-Dieu.

The hamlet is near the city of Roanne, and the eight families that live there aim to enjoy ‘a simpler life’ that is made up of ‘renewed social ties in the rural world’.

Régis and Anne-Reine Anouil run a 2.6-hectare vineyard within the hamlet. They produce approximately 10,000 bottles per year, including red, white and rosé.

‘We manage our vines using agroforestry and try to respect life in our soils as much as possible,’ said Régis Anouil. ‘Our wines are natural, labelled Vin Méthode Nature, which means that they are made only from fermented grape juice.

‘The wines are vinified without traumatic processes, without any of the inputs of modern oenology – wines neither fined, nor filtered, nor sulphites.’

The couple’s white wine – a blend of Chardonnay, Grenache Blanc and Clairette Blanche from the 2022 and 2023 vintages – will serve as the sacramental wine during the grand reopening of Notre-Dame, and during subsequent masses held throughout the following week.

‘Mass wines are most often over-sweetened and over-sulphured wines,’ said Régis Anouil. ‘Even before becoming a winemaker, I was not at ease with the fact that the wines brought to the altars were not healthy. Now that we are winemakers, offering our natural wines is an element that counts in our eyes.’

He said the hamlet felt ‘great humility’ after learning that their white wine had been chosen for the Notre-Dame ceremony. ‘This fruit of the earth and the work of men is our very modest offering to the immense surge of generosity that accompanies the reconstruction of the cathedral of Paris,’ he added.

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Inside the November 2024 issue of Decanter magazine:

FEATURES

• Natural wine: A lens on the future With interest in natural wines surging, Christina Rasmussen and Honey Spencer investigate the movement’s wider influence
• Champagne style guide Looking for your new favourite fizz? Tom Hewson’s illustrated guide will help you make new discoveries in the wide world of Champagne
• Jura It may be France’s smallest wine region, but Jura produces some of the nation’s most fascinating wines, says Rupert Joy
• Vintage preview: Paso Robles 2022 Brianne Cohen provides key insights into a difficult vintage
• Barossa Shiraz 2022 highlights Big and burly are adjectives of the past when it comes to Barossa Shiraz, according to David Sly’s report
• Regional profile, New Zealand: Gimblett Gravels Emma Jenkins MW charts the region’s journey from wasteland to wine mecca

LEARNING

• Wine wisdom Expert tips to help you on your journey through wine, plus ‘The ethical drinker’

SPIRITS

• Distilled Spirits news and cocktail insights – plus five great bourbons
• Sugar-cane juice rums Think you know rum? Think again, as Millie Milliken introduces you to the joys of cane juice spirits

GOOD LIVING

• Perfect pairing: pairing: Pumpkin & walnut gnocchi Autumn flavours and the best wines to match them
• Fizz & food: pairings that pop Our food and wine expert Fiona Beckett challenges preconceptions around Champagne pairings
• Travel: Wine lover’s guide to Etna A Sicilian hotspot in more than one way, says Fiona Sims. The wines, the food and the lava flows

BUYING GUIDE

• Editors’ picks Tasting highlights
• Panel tasting: Aragón reds Garnacha and beyond from this rural corner of Spain, with 26 wines scoring 90pts or more
• Panel tasting: Languedoc whites A wide range of terroirs, grapes and wine styles; a wide range of wines assessed – there’s something for everyone in this epic tasting
• Expert’s choice: Hunter Valley Semillon Huon Hooke picks 18 of these niche-favourite Aussie dry whites, to drink young or age
• Weekday wines 25 top wines under £20: the Decanter team brings you some more great-value drops
• Weekend wines Priced £20-£50, seven standout buys to impress

COLLECTORS

• Marketwatch investment news Auction news, new releases and strength in big-name Tuscany

REGULARS

• Meet the experts Decanter’s authors
• Uncorked News, views & more
• Andrew Jefford’s column In Roussillon: why Collioure ‘could be a little mountain Burgundy’
• Hugh Johnson’s column What’s on his ‘comfort list’ of wines?
• Guest column Jason Millar makes the case for ‘simplicity and purity’
• DWWA 2024 highlights Piedmont’s signature standouts
• Wine to 5: Dr Mark Krstic The academic: wine research institute manager at the Australian Wine Research Institute

Inside Decanter’s Spain supplement 2024:

• Welcome Revolution and reinvention in Spain’s dynamic scene. Ines Salpico
• Meet the Decanter experts Our team of international Spanish wine contributors
• Guest column Almudena Alberca MW on the benefits of preserving Spain’s wealth of traditional vine varieties
• The new Priorat Fintan Kerr on the region’s shift away from weighty, chunky reds to more nuanced styles
• Producer profile: Alvaro Palacios Sarah Jane Evans MW outlines what makes Alvaro one of Spain’s modern-day benchmark-setting winemakers
• My top 20: Txakoli Beth Willard’s pick of these fresh, lively northern wines
• Comando G: crafting Garnacha The passion and commitment that led Daniel Landi and Fernando García to the Gredos mountains. By Ines Salpico
• Spanish cooperatives David Williams spotlights just some of the best wine co-ops he’s come across on his travels
• 18 top buys: White Rioja Our Spain Regional Editor Ines Salpico’s pick
• La hora del vermut Noah Chichester on the central part Spain’s vermouth plays in its lifestyle and daily culture
• Panel tasting: Spanish Garnacha From 69 wines tasted, our impressed judges picked out nine Outstanding wines and 28 Highly recommended
• Restaurants: Where to go In Spain’s dynamic dining-out scene, Noah Chichester picks just four must-try new food-and-wine hotspots
• Travel: 10 top Balearic Island wineries Shawn Hennessey says now is the time to tour the four islands and discover the fascination and diversity of its producers’ wines – and Ines Salpico highlights 1o to look out for and try

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I’ll never forget the moment Pierre Overnoy handed me a jar containing a cluster of Ploussard grapes, harvested on 2 July 1991: a preserved piece of the natural world from my birth year. As I was departing, the pioneering Jura winemaker gave me a loaf of homemade bread.

For the winemakers who gave birth to what has become known as the natural wine movement, this love for nature, combined with a paysan mindset, lies at the core of not only their approach to wine, but to life.

Ten natural wine recommendations below

It was this approach that resonated with me when I first came across natural wine in my mid-20s. I was quick to embrace it.

Bottles such as Guy Breton’s 1989 Morgon, experiences with wines by the Jura’s Houillon-Overnoy and Domaine des Miroirs, the Mosel’s Rita and Rudolf Trossen, Pierre Frick in Alsace, Maison Valette in Burgundy, as well as meeting their farmers and makers, saw me fall head-overheels for wine made without sulphites (SO2).

Years later, I now hesitate to use the term ‘natural wine’. It’s not because I don’t love these wines anymore – quite the opposite, I love them more than ever – rather it’s the term that I find problematic, as it lacks a specific definition.

When we try to define complex topics in simplistic terms, it leaves room for misuse. When somebody tells you a wine is natural, you can’t take it for granted. Only with research can you decide.

The first question should be: does it come from a truly healthy environment? As Jean-Philippe Bret of Domaine La Soufrandière/Bret Brothers in the Mâconnais summarises: ‘To make natural wine from grapes grown with synthetic chemicals is simply impossible. We must return to a form of living agriculture.’

Dedicated winemakers are working to better understand their wines and vineyards, and to ensure that they are as full of life as possible to cope with an uncertain future climate. It’s their efforts that deserve centre stage.

What is natural wine?

The first mentions of natural wine during the 1800s focused on eschewing additions in winemaking, namely sugar (chaptalisation). By the 1980s, winemakers were embracing organics, noting significant improvements in both vineyard and fermentation health.

Today, it’s generally agreed that natural wine should be farmed organically or biodynamically, should be made with minimal intervention (meaning no techniques such as flash pasteurisation) and without additives. Most also feel it should be unfined and unfiltered.

The only substantial area of disagreement is over the addition of sulphites (sulphur dioxide, essentially, which can be used at various stages in the winemaking process to help prevent oxidation in the wine) – among natural wine advocates, some say that none should be added, some say only up to 30ppm, others say less than 70ppm.

Getting to know microbes

In the 1970s, under the guidance of biochemist and négociant Jules Chauvet, Beaujolais winemaker Marcel Lapierre shifted to organic farming and started to shun additions, instead using a microscope to assess yeast and bacteria. Soon others joined him, including Guy Breton, who made his first vintage in 1988.

‘After five years of farming organically, we saw a real increase in yeast strains,’ says Breton. ‘It takes at least that long for soil to heal from herbicide. Fermentations became healthier and faster.

Even just 500m apart, healthy vineyards can have completely different yeast populations. If you ferment naturally, this gives your wines completely different tastes.’

The next generation of Beaujolais winemakers continues this work. Camille Lapierre of Domaine Marcel Lapierre explains that microscopes have become more precise, enabling them to spot yeasts they hadn’t seen previously: were they there before, or have they recently arrived? Time will reveal more.

Paul-Henri Thillardon of Domaine Thillardon, based in Chénas, which he runs with his brother Charles, travels across French regions with like-minded winemakers and his microscope. Their united goal is to better understand the changes in wine microbiology that are taking place due to climate change, and to seek solutions to problems.

In Cambria, California, Rajat Parr of Phelan Farm cultivates a diverse microbial population in the soil by composting, as well as spraying turmeric, neem oil, nettles, willow and oak bark, milk thistle, honey, thyme, horsetail, kelp, Pacific Ocean water and fish-bone emulsion, thereby improving vineyard health and resilience.

Lab analysis of Parr’s soils by Brian Vagg, a consultant at Dr Elaine’s Soil Food Web School, showed a significant increase in the fungal population in a period of just 15 months from July 2022 to October 2023, as well as a marked and beneficial decrease in the bacterial population.

Angiolino Maule of La Biancara near Gambellara, in Veneto, is so dedicated to natural wine that in 2006 he founded VinNatur.

The non-profit association, which now has more than 300 winemaker members in 12 countries, funds research by soil scientists, entomologists, oenologists and agronomists, including a study by analysts FoodMicroTeam of the complexities of ‘mouse taint’, a phenomenon caused by lactic acid bacteria.

Maule says: ‘To make good natural wine you need much more knowledge than for making good conventional wine. With climate change, by working with open-minded researchers, we can get to the bottom of these challenges, too.

The plant kingdom

Vineyards were once criss-crossed with trees, fields and livestock, but when globalisation took hold, and tractors arrived, in just one generation many landscapes became monocultures. Faced with the threat of species loss, accelerating pest outbreaks and grapevine diseases, many winegrowers are reverting.

In Sicily, Arianna Occhipinti says that 50% of her farm is planted to wheat, olive groves, citrus fruits, pears, vegetable gardens, rotational arable land, forest and Mediterranean scrub. This includes small plots of indigenous species, otherwise in danger of abandonment.

‘This is my contribution to saving species,’ says Occhipinti. ‘Vineyards are more resilient in polyculture. A balance gives energy to the vineyards, and to the people working here.’

In the Loire valley’s Anjou region, Stéphanie Debout and Vincent Bertin of Deboutbertin work with agroforestry: vineyards surrounded by hedges and some co-planted with trees. This involves either climate-resilient trees or indigenous fruit trees from the regional fruit-species preservation association Les Croqueurs de Pommes.

‘It’s depressing to walk through a vineyard home to just vines,’ says Bertin. ‘It feels like a place of work only. Walking through a parcel with trees growing, fruit ripening, flowers blooming, birds and insects – that brings pleasure.’

He adds that it’s fragile economically to produce only grapes; working with additional crops provides security.

In the Jura in eastern France, Katie Worobeck of Maison Maenad is planting trees within rows, ‘to create as biodiverse an environment as possible, within a cultivated environment’.

She checks that the species she plants have the same mycorrhizal networks (underground expanses of fungal filaments that form connections between plant root systems) as grapevines, that they tolerate pruning and provide dappled shade, and aren’t susceptible to mildew.

She began among the Poulsard vines, a variety that’s prone to sunburn. In Mâcon, renowned botanist Gérard Ducerf has assessed vastly diverse species in Maison Valette’s indigenous cover crop.

The past decades have seen significant decline in the diversity of grape varieties planted. In her article ‘A resource for the world?’ in Decanter’s September 2024 issue, Dr Laura Catena, founder of the Catena Institute of Wine in Argentina, stated: ‘In general, there has been a dramatic reduction in genetic diversity within many of the noble grape varieties over the last century.’

In Trentino, northeast Italy, Elisabetta Foradori saved the genetic diversity of her region’s indigenous variety Teroldego by planting massal selections (propagated using cuttings from a diverse selection of vines with desirable characteristics) when others were only planting clones.

She also began a breeding programme, propagating Teroldego seedlings. To further enhance biodiversity, she breeds Tyrolean Grey cattle and her daughter Myrtha Zierock has implemented market gardening.

Globally, winemakers are also turning to hybrid grape varieties, which are often more resistant to climatic extremes and disease pressures. In Vermont, USA, Deirdre Heekin of La Garagista proves they can create profound wines.

The animal kingdom

Hooves, trotters or claws on the ground combat monoculture. Jura domaine Les Dolomies had a vineyard that frequently succumbed to budworm – moth larvae that have a habit of hollowing out flower buds from the inside. Integrating 50 chickens solved the problem: they happily feasted on them.

Some winemakers have returned to ploughing by horse, such as Anjou’s Deboutbertin and the Thillardons in Chénas, or even harvesting by horse, as at Les Frères Soulier in the Gard, west of Avignon, or by donkey at Les Dolomies. Soil compaction is lessened, and manure forms a key ingredient for compost.

Charlotte Touati-Houillon, of Domaine Houillon in the Vaucluse, southern Rhône, uses manure as a component when making label parchment, having learnt the technique during her previous career translating ancient manuscripts as a historian in Ethiopia.

With her husband Aurélien – brother of Emmanuel and Adeline Houillon in Jura – they focus on rare breeds, such as the Poitevin horse (in 2011 there were just over 300 breeding horses, according to specialist Cécile Zahorka at thepixelnomad.com), the Poitou donkey (which was not far from extinction by the 1970s, according to livestockconservancy.org), and miniature Mediterranean donkeys.

‘If we don’t continue breeding and conservation, eventually we’ll only have two horse breeds and two grape varieties,’ says Touati-Houillon. ‘We can each do our bit to safeguard diversity. It can be beneficial when a pandemic occurs, and there’s the emotional side of looking after breeds of which only few individuals survive.’

At Phelan Farm, Rajat Parr tends sheep, protected from mountain lions by Maremma dogs, for grazing and biodiversification.

In Austria’s Weinviertel, Johannes Zillinger also seeks these benefits with his Ouessant sheep and Kune Kune pigs, which live in his vineyards. The lanolin in sheep’s wool is evidently a natural deterrent to deer, and he supplies his extended family with pork from happy pigs.

‘In our village, we have two huge indoor conventional pig farmers with 3,000 or more pigs,’ says Zillinger. ‘For many, pigs are just “walking money”. Our 40 pigs live in 3ha of vineyards, with two ponds. You see how happy they are. Why should a vineyard only be a vineyard?’

When visiting Beaujolais recently, I met a cow. She had been lovingly raised by Bénédicte and Emmanuel Leroy of Champagne Ruppert-Leroy in the Côte des Bar, and was soon to be integrated into the Thillardon herd in exchange for 90 bottles of their wine.

This represents the very essence of permaculture: to live from your land and to share produce. Both domaines work in polyculture – a decision rooted in a love for biodiversity, animals and, most crucially of all, for people.

‘When talking about natural wine, we must talk about the social aspect,’ says Emmanuel Leroy. ‘Given that consumers expect cheap produce, agriculture and human beings are in grave danger – people even take their own lives.

‘With Paul-Henri Thillardon, we often discuss that our domaines will only function if the people working with us are happy and feel a sense of belonging. Across France, you see vineyard workers, often from abroad, being paid a pittance. For us, it’s crucial that we pay our employees well, and look after them. Every day, we have lunch together, with produce from our farm.’

Open minds, broader palates

Once niche, styles such as pétillant naturel – the ‘ancestral method’ in which efferevescence is created in a wine by bottling it before it has completed its single fermentation – and wines matured under a layer of flor are now celebrated: the Jura’s Stéphane Tissot is globally renowned for several single-vineyard vins jaunes.

Orange wine has also crossed multiple borders. Maria and Sepp Muster, Weingut Werlitsch (Brigitte and Ewald Tscheppe) and Andreas Tscheppe (Ewald’s brother) were inspired by the likes of Italy’s Joško Gravner to create their own spellbinding examples in Styria, Austria.

In Germany, Petra Kujanpää of Mosel’s Shadowfolk created The Mystics, macerated for up to 350 days.

‘I love skin-macerated wines,’ she says, ‘because the terroir is still there, but they give you a whole new dimension of texture and flavours.’

Mphumeleli Ndlangisa of Magna Carta Wines in South Africa was inspired to make orange wine by his love of the wines of Georgia. Now that he has his own farm and vineyards in Swartland, he hopes to go so far as to make his own clay vessels.

Many of his wine names feature his indigenous language, Zulu: ‘I’m really trying to find an African style, and to work with what we have locally,’ he says. ‘The DNA of this place is in the clay.’

Sulphite exploration

Commonly used in wine production for their antiseptic and antioxidant properties, sulphites can alter wine’s structure and taste. The wish to intervene less, to transparently show a sense of place, lies behind winemakers’ decisions to work without them, or to use them at lower doses.

Jean-Philippe Bret (pictured above) has had success with microdoses in the Zen cuvées at Bret Brothers and La Soufrandière, adding sometimes as little as 5 parts per million (ppm) – in the EU, regulations permit up to 200ppm (or mg/L) in dry white wine.

Yet for him, even a tiny amount can give microorganisms a ‘shock’, preventing a potentially problematic microbial party.

Instead of using sulphites produced as a by-product of the petrochemical industry (the norm), Mark and Martial Angeli of Anjou’s La Ferme de La Sansonnière work with mined Polish sulphur; they find that this gives significantly different results, barely affecting the wines.

Also in the Loire, Virginie Joly of La Coulée de Serrant adds that sometimes it enables her to reduce doses.

During Rajat Parr’s sommelier career, he found himself drawn to wines made entirely without added sulphites, notably Thierry Allemand’s cuvée from the northern Rhône. Wines at Phelan Farm in California have been made without sulphites thus far.

‘Wine made without sulphites,’ says Parr, ‘is like listening to a vinyl record or taking a photo with an analogue camera – you have the raw version. It’s not necessarily better, but the vibration feels higher. If I’m going to spend so much time taking care of a vineyard, why would I dilute the fruit’s rawness?’

The future of wines like these relies on their people. Only fairly treated, thriving human beings can cultivate thriving vineyard ecosystems. In turn, only thriving vineyard ecosystems can create grapes that can be transformed into wines that truly tug at our heartstrings.

Honey Spencer recommends these low intervention wines…

Guy Breton, P’tit Max Morgon, Beaujolais, France 2020

Guy Breton’s P’tit Max cuvée represents his nickname as the son of Max Breton. From vines up to 130 years old, Breton crafts his wines for precision and finesse over opulence or power. Fermented with native yeasts, P’tit Max goes through carbonic maceration, whereby whole clusters see a maceration in tank (the duration depends on the conditions of the vintage) followed by 10-12 months’ elevage in old barrels and a minute dose of SO2. P’tit Max is imbued with the chiselled energy afforded by Morgon’s granite bedrock combined with a distinctive spice coming from Breton’s oldest vines. Pair with autumn game meats and other umami-led dishes such as risotto with dried morels.

La Biancara, Monte Sorio Passito, Veneto, Italy 2017

An enthralling passito sweet wine from the bucolic hillsides of Veneto’s Sorio di Gambellara. Made from Gargenega under the guidance of biodynamic veterans Rosamaria and Angiolino Maule. Handselected bunches are strung up in the winery for three months in order to concentrate the sugars before fermentation at the turn of the year, with indigenous yeast in stainless steel tanks. The wine is then committed to barrel and released after three and a half years. A rich amber, this has layers of stem ginger, raisin and almond. An affable companion to blue cheeses such a Roquefort, as well as desserts of like-minded sweetness and viscosity, such as tarte tatin (or better yet, the two combined).

Maison Maenad, De L’Avant, Côtes du Jura, France 2021

A singular Chardonnay from a parcel of old vines in Jura’s Sud Revermont region. Canadian Katie Worobeck perfectly captures the vibratory qualities made available by the ancient Jurassic terroir. Grapes are added to a manual vertical press and subsequent movements are facilitated only by gravity before 12 months’ ageing in old demi-muids. Notes redolent of late-summer citrus and river stones precede a staggering vibrancy on the palate. At Sune restaurant (in Hackney, east London), we pour the few bottles afforded to us alongside roast monkfish, nori and sake lees emulsion.

Foradori, Granato Teroldego, Vigneti delle Dolomiti, Alto Adige, Italy 2018

Granato, first bottled in 1989 (the 1988 vintage) by Elizabetta Foradori, displays the family’s determination, exemplifying the potential of both local native variety Teroldego and ambitious biodynamic farming. The Foradori formula has proven unflinchingly unerring for more than 30 years. Dark, fleshy and muscular with contours of smoke and a savoury finish, Granato is the Foradori family’s expression of the best selected parcels, clusters and vessels. Pour alongside smoked meats or game such as venison with a blackberry jus.

Phelan Farm, Trousseau, San Luis Obispo, California, USA 2021

A high-toned and haunting take on Jura’s prized (alongside Poulsard/Ploussard) black variety Trousseau. From the cool coastal town of Cambria on the northerly fringes of California’s San Luis Obispo coast and made by sommelier turned viticulturist and winemaker Rajat Parr. In 2021, grapes were retained as whole clusters and fermented with native yeast, followed by maturation in neutral oak barrels and bottling via gravity with no SO2 additions. On the palate, the wine is open-hearted and supple with a redcurrant coulis fragrance. I’ve always been a fan of Trousseau at the end of a meal, with a plate of hard cheeses such as Comté, but game or mushroom terrines would work equally well.

Ruppert-Leroy, Fosse Grely Brut Nature, Champagne, France NV

The lieu-dit of Fosse Grely, in southern Champagne’s Côte des Bar region, is where Bénédicte Leroy’s father Gérard Ruppert chose to plant the domaine’s inaugural vines. But it wasn’t until his daughter and her partner Emmanuel showed an interest in taking over the family business that the first wine was made at the domaine, allowing the couple to harness the full potential of the meticulously kept, relatively high-elevation organic vineyards (at 260m). The Fosse Grely vineyard is perched atop a thick layer of limestone with a thin covering of red clay and small stones. A decisive and dazzlingly pure expression of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay (50% each), with 20 months on lees, no sulphites and no dosage. A subtle black pepper spice pervades at first, giving way to warm lemon skin, flat white peach and shortbread. Best paired with siu mai dumplings or fried chicken with crème fraîche and roe.

La Garagista, Harlots & Ruffians, Vermont, USA 2022

While Vermont is technically within the latitudinal limits of global grape-growing (30°-50°), Vitis vinifera vines have limited ability to survive the harsh winters this far north, which has prompted growers to plant hybrid varieties that are more frost resistant. Deirdre Heekin’s Harlots & Ruffians is a field blend of two such hybrids, 75% La Crescent and 25% Frontenac Gris, which are both able to withstand temperatures of -35°C. With native-yeast fermentation, no filtration and zero SO2 addition, Heekin is able to craft a wine that’s dry yet detailed, with myriad orchard fruits and a dusting of baking spices. A good contender for veg-led dishes such as cucumber with whipped feta, quiches or white fish.

Andreas Tscheppe, Stag Beetle, Styria, Austria 2021

I defy any wine lover not to be bowled over by Elisabeth and Andreas Tscheppe’s triumphant skin-contact wine Stag Beetle. It’s a blend of 60% Sauvignon Blanc and 40% Chardonnay, two varieties that seem to pick up electric momentum from the region’s opok soils: compacted clay and silty limestone deposits. As amber wines continue to enjoy a modern resurgence, cuvées such as this serve as a benchmark for quality and character for the category. Harvested by hand from the Tscheppes’ steep, biodynamically farmed slopes, the grapes see extended skin contact of five weeks before being transferred to a 600L barrel, which is then planted in the ground over winter to harness energy from the soil. It’s bottled after 24 months. Densely structured and utterly alive: tropical fruits bed in with crushed rocks and minerals in the glass.

Rita & Rudolf Trossen, Lay Purus Riesling, Mosel, Germany 2019

Not all producers are capable of making wine without the addition of sulphites, but Rita and Rudolf Trossen, who have been certified organic and working in accordance with biodynamic principles since the 1980s, certainly are. Lay Purus comes from 40-year-old vines on some of Mosel’s steepest slopes and forms part of the Purus series: wines made without any additives whatsoever since 2010. The Trossens opt instead for extended lees ageing to ensure biological stability before bottling. Precise and high-toned, with layers of umami, almond and apricot. The natural wine for those who ‘don’t do’ natural wine.

La Ferme de la Sansonnière, La Lune, Loire, France 2022

It’s hard to know what came first, the term ‘unicorn wine’ or Mark Angeli’s otherworldly Vin de France cuvée La Lune, with its signature purple unicorn on the label. What is clear is the defiant mastery of the Angeli family (Mark works with his son Martial) in turning wines from a historically sweet wine appellation (AP Bonnezeaux in the Loire valley’s Anjou) into dry, crystalline iterations of local varieties. Made from 100% Chenin Blanc, there is both a confected element to the fruit profile and a current pulsing through it that would leave many uninitiated blind tasters scratching their heads. An elixir to drink whenever possible, to remind us of the unadulterated joys wine can add to life here on Earth. Pair with soft goat’s cheese, cooked seafood or any dessert that isn’t overly sweet.

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Pét-nat has gone mainstream. Even M&S, surely a barometer of the tastes of Britain’s middle classes, stocks one.

And it’s from England; which really should be no surprise seeing as this country’s speciality is sparkling wine.

Scroll down for six British pét-nats to try

What are pét-nats?

To show off the sheer diversity of the British pét-nat scene, last year Tim Wildman MW put on the inaugural ‘Brit Nat’ tasting in London.

This year there was the sequel with over 50 wines to taste. Wildman is the man behind the Lost in a Field ‘Frolic’ pét-nat made from grape varieties that once underpinned English winemaking, like Madeleine Angevine, Reichensteiner and Schönburger, and has become a champion for the category.

He also makes pét-nats in Australia and indeed the term comes from there – it’s short for ‘pétillant naturel’ (naturally sparkling). Those Aussies do love a snappy abbreviation.

Pét-nat is a broad category using three main winemaking techniques. The first is what is known in France as ‘méthode ancestrale’ and Wildman calls ‘interruption’.

This involves bottling a fermenting wine so it finishes in the bottle and the resulting carbon dioxide will be absorbed into the wine. These wines are occasionally disgorged to remove sediment.

According to Will Davenport in Sussex who has been making pét-nats longer than anyone else in England, they can be tricky.

‘You have to measure sugar level assiduously and then bottle at the right time. It works with a slow ferment but one year the ferment was so fast that the last bottles had much less sugar in so they had barely any fizz. Some years we get it right, some years we don’t make it.’

All this needs to be done at harvest time when there are tonnes of grapes coming in.

Bottoms Up

No wonder some producers use a method which Wildman calls ‘intermission’.

This involves starting with a base wine and then provoking a secondary fermentation. This is often achieved by adding unfermented grape juice, either a fresh batch or even frozen from a previous year – though sugar might be used instead.

‘The majority of pét-nats in the world are made this way,’ according to Wildman.

When this secondary fermentation takes place in bottle, the wines are sometimes referred to as ‘col fondo‘, a reference to the traditional, bottle-fermented Prosecco style.

Hugo Stewart at Domaine Hugo in Wiltshire describes it as the, ‘missing link between pét-nat and English Sparkling Wine’.

To make his, he adds the still fermenting wine from one vintage to the finished wine of another, and then bottles it under a crown cap.

Styles, grapes and regions

It’s hard to generalise about regional styles as there are wines like Wildman’s which are made from grapes harvested all over the country.

But, largely in England’s sparkling wine heartlands of Kent, Sussex etc, the wines tend to be made from classic French varieties.

They also tend to be more accessible to pét-nat agnostics like me. The further north and west you go, the more hybrids like Rondo and Solaris come in.

That said, Solaris with its heady peach and satsuma flavours seems to work especially well in a pét-nat – as it does with orange wines.

Production ranges from 100 bottles for Woodfine Interconnections from Beaconsfield in Bucks to 9,000 for the M&S pét-nat which is made by Defined Wine, a contract business that employs ex-Cloudy Bay winemaker Nick Lane.

And as you might expect from producers of different sizes around the country using different techniques and grape varieties, the wines were varied.

Many of the newly-bottled wines tasted (to me) a little simplistic, a character Wildman described in his own wines as ‘tank juice.’

He thinks the wines change after 12 months in bottle. Indeed tasting Wildman’s own wines, the 2022 was hugely superior to the rather raw 2023.

The verdict

On the whole, I found the best were those made by larger experienced producers like Davenport and London Cru.

Among some of the smaller producers, there was a lot of Brett and volatile acidity (VA), some very rough tannins and a little mouse taint.

There were at least three wines I found undrinkable. Plus the occasional bottle that gushed all over the floor on opening.

According to Wildman this last problem is caused by tartrate crystals in undisgorged bottles causing the wine to fizz uncontrollably when opened (they act as vectors for bubble formation).

Having said all this, the standard was higher than I thought they would be (perhaps because my expectations were low).

There were around 20 bottles I enjoyed, with a special mention going to the M&S one which offers outstanding value for money at £15.99.

Scores were generally low because these are not complex wines for pontificating over, they’re wines for drinking though they are expensive for such basic quality.

Overall the more conventional wines got the highest marks from me, but some people love the VA bombs.

Maybe it’s a fashion thing.

This article was amended on 13/11/2024 to clarify details around the key production methods.

Henry’s pick of British pét-nats

Related articles

• Pét-nat for beginners
• Dermot Sugrue’s bold next step
• The rise of English and Welsh orange wine

Your wine choices, as your wardrobe’s, are subject to seasonal review. It’s a matter of weather and it’s a matter of mood. So what does the arrival of autumn (and the faint hope of an Indian summer) call for? Versatile wines with character and food-pairing appeal.

Pale rosés give way to their fuller-bodied counterparts, chillable reds make space in the fridge for rich whites and bolder reds sneak in. Cocktail recipes get zesty and spicy, perfect for longer autumn evenings.

Fittingly-coloured orange wines are also perfect autumnal wines. At once refreshing and generous, for these moody days when sun and rain might be out within the same hour. And as the season’s produce starts to fill market stalls these amber-hued wines will give you perfect and versatile food pairing options.

Scroll down for tasting notes and scores of 12 orange wines to try this autumn

How is orange wine made?

An orange wine is made from white grapes fermented in contact with the skins – hence why they are also called skin-contact wines.

The light hue of most commercially available white wine is a result of the separation of the juice from the skins immediately or shortly after the grapes arrive at the cellar, by pressing the bunches. Fermentation happens without the skins thus preventing the extraction of colour, tannins and other polyphenolic compounds.

The length of maceration (the period when skins are left in contact with the juice before, during and after fermentation) determines the colour intensity of an orange wine. Fermentation temperature as well as the vessel used for fermentation and/or ageing also have a role to play.

As mentioned above, maceration extracts tannins and flavours compounds in addition to colour, which is why orange wines tend to have a distinct textural character (often described as grippy), some weight on the palate and, therefore, great food pairing appeal.

It’s sometimes said that orange wines are ‘white wines produced like a red’. However, historically, fermentation on the skins was the rule for all grapes, red and white, namely because these were often grown and fermented together. The concept of single-varietal wine and mono-varietal planting is very recent in the history of wine.

Even when varieties started being planted and vinified separately, wines were rarely light and clear in the glass. Light-hued white wines are a modern invention, only made possible by modern winemaking techniques such as cold settling, sterile filtration, temperature control and routine use of sulphites. Wines used to have a slight hue due to a degree of oxidation if not skin contact.

Millennial revival

As the industrialisation of wine production took hold, orange wines – perceived as less sophisticated, symbols of a less technologically advanced era – lost territory to modern ‘cleaner’ styles. They survived in regions where the wine sector struggled to establish itself as an industry, such as the Balkans, and at the hands of mavericks such as Josko Gravner and Stanko Radikon.

Orange wines were rediscovered at the beginning of the 21st century as part of a backlash against the standardisation of industrially-produced wine and the resulting loss of diversity of grape varieties, styles and traditions.

Orange wine was adopted by the ‘natural wine movement’ as its flagship style and propelled to the international stage as a beacon of resistance to commercially-made wines. Skin-contact became shorthand for low intervention as both producers and consumers increased their awareness of the sustainability implications of mass production.

Countries, like Georgia and Slovenia, where the style had remained firmly in production throughout the 20th century, found a new, enthusiastic audience and encouraged new producers. The vibrant natural wine community in Austria and Italy passionately embraced orange wines, with producers like Gut Oggau, COS, Claus Preisinger and Elisabetta Foradori releasing some of the defining wines of the dawn of the new millennium.

Winemakers in Portugal, Spain and Chile started researching their own regions’ historical iterations of orange wine – especially those produced in clay vessels – while adventurous ‘new world’ winemakers also embraced the style. Even producers in England and Wales are exploring the expressive potential of fermenting white grapes on their skins.

The result was a fresh understanding of the history of many wine regions, of the expressive potential of white varieties, and of how wine styles need to be seen in a spectrum rather than classified as ‘black (or red) or white’.

It’s important not to confuse orange wine and natural wine: the latter is a style while the former is a technique. It follows that not all orange wine is necessarily natural, and vice versa – i.e. skin-contact wine is not necessarily ‘funky’ or low intervention.

While texture and complexity are attributes of all (good) amber-hued wines, they can also be extremely refined. You will find a range of expressions, and both adventurous and classical wine lovers will surely find an orange wine they love. This style is not as divisive as one might think.

Tannins, flavour, texture – perfect food wines

Aromatic complexity, structure and textural character are what make orange wines special. At the crossroads of a red and white wine, they playfully stimulate and challenge the senses. Imagine the freshness and taught acidity of a white wine entwined with the tannic grip and suppleness of a red. What could possibly be better to pair with food?

Many orange wines are perfect companions for cheese platters, smoked fish, root vegetable-based dishes and roasted meat. They usually have a herbal, savoury edge that brings a meal’s flavours to life, supported by gentle tannins and firm acidity.

Best enjoyed only slightly chilled, skin-contact wines have a fresh vibrancy but also a sense of textural warmth, perfect to ease yourself into autumn’s mood. Nothing better than a picnic with a amber-hued bottle alongside the season’s harvest bounty – grapes, pear and Mediterranean citrus – before the winter’s loom sets in.

Great orange wines for autumn – 12 to try:

The wines below have been tasted and rated by Decanter’s editorial team and contributors.

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Though the holiday island of Lanzarote seems an unlikely source for artisan wines made by hip and happening young winemakers, the island’s fast-developing wine scene is worthy of attention.

Lanzarote has produced wine since the Spanish conquistadors colonised this Atlantic outpost in the 15th century.

Scroll down for a selection of wines from Lanzarote

From the volcanic ashes

The industry all but disappeared as wines from Portugal and mainland Spain rose in popularity, but an ongoing renaissance is making the most of the island’s extraordinary volcanic landscape.

The Timanfaya National Park enthrals first time visitors to Lanzarote. Huge lava fields and miles of volcanic ash have laid undisturbed since a series of volcanic eruptions in the 1730s.

The eruptions carpeted one-third of the island, burying fertile ground beneath a pitch-black carapace where seemingly nothing lives or grows.

It is here that most of Lanzarote’s vineyards are located.

Ditches and deserts

This geology alone demands new thinking on vine cultivation, but there is an added problem: Lanzarote is also a desert, seeing just 150mls of rain per year.

The island’s unique solution is to plant each vine in its own shallow pit, known as a ‘hoyo’.

Digging out these hollows allows the roots to reach the subsoil through a layer of volcanic ash that can be up to three metres thick.

Above ground, low stone walls (‘abrigos‘) protect from the fierce trade winds. With as little as three hundred vines per hectare, this is low-yield viticulture in the extreme.

The winds, however, are also the secret weapon against drought. The combination of the hoyos and volcanic material captures enough of the moisture that is carried on the winds to sustain the vines without irrigation.

These conditions – isolated, dry, warm with constant breezes – mean little pressure from disease, and an estimated 95% of the island’s vineyards are farmed without chemical fungicides.

Volcanic character

These are very old vines too. Phylloxera never reached the islands, so Lanzarote boasts many ungrafted, 100-year-old vines.

Volcanic soils impart a particular mineral signature on the wines made from them, and ‘volcanic wine’ is very much in vogue.

Wines from Italy’s Mount Etna and Mount Vesuvius are prime examples, but so too are those from many countries on the Pacific’s ‘Ring of Fire.’

Like the best of these, the volcanic wines of Lanzarote display an intriguing flinty, smoky and ozone-like character.

The Grape Varieties

Lanzarote is proud of its historic varieties and little else makes its way into bottles.

Malvasía Volcánica accounts for around 70% of all wine production. Distinct from other Malvasias, it is a cross between Malvasia (Malmsey) first brought to the island by the Greeks, and the local Marmajuelo.

Listán Negro has been grown in the Canary Islands since the arrival of the Spanish in the 1500s and is embraced as a native grape.

It should not be confused with Listán Prieto, another Castilian grape that arrived at the same time and which went on to the Americas where it is known today as País in Chile, Criolla Chica in Argentina, and Mission in California.

Listán Blanco is less widely planted than Listán Negro, and is a synonym for Palomino of Jerez.

Diego mostly features as a blending component. Also known as Vijariego, it can add a green apple and herb bite to blends.

The Bodegas

El Grifo is one of Lanzarote’s big players. It is a real survivor having been in continuous production since 1775. On my first visit to Lanzarote over 30 years ago its wines were perfectly serviceable, but unexciting.

Today El Grifo has upped its game, spurred on by the excitement around new, small wineries making terroir-driven wines.

If visiting Lanzarote, you will find that bigger names like El Grifo, Bermejo and Vega de Yuco feature in supermarkets and on every restaurant list.

Make no mistake, they make good wines that are well worth exploring, but the greatest interest for the wine enthusiast lies in the new breed of artisan producers.

The Artisans: Five Lanzarote producers to know

Titerok-Akaet

The bodega launched in 2017, but with access to much older vines. Farmed organically, Marta Labanda and Juan Daniel Ramirez use minimal SO2 and central to their philosophy is the recovery and preservation of old vines.

Puro Rofe

Since 2017 this project has produced some of the most interesting wines on the island. Founder Rayco Fernandez sources grapes from local organic growers, but with a commitment to terroir-driven wines and sustainable farming.

All ferments are spontaneous, some in amphora, and wines are unfiltered, unfined and made with minimal sulphur.

Jable de TAO

Another new, terroir-driven producer since 2021, sourcing fruit from old vineyards. They are working steadfastly to research the island’s soils and micro-climates.

The wine tasted here, called Tenesar, is a perfect example. From vineyards of marine sand and volcanic ash just two kilometres from the coast, the saline note is unmissable.

Cohombrillo 4/24

Owner Eamon López O’Rourke gave up the unlikely job of captaining a tourist submarine to establish his bodega in 2021.

Focused on natural wines, his annual production is only around 5,000 bottles. Farming is organic, with no additives used in the winery.

Bodega Erupción

Also dating from 2021, third generation winegrower Amor Lopez farms sixteen plots across the island.

Working with ungrafted, 100-year-old vines, ferments are all spontaneous and her winemaking is ‘hands-off’.

Bodega David Fernandez

This is a brand new project from Lanzarote native David Fernandez. Aged only 29, the first wines are just appearing in the market.

He is based in the north of Lanzarote, as are some of his vineyards, which he is rehabilitating after years of neglect. All natural wines, he will release single parcel cuvées, with a focus on individual terroirs. Definitely wines to keep an eye out for.

The Wines

Few of these wines are available from UK retailers, but the Wine Shop Lanzarote exports to the UK.

If you are visiting the Playa Blanca area, the wine shop of Kamezi Boutique Villas has one of the island’s best selections from small producers.

Top wine picks from Lanzarote

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The use of SO2 in winemaking is a hot conversation topic among producers and industry professionals. There are those who champion its use freely, while others shun it almost entirely.

I got in touch with some leading voices in the natural wine movement in the US to get their thoughts.

What do sulphites do?

In addition to acting as a preservative for wine, sulphites also double as a sanitiser for fruit, as well as helping keep fermentations from going awry.

‘The benefit of using sulphites is that it cleans the fermentation environment, so one is more easily able to regulate fermentation to ensure no defects,’ explains Zev Rovine, owner of New York-based Zev Rovine Selections.

Patrick Cappiello of Monte Rio Cellars in Sonoma and a big natural wine advocate expands on this, stating that sulphites remove ‘distractions’ from the yeast, and help avoid stuck fermentations – as well as the developments of faults in wine (mousiness, brettanomyces, etc.).

Matt Crafton, winemaker at Napa Valley-based Château Montelena, adds that in addition to preventing oxidation and/or microbial spoilage, sulphites also create bottle to bottle consistency, giving assurance to regular customers.

Downsides to using sulphites

On the other hand, Rovine explains that the benefits of using sulphites can also be a curse.

‘The downside I think is that when you clean your fermentation environment, you sterilise the microbiology – good bacteria, yeast complexities – out of it, [sometimes] to the point that it’s no longer that expressive,’ he says.

Brent Mayeaux, winemaker at Stagiaire Wines – a fervent believer in no-sulphur winemaking – echoes this, stating that while using sulphites at the destemmer or press can provide an environment for strong yeast to flourish, it also creates much less microbially diverse ferments.

‘You might not have any spoilage, but with a whole swath of hundreds of thousands of yeasts working on that wine, you get a much more complex fermentation,’ he says.

When to use sulphites

Cappiello explains that the first opportunity to use sulphites during winemaking is when fruit comes into the winery.

‘If the fruit looks raisined or has some mildew buildup, then we set up a pump and add just 10 parts per million [ppm]; all that does is help the juice go from brown to the colour of wine,’ he says.

He likens it to using hydrogen peroxide on a wound – and in both cases, states that using too much can be counterproductive.

‘[Too much] can start to strip the wine; like anything not done in moderation, going overboard with it can compromise the integrity and structure of a wine,’ he says.

The next opportunity would be during pressing, where Cappiello explains that 10-15ppm can help wake up tired yeasts and aid in getting a fermentation fully dry, followed by doing so at barreling.

‘By adding 20ppm at barreling, you [create] a little blanket to keep the wine safe,’ he explains, saying that if a barrel has brett or a cracked bung stave, sulphites will protect the wine inside of it – and will likely dissipate out.

The last opportunity is during racking or at bottling, where it acts as a sanitiser and protector, even with as little as 10ppm.

Timing matters

Rovine finds that the moment at which one uses sulphites matters, particularly in the lens of terroir reflection.

‘If you’re using it during fermentation, you’re really altering the yeast complexity, and for me, yeast is a big part of the story of terroir,’ he says.

He believes that adding small amounts near the point of bottling has less of an impact on the final taste of a wine.

Though, on the zero-zero end of the spectrum, producers like Mayeaux find sulphites to be a crutch.

‘Using sulphites early on corrects bad fruit, and adding sulphites later in the process makes up for bad winemaking,’ he says.

Mayeaux finds that if one can get through fermentation with a clean and stable wine, that adding sulphites towards the end of the process can lock the wine down in a constraining way.

‘That being said, I also don’t like drinking bad wine, so as much as you can cover up and confiscate terroir with sulphites, you can also do so if you’re not careful [during the winemaking process],’ he says.

For Rovine, being more dogmatic about vineyard practices than sulphites is more important, especially in the context of climate extremes.

‘Let’s have an open heart for the fact that weather is crazy, and if you have mildew or are not able to do enough triage so you add [a small amount] of sulphites, I’m not going to [criticise] you, because it’s your job to make wine,’ he says.

Sulphite ‘sweet spot’ – how much is too much?

Crafton notes that as with many topics in wine, the question of whether to use sulphites or not isn’t binary, though there is such a thing as too much.

Rovine agrees, stating that the general standard for usage of sulphites in conventional wine is far too much, and that using it in large amounts drastically changes the taste of a wine.

‘I do believe that these wines are less terroir expressive than those done with very little or zero [sulphites],’ he says.

Crafton believes in using sulphites judiciously, and with good reason. For others, like Mayeaux, the best solution is no sulphites at all.

‘Brett and other [faults] can be managed with good vineyard and cellar practices, so for me, sulphite-free winemaking is the most interesting intellectually, because I really get to see what someone is doing in the vineyard and in the cellar,’ he says,

However, Cappiello notes that he previously tried to work with no sulphites, and quickly noticed that the wines were falling apart.

‘I was running into a lot of problems, and then I realised if I added some sulphites, I’d have a lot less,’ he says.

Vinyl versus autotune

Cappiello thinks it’s a shame that sulphite usage often gets lumped into ‘conventional vinification practices’.

‘If we want to represent terroir responsibly, one of the best tools a winemaker can use to showcase the vineyard itself is sulphites because you’re removing any potential mess ups,’ he says.

To him, adding minimal sulphites in wine production is like using a modern record player – it offers a more representative experience of the creation at hand.

‘You’re taking the same thing – be it vinyl or wine – and creating a much purer, clearer, and deeper experience with it,’ he says.

Mayeaux also uses a musical analogy, though in a completely different way.

‘Sulphites to me are like autotune in music. It makes up for a shortcoming somewhere,’ he says.

Rovine reiterates his above point – and perhaps sums it up best, stating that if a small amount of sulphites allows a bottling process to go well, or permits bottles to avoid bottle shock and side flavours, he prefers the addition of it.

‘I think there’s a big difference between zero and a little bit,’ he says. ‘I think it’s nice to sell the best tasting wine that we can, and I don’t simply accept deviations as the beauty of nature, since we can fix it.’

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• What does minimal intervention really mean?

For as much buzzy jargon as there is in the world of wine – small production, sustainable, organic, New World, natural, among them – the terms are quite definitive. In the last decade, however, the increasingly popular discussion around a new phrase has caused some confusion among consumers and even winemakers: minimal intervention.

Many winemakers believe that for a wine to be considered low or minimal intervention, it all starts with vineyard practices to optimise the terroir and purity of the fruit, which is emphasised by implementing organic and sustainable practices.

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Seeking specificity

In Virginia, Maya Hood White, winemaker at Early Mountain Vineyards, views the term ‘minimal intervention’ as encompassing the whole process from farming through to the cellar; for the former, she stresses the minimisation of aggressive chemicals, mindfulness of fuel usage and tractor passes.

‘Irrigation is also an intervention that alters the essence of the fruit and then the wines,’ says Paul Sloan, winemaker at Small Vines. Their high-density planting allows Small Vines to dry farm, which translates to a ‘more pure sense of place’, according to Sloan.

While these farming practices aren’t new, the attention surrounding their influence on low or minimal-intervention wine is what’s bringing them to the forefront.

Sam Bilbro from Idlewild Wines explains: ‘If we make really good vineyard decisions, we can make very few touches in the winery because we have beautiful and healthy fruit to work with in the cellar.’

There’s no wine without some intervention

This is probably where we should acknowledge that winemaking, by definition, is intervention.

‘The grapes neither jump from the vine into a vat nor from vat to barrel to bottle,’ says Maggie Harrison, winemaker at Antica Terra, about the necessary go-between of human action that’s been part of winemaking since the beginning of time.

Perhaps this is why it’s so challenging to define – with no precedent or global regulation surrounding the term, low or minimal intervention means different things to different people. ‘It’s a spectrum,’ says Hood White, much like many things in life, which makes it. ‘A delicate balance explaining what we do or don’t do in our production processes while not looking to project judgement on other producers.’

As technology and science have advanced, winemakers have realised that a subpar harvest can still be salvaged; imbalances can be solved through manipulations such as fining, filtration, chaptalisation, stabilisers and additives.

‘It is easier, cheaper and less laborious to intervene afterwards in the cellar with chemistry than to farm well in the first place,’ says Sloan. Since many wineries don’t control their vineyards: ‘The only way they can compensate for flaws is with chemistry.’

For this reason, Sloan reverts to why low-intervention practices should start in the vineyards. ‘We choose to prevent problems in advance by farming well, using proper site selection, trellis design, tight spacing and prompt harvest date decisions.’

Recognising that every wine has its challenges, Bilbro echoes Sloan. As winemakers, he says, it is their job to locate the potential problem points of each variety and mitigate those issues.

He adds that in conventional winemaking, if a wine is prone to stalling at the end of fermentation, they could add synthetic products to aid the yeast. However, in minimal intervention winemaking: ‘We could stir the wine to suspend the remaining active yeast and keep it warm (bring it out to the sun a bit each day) to help keep the yeast active through the finish.’

A fuzzy definition

Though Bilbro is aiding the process, it still fits into Sloan’s definition of minimal intervention. ‘Having the lowest amount of human-made or artificial inputs or enhancements in both the farming and the winemaking process.’

While this definition broadly summarises minimal intervention, the term can still be confusing for most consumers who don’t understand what is regulated or legal to use in farming and wine production.

This is why the term is often misused and misrepresented by consumers. ‘It is so disappointing to listen to a producer talk about their low intervention winemaking when you know the high input, commercially farmed vineyards they are purchasing their fruit from,’ says Hood White.

This is why she encourages consumers to ask questions and emphasises the message of how a lower intervention approach ‘always begins with farming’.

Purity remains elusive

Even still, large-production wineries aren’t the only ones that ultimately might adjust their wines post harvest.

Harrison explains that if a winemaker is adding acid it’s ‘because they truly believe it will make the wine in our glass more balanced, longer-lived, more complete’. It’s part of the winemaking process, and if a winery isn’t fortunate to have estate vineyards they can meticulously watch over, decisions must be made.

As winemakers are craftspeople, adds Harrison, they shouldn’t be chastised for doing their best work, even if that includes making adjustments in the cellar.

Until minimal intervention is globally defined or regulated, each winemaker will have their personal perception and ability to label their wines based on what this term means to them and how they produce wine according to it.

For the time being, it’s up to the consumer to engage with producers they prefer to help inform their own understanding of terms like minimal intervention and what they expect in wines that use that sort of marketing or labelling.

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Driving down Route 14 in Dundee, New York, a clear day reveals rolling hills of grape vines along either side of Seneca Lake. Seneca is the largest and deepest of the 11 glacially carved Finger Lakes in upstate New York. The lush terrain and diverse microclimates across its 61 kilometres are home to over 60 producers, including Nathan Kendall.

His name is becoming increasingly familiar to those watching New York’s growing wine scene. Kendall has topped various wine industry recognition lists over the last few years as a rapidly rising star in both New York and American wine. He calls the attention ‘truly humbling for a small-town person.’

Scroll down to see notes and scores for 10 wines from Nathan Kendall

‘Anything I read about the region, whether it be myself or anyone else, is a victory for the whole team,’ says Kendall. He is a rising tide lifting all ships in a place that means a lot to him. Kendall grew up locally, in a town with a population of just 1,700.

The experience seems to have grounded Kendall further in his efforts as a Finger Lakes winemaker and steward of the land. He is steadfast in his minimalist approach, embracing vintage variation and the authenticity of place.

Growing up in New York

Kendall’s love for New York is intrinsic. ‘My parents were drinking local back before it was trendy,’ he smiles.

Grape cultivation and winemaking is an older business here than people might think. Indigenous peoples are thought to have cultivated and harvested grapes after they arrived at the end of the last Ice Age. The first commercial Vitis labrusca plantings date back to 1829, with varieties that have since been given names connected with those same peoples, such as the Cayuga, Catawba, and Delaware.

The Vitis vinifera revolution didn’t hit this region until the 1960s led by Charles Fournier and Dr. Konstantin Frank.

With his mother working at Hermann J Wiemer and his best friend’s family farming grapes, Kendall grew up surrounded by viticulture. He quickly became intrigued by the concept of turning fruit into a delicious drink. By 18, he was working in tasting rooms and reading wine books voraciously.

Kendall pursued a business degree with wine in mind before deciding hands-on vineyard management and winemaking experience could be beneficial. Concurrently, his parents opened Hickory Hollow Wine Cellars on the southwest side of Seneca Lake.

‘I felt I had something I had to prove on my own,’ said Kendall, who chased harvests after school.

For five years, he travelled the world, starting in Sonoma before working in Willamette Valley; Waipara in New Zealand; the Mosel in Germany; and Adelaide Hills, Australia.

‘I expedited the learning process and completely avoided winter,’ says Nathan, laughing at the memory.

Coming into focus

Alongside sunnier days, Kendall’s time abroad allowed him to find his style: low to no intervention and letting the vintage and grape variety shine. He returned home in 2011, working for local wineries while honing his craft on the side.

‘I started making teeny batches of wine in the corner for fun and to work with the techniques I learned [abroad],’ Kendall explains. ‘I grew that every year until I just couldn’t balance the two, and my side hustle became more of a day job.’

This was the start of his namesake brand, Nathan K. In 2016, he took over winemaking for Hickory Hollow while also starting a natural wine project he called ‘chëpìka’ – which means ‘root’ in Lenape, the Algonquian language spoken by the Delaware tribe – with New York City-based sommelier Pascaline Lepeltier.

Today, Kendall operates all three brands, each with a separate focus. Nathan K. centres around Finger Lakes vinifera, while Hickory Hollow explores French-American hybrid grapes. For chëpìka he explores wines made from Vitis labrusca hybrids. ‘It’s been a fun little history project and a lesson in horticulture,’ he says.

Honouring home

Kendall’s style allows him to highlight the best of the Finger Lakes. In the vineyard, grapes are carefully selected by hand, allowing Kendall to avoid sorting on the press pad. His vinification methods are minimal, partly by necessity and partly by design. ‘I’m not working with any refrigeration, and my press is old enough to be my grandfather,’ he jokes.

In the cellar, he lets the cool-climate region shine. ‘I lean into the beauty we have here: higher acid, lower alcohol, more delicate wines in general.’ Kendall focuses on complexity through mouthfeel.

‘I like a little more texture in white wines, which I get through barrel ferments and lees ageing,’ he details. The reds are a fresher style, a little more fruit-forward. I like the whole cluster adds – they really make the fruit pop.’

Though Kendall has enough land for a future estate vineyard, he believes his purpose right now is to allow it to flourish naturally. Instead, he partners with three to four local grape growers annually to get the fruit he needs.

He tends to prefer working with neutral grapes like Chardonnay. ‘They’re a little more transparent in regards to understanding what you’re working with in the vineyard site,’ he explains. As such, Kendall determines the best possible use for the fruit he sources each year.

Championing hybrids

Making fine wines with hybrid grapes for chëpìka is more than just winemaking to Kendall – it’s a catalyst for necessary conversations. ‘I thought it was important to see if those varieties are still relevant,’ he says of the organic Catawba, Delaware, and Concord he sources for the brand.

These were among the most planted varieties during the early development of the Finger Lakes region, and with a less predictable climate, he finds them more relevant than ever.

Kendall suggests consumers should open their minds to new varieties to expand the industry. ‘It’s about being able to work with grapes in your backyard because not everyone can afford to live near the lake where the more tender vinifera thrives,’ he notes. ‘As long as you’re not biased about the specific species of grape, you can make something real nice.’

The brand chëpìka has also become a way to honour the region’s original inhabitants. ‘There are so many stories that aren’t told or preserved,’ Kendall says, disheartened by the forgotten history of New York’s indigenous communities. ‘It’s eye-opening and we figured we just have to have that uncomfortable conversation a lot of people want to ignore.’

Kendall and Lepeltier help keep these stories alive by donating proceeds to OJI:SDA Sustainable Indigenous Futures (a local non-profit organisation founded by indigenous people).

The wines also support the Literacy Volunteers of Yates County, which assists vineyard farmers with English language skills. ‘We thought it was important to take the proceeds from every bottle sold and put them towards something more noble,’ he says.

When asked what’s next, Kendall just smiles. ‘I just wake up grateful. I’m happy I’m here, and I try to do a little bit better than I did yesterday: get a little bit better extraction, a little more nuance, a little more precision on the sparkling. I just try to be a better version of the last time.’

10 wines from Finger Lakes maestro Nathan Kendall

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It is legitimate to hesitate before writing natural wine without inverted commas, given the difficulty in defining what might actually constitute natural wine. Despite the grey areas, and leaving aside the semantics of ‘natural’, there’s a general understanding that a natural wine will be made from organic grapes, with few or no additives or manipulation, probably with spontaneous fermentation and without fining or filtering.

This approach to vinification can take wines outside many peoples’ comfort zones, with the risk of excess volatile acidity, brettanomyces, and oxidation – but also a whole raft of other unfamiliar and frankly unpleasant aromas which incur the wrath and indignation of journalists who, in no uncertain terms, have largely branded natural wine as undrinkable in the past.

Scroll down to see notes and scores for 10 (non-stinky) Italian natural wines

Badge of honour

Producers tend to take two positions towards this criticism. The hard line is to trenchantly defend what would generally be considered winemaking faults as a testimony to a wine’s ‘naturalness’, and wear them as a badge of honour. The response I have often heard is that sommeliers, oenologists, journalists and the world at large don’t understand natural wine (and you may wonder what is there to understand… surely a wine is either enjoyable or not). I can’t help thinking there is a touch of victimism in this stance.

The softer line, adopted by many supporters of natural wine goes something like, ‘look beyond the unfamiliar at what lies behind, and learn to appreciate the vitality and spontaneity.’

This assumes that one needs to be inducted into natural wine, and probably change one’s tasting parameters, which actually works for many people who, after initial perplexity, become hooked on natural wines.

With some reservations, as a taster with an Italian wine guide that receives a lot of samples from natural winemakers, I would include myself in this category, although I also have to taste a lot of wines which I really wouldn’t want to drink.

A third way

A third position is also starting to emerge. I first heard it stated explicitly three years ago, during a cellar visit to a biodynamic producer in Puglia who declared, (verbatim), ‘Natural wines don’t stink!’

And in fact, his didn’t – they had pure, vibrant fruit, with depth and complexity. They were altogether very satisfying wines. This idea that natural wine shouldn’t be difficult to appreciate is being echoed increasingly at shows and tastings. Are we seeing the rehabilitation of natural wine? Are producers overcoming the problems that beset them in the past?

To try to find out, I went to the annual show of the VinNatur group at Gambellara in the Veneto to taste the wines and talk to the president of the association, wine producer Angiolino Maule. The VinNatur group was founded in 2006 with an initial 50 members from Italy and France, and has grown to its current 300 members in 12 countries.

Many of the wineries are young, small-scale and would probably not be familiar to anyone outside natural wine circles, but there are also a number of larger, well known and widely regarded members.

Associates have to adhere to a code of conduct which goes a long way beyond the much less stringent EU regulations for organic wine. It allows for a little flexibility in some areas, but is rigorous on the fundamentals of organic viticulture and the exclusion of additives in the cellar.

Every year, 40% of the member wineries are inspected by an external agency, and all the producers’ wines are sent to an independent laboratory to check for pesticide residue and the presence of sulphites above the limits specified in the code of conduct (50mg/l for whites; 30mg/l for reds).

The vast majority get the thumbs up. Any producer who does not conform can request a second chance, but after that the association is unforgiving.

A proactive approach

This approach, however, is not punitive but aims to be supportive and proactive. The association recognises that, in the words of Angiolino Maule, ‘it is 10 times more difficult to make a natural wine,’ and that ‘there is much to learn.’

This is one of the areas in which VinNatur is most active, funding research, for example, into procedures to avoid oxidation in wines without recourse to SO2, and into ways to reduce and hopefully eliminate the use of copper-based products in the vineyard.

There is a common perception that natural wine somehow makes itself, but in fact it involves an awful lot of science.

During tasting, I found some wines with slightly precarious balance, but on the whole I came away from the event with the impression that producers are increasingly showing us the positives of low intervention winemaking and fewer of the problematic aspects.

It confirmed my conviction that natural wine should not, and need not, be approached as a separate category which dictates criteria of judgement different to those of any other wine.

10 Italian natural wines that don’t stink:

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However, not all Manhattan-based wine stores are created equal, and seeking one that best suits your needs is a great place to start. Whether looking for well-aged greats from France and Italy or a unique selection of low-intervention or natural wines, Manhattan certainly has a well-stocked store for you; it’s simply a matter of knowing where to look.

We’ve done the hard work for you and rounded up a curated list of Manhattan’s best wine shops, and a couple from Brooklyn. Our picks cover a diverse array of selections and are situated across a variety of NYC neighbourhoods. In short? If you’re in Manhattan, access to great wine is likely just a few blocks away.

Manhattan

Millesima USA (Upper East Side)

Now located at its brand new address of 1257 Second Avenue at E. 66th Street, this long-standing New York icon debuts a new chapter of its historic story. Founded in 1983 in Bordeaux, the family-owned company opened its New York retail location back in 2006 and is best known for its luxurious design and fine wine / collectable offerings, though it doesn’t stop there. In addition to sought-after Bordeaux (the shop’s undeniable speciality), Millesima also offers a large array of mid-range drinkers from Burgundy and Champagne, as well as smaller lineups from America, the southern hemisphere, and the Iberian peninsula.

Astor Wines & Spirits (Greenwich Village)

For one of New York’s largest wine and spirits selections – as well as some of its lowest, unbeatable prices – look no further than Astor Wines & Spirits. Located at 399 Lafayette Street, this long-standing, warehouse-esque store is situated in a landmark 19th-century building and offers a massive variety of wines and spirits from around the world. Whether seeking out something quirky (a Sagrantino, Vermentino and Dolcetto pét-nat from Australia, anyone?) or gems for the cellar, Astor Wines & Spirits (hello, 2021 Chablis Grand Cru Valmur from Raveneau) truly has something for every wine drinker in the city. You likely won’t find the bottle you’re looking for at a better price. As of 2022, Astor Wines & Spirits officially became an employee-owned company and today stocks an impressive 5,000+ SKUs.

Crush Wine & Spirits (Midtown East)

Situated in Manhattan’s Midtown East neighbourhood, Crush Wine & Spirits was founded by native New Yorkers Drew Nieporent, Josh Guberman, and Robert Schagrin back in 2005. The shop focuses on its ‘pillar’ regions: Champagne, Burgundy, Piedmont, Beaujolais, Germany, Loire and Northern Rhône, though also offers a variety of selections from South America, Austria and beyond. Crush also has a Fine & Rare department providing corporate gifting services and one-on-one cellar building consulting. In addition, it regularly offers early access to special offers and discounts via email (be sure to sign up to the mailing list!). Current feature highlights include Pascal Cotat Sancerre, a White Burgundy selection dating back to 2008, and ‘Jura Rarities’ from Montbourgeau, Domaine du Pélican and Fumey-Chatelain.

Parcelle (Midtown West)

Every so often, a new wine shop comes to Manhattan’s scene and gives its historic counterparts a run for their money. Such is the case for Parcelle, which first opened its doors back in 2018. Spearheaded by sommelier Grant Reynolds, Parcelle marks the first retail concept for the city’s beloved Delicious Hospitality Group, which is best known as the brains behind Charlie Bird, Pasquale Jones and Legacy Records. The shop offers a variety of daily drinkers and mid-range offerings, as well as a Fine & Rare section that promises to wow collectors of all stripes (think large-format Champagne, back-vintage Mascarello and more). Parcelle offers a daily deal, which is easily found at the top of its website and, as of summer 2022, also has a partner wine bar at 135 Division Street that offers similar by-the-glass pours and regular on-site events.

Somm Cellars (Upper West Side)

Like Parcelle, Somm Cellars is also a welcome new addition to Manhattan’s wine shop scene. Owned by friends (and industry vets) Jason Jacobeit and Daniel Jung, formerly of Bâtard and Tribeca Grill, respectively, Somm Cellars seeks to bring a curated array of wines and spirits to New York’s Upper West Side with an emphasis on high-level hospitality and inclusivity. The shop is situated on the ground floor of One Waterline Square, which doubles as the perfect backdrop for hosting a variety of events. The team sends out daily email offers featuring discounted back-vintage bottles (recent offers include 1983 Château Talbot, St-Julien and Robert Chevillon wines dating back to 1997) and also sells an array of accessories, including Zalto and Riedel glassware along with Coravin preservation devices.

Chambers Street Wines (Tribeca)

Deemed one of the OG natural wine stores in New York, Chambers Street Wines’ massive influence on the industry still reverberates today. Founded in 2001 by David Lillie and Jamie Wolff, this artisanal wine-focused staple recently moved from its original location at 149 Chambers Street down to 79 Chambers Street, yet its focus remains the same. Chambers has long pioneered small-batch wines from growers committed to sustainability, with an emphasis on the Loire Valley, Burgundy, Piedmont and Austria. In the words of the shop: ‘Every wine we stock is tasted, re-tasted, debated,’ and the commitment to authenticity, coupled with the shop’s knowledgeable staff, is undeniably what’s made it a Manhattan wine staple for over 20 years.

Flatiron Wines & Spirits (Flatiron)

Flatiron Wine & Spirits has been an institution in the Flatiron / Union Square / NoMad area since its opening in 2012. Last year, the shop relocated from its original 21st / 22nd Street location to a roomier space on 18th and Broadway, allowing for on-site events, classes – and, of course, more carefully sourced wines. In addition to a robust Burgundy section, what Flatiron does best is its daily drinker selection, with a plentiful amount of bottles clocking in between the $15 and $25 dollar price points. Whether classically styled bottles or more eccentric natural wines are what you’re after, this well-curated shop’s got something for every price point.

Wine Therapy (Nolita)

Natural wine lovers in the know are no strangers to the powerful impact that Wine Therapy has had on the city’s burgeoning, low-intervention wine scene. Founded in 2005 by Jean-Baptiste Humbert, Wine Therapy began pioneering eclectic, off-the-beaten-path grape varieties, regions and producers far before doing so was fashionable, and today continues to stock its shelves with the same ethos as day one. Expect classic natural wine pillars such as Les Capriades, Agnès et René Mosse, and Fabien Jouves to grace the shelves, as well as more eccentric picks from Greece, Slovenia and beyond. (The shop also boasts an impressive lineup of rosé, orange wines and pét-nats.) Wine Therapy also offers curated cases and free local delivery, as well as delivery throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn for an added fee.

Brooklyn

Leon & Son (Clinton Hill)

In the realm of Brooklyn wine shop offerings, Leon & Son has completely changed the game. Founded by industry veteran Chris Leon back in 2015, the shop fervently (and successfully) pursued its initial goal of becoming Clinton Hill’s go-to neighbourhood wine shop – and has since taken the entire borough by storm. Focused on ‘hidden gem wines from progressive and natural winemakers’, Leon’s selection highlights classics and newcomers alike while shedding equal light on classic regions (Piedmont, Burgundy, Champagne) and lesser-known areas in other countries (Portugal, Australia, and South Africa).

Brooklyn Wine Exchange (Cobble Hill)

Situated on the border of Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill, Brooklyn Wine Exchange first opened its doors in 2009 and has since become a pillar in the borough’s off-premise wine industry. The shop’s friendly staff and easy-to-navigate site make exploring new wines easy and hassle free, with prompts like ‘chilled reds’, ‘crisp mineral whites’, ‘certified biodynamic’ and ‘vegan-friendly’ promising to lead new drinkers and seasoned wine lovers alike to something new and exciting. The shop also offers annual memberships for $100, with benefits including 10% off wines and 5% off most spirits with every in-person or online purchase. We’d also be remiss not to highlight the impeccably curated spirits selection, which features a variety of classic whiskies and agave-based spirits, as well as amari, liqueurs and vermouths.

Additional wine shop recommendations in Manhattan:

Beaupierre Wine & Spirits (Hell’s Kitchen)

Morrell Wine (Midtown)

Pasanella & Son Vintners (Downtown / South Street Seaport)

Tribeca Wine Merchants (Tribeca)

Convive Wine & Spirits (East Village)

Discovery Wines (Lower East Side)

Wine & Unwind (Harlem)

Grape Collective (Upper West Side)

Eastside Cellars (Upper East Side)

Additional wine shop recommendations in Brooklyn

Vine Wine (Williamsburg)

Smith & Vine (Carroll Gardens)

VyneYard (Prospect Lefferts Gardens)

Slope Cellars (Park Slope)

Thirst Wine Merchants (Fort Greene)

Good Wine (Park Slope)

Vanderbilt Ave Wine Merchants (Prospect Heights)

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It all started from a single plot in ‘Contrada Fossa di Lupo’. Arianna Occhipinti acquired the first hectare of bush vines when she moved back to her hometown in Sicily, Vittoria, after having obtained an enology degree from the University of Milan.

Encouraged by her uncle, Giusto Occhipinti, who had co-founded the renowned COS estate, she established a garage winery, relying on rudimentary equipment and embracing a minimalist philosophy from day one.

Scroll down to see tasting notes and scores for Arianna Occhipinti’s wines

When telling her story during my visit to the estate, she confessed that starting from scratch had been anything but easy.

‘While being Sicily’s only DOCG wine because of its historical relevance, Cerasuolo di Vittoria was virtually unknown, and the local Frappato grape had almost disappeared,’ she explained.

‘Rescuing forsaken old vineyards has been the toughest job: their owners received subsidies to uproot them, so they were reluctant to hand them out to a young farmer.’

Obstinacy, extreme passion, and a clear vision allowed her to reverse the downward spiral and become one of the most critically acclaimed independent growers of her generation.

Twenty harvests later, the influence of Arianna Occhipinti’s work goes beyond the up-and-coming Vittoria area and the Frappato variety, which she almost single-handedly put back on the international wine map.

Many talented emerging producers in Sicily admit having drawn inspiration from her game-changing approach: an almost Burgundian take on low-intervention winemaking mixed with Mediterranean viticultural know-how.

Arianna Occhipinti

Location: Vittoria, southeastern Sicily

Date established: 2004

Area under vine: 40 hectares

Age of the vineyards: Seven to 65 years.

Key grapes: Frappato, Nero d’Avola, Zibibbo, Albanello, Grillo.

Total production: approximately 150,000 bottles

Winemaking style: low-intervention, with grapes sourced from biodynamically farmed vineyards.

The quest for finesse

By making some of the brightest and juiciest wines in Italy, Arianna Occhipinti’s success stems, in part, from her unique ability to defy the stereotypes that Sicilian reds are simply hearty and jammy.

‘Vittoria is no Etna,’ Arianna explains. ‘Our vineyards are located in the southernmost corner of Eastern Sicily, and lie south of Tunis. Temperatures here often outstrip 40 degrees during summer, and annual rainfalls rarely exceed 300 millimetres.’

So how does she achieve a mid-weight and airy style that often draws parallels to Burgundy red?

The answer may lie beneath the ground: ‘Vineyards in Vittoria lie on an ancient seabed consisting of layers of sand and white limestone,’ explains Arianna.

‘The presence of the latter is crucial, as it absorbs the light, and lowers soil temperatures. It also drains water at the top, then releases it slowly during the driest months.’

Even Nero d’Avola, a grape known for giving smooth wines with slightly candied fruit, acquires a racier personality in the area around Vittoria.

‘All misconceptions about Nero d’Avola derive from producers having planted it on heavy clay-rich soils, especially in western Sicily,’ Arianna continues. ‘When planted on white limestone with little clay, it retains outstanding acidity, Champagne-like low PH, and moderate alcohol.’

Frappato’s unique identity

Genetic ties to Sangiovese, Nerello Mascalese and Gaglioppo all contribute to shaping the peculiar identity of Frappato, the indigenous grape she brought to fame.

When asked why she decided to market a mono-varietal Frappato as the estate’s flagship wine instead of relying on Cerasuolo di Vittoria’s typical blend of Nero d’Avola and Frappato, Arianna replies: ‘I conducted research on Frappato while studying enology, and realised it shared features like small berries, a thick skin, a light colour and high natural acidity with some of the best grapes in the world. The few single-variety versions available at the time were simple and easy going but I wanted to prove it could produce world-class wine.’

Late ripening and low-cropping, Frappato vines were frequently abandoned, especially in times when Sicilian farmers were often earning little more than €0.15 cents per kilo by selling grapes to cooperatives.

‘It only gives one bunch per shoot, yielding between 20 and 45 hectoliters per hectare. But it also accumulates sugar slowly, so alcohol falls in the 11-13% range,’ Arianna adds.

Frappato is also especially good for terroir expression, as shown by the three ‘vini di contrada’, originating from single vineyards within the commune of Vittoria.

‘The aim with them is to highlight the fact that variations in soil composition lead to significant differences in the aromatic profile,’ says Arianna.

Five out of 10 wines in the portfolio currently originate from a specific contrada, including her top-shelf, mono-varietal Grillo, called ‘Santa Margherita’ (‘SM’ for short), a recent addition to the line-up. Planted on white sandy-calcareous marl, Grillo behaves similarly to Frappato and Nero d’Avola, retaining impressively high acidity (often above 7g/l).

In the vineyard

Total vineyard plantings amount to 40 hectares on a plateau that ranges between 250 and 280 metres above sea level, within sight of the Iblean mountains and the Mediterranean Sea lying some 20 kilometres away as the crow flies.

Benefiting from the strongest solar radiation in Europe outside of Southern Spain, and from constant drying winds, disease pressure is usually minimal. ‘In a favourable vintage, you only need to treat the vines two or three times with copper and sulphur,’ notes Arianna.

Having started to follow the development of the natural wine movement in Italy while studying in Milan, Arianna also implemented biodynamic practices in her dry-farmed parcels, and she is currently considering obtaining biodynamic certification.

In the cellar

Harvest normally starts in the second week of September, and takes up to three weeks to complete. While the Nero d’Avola, Zibibbo, Albanello and Grillo are fully destemmed, up to 20% of the Frappato undergoes whole-bunch fermentation, which further enhances its sweetness, and adds a touch of herbal freshness.

As Arianna says: ‘Frappato’s small berries and ripe stems facilitate this process. With Nero d’Avola you can’t do the same as it tends to have greener stems.’

Fermentation occurs spontaneously and with little or no temperature control in concrete tanks. The reds then spend between two to four weeks on their skins, and punching down and pumping over are carried out as gently as possible to avoid excess extraction. Maceration for the whites varies from 48 hours for Grillo up to 12 days for the likes of Zibibbo and Albanello.

The Zibibbo, Albanello and the entry-level reds mature in concrete. The Nero d’Avola, Grillo and Frappato for the single-varietal wines normally spend between 12 and 16 months in 5,000 litre Slavonian and Austrian oak casks, and the Cerasuolo di Vittoria blend rests in French oak casks for at least 32 months.

The wines are then bottled unfiltered and unfined, with only minimal additions of sulphur dioxide.

The wines

Arianna Occhipinti’s wines have become increasingly refined and focused over time. At times they may still show a touch of reduction or just a bit of funkiness upon opening – derived from the uncompromising winemaking style, but never so much as to detract from their overall sense of purity.

Most importantly, they constantly evolve in the glass, taking on different shades after exposure to oxygen and retaining their freshness for days.

The 100% Frappato wines usually steal the show with their intoxicating aromatics and tremendous early-drinking appeal, yet the ‘Grotte Alte Cerasuolo di Vittoria’ and ‘Siccagno’, a pure Nero d’Avola, also deserve attention.

They may be less immediate at first, displaying a more structured palate and requiring longer to become fully expressive, but evolve gracefully in bottle, as shown by excellent back vintages of Siccagno (2014 and 2016) tasted recently.

The introduction of the ‘SM’ bianco marks yet another milestone: even though Grillo is commonly associated with western Sicily, it is likely to become a benchmark wine for the variety.

Looking ahead, Arianna has also started a new project to revive cork production in Sicily.

‘A large cork forest lies only 20 minutes away from Vittoria: it was nearly abandoned, so I started collaborating with a local cork producer who sources raw materials from there,’ she says. ‘It isn’t just a matter of achieving better quality control: the work of artisans is also essential for the preservation of ancient crafts and rural landscapes.’

Arianna Occhipinti: Latest vintages

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Whether heavy-hitting grands crus, low-intervention up-and-comers, or back-vintage bottles are what you’re after, when it comes to drinking great Burgundy in France, there’s absolutely no need to leave country’s beautiful capital city (though we’d definitely recommend a trip down to Dijon or Beaune, should your stay allow it). Curious where to go? Check out eight of the best places to drink Burgundy in Paris, from budget-friendly bistros to fancier fine dining establishments.

Ambassade de Bourgogne

6 Rue de l’Odéon, 75006

As the name implies, Ambassade de Bourgogne is a great place to start when looking for Burgundy in Paris. This part wine bar, part wine shop is the only establishment exclusively dedicated to Burgundian wines in the City of Lights, and its quaint Left Bank location offers a quiet reprieve for enjoying your bounty. The 26-page wine list boasts a number of offerings, from young up-and-comers such as Berthaut-Gerbet to long-standing classics such as Gouges, Roumier and more. The bar offers a handful of small bites, though we’d recommend not arriving too hungry – the wine is the star of the show. Ambassade de Bourgogne is open seven days a week, with hours from 10am to 11pm on Tuesday through Saturday and shorter hours on Sunday and Monday.

Caves Legrand

1 Rue de la Banque, 75002

Situated inside the breathtaking Galerie Vivienne, Caves Legrand has been serving wine lovers within its four gorgeous walls since 1880. Now spearheaded by Arnaud Tronche, formerly of Racines in New York, the bar/cave’s programme is better than ever – and a plethora of Burgundian gems is just waiting to be discovered. While some off-the-beaten-path bottles can be found, the selection at Caves Legrand definitely errs on the more traditional side of things, and while the offerings aren’t cheap, the ambiance is absolutely worth it. In addition to the on-site restaurant, La Table des Caves, the wine shop portion of Caves Legrand doubles as a wine bar, offering light snacks, by-the-glass-pours, and reasonable corkage fees.

Les Climats

41 Rue de Lille, 75007

For elevated French cuisine and extensive Burgundian wine offerings served up in a stunning Art Nouveau-inspired space – or a charming ‘secret’ garden, should you prefer –Les Climats is just the ticket. This Michelin star restaurant, located in the former Maison des Dames des Postes, offers refined-yet-innovative takes on traditional French fare, with menu offerings based on seasonal availability of products. The restaurant’s stunning stained glass windows and ornate brass fixtures are only outdone by the massive glass-walled cellars, which are naturally where the stars of the show are housed. Fair warning, a meal at Les Climats isn’t the cheapest, but it promises to be one of your most memorable.

La Compagnie des Vins Surnaturels

7 Rue Lobineau, 75006

Known for its sister establishments in New York and London, the Paris output of La Compagnie des Vins Surnaturels was the original wine-focused opening of the Experimental Group. Located just a hop, skip and a jump away from the Saint-Germain Market, this Left Bank wine bar offers a sultry, dimly lit ambiance for enjoying a variety of wines – solid Burgundy offerings included. Spearheaded by the talented Fabien Suquet – who traded the City of Lights’ post for New York’s popular location – La Compagnie’s 600 carefully curated selections promise to please a variety of preferences. Small, tapas-style bites are also available; open from 6pm to 1am daily (a serious win for those looking for somewhere to drink late-night on Sundays or Mondays).

Lavinia

22 Av. Victor Hugo, 75116

Established in 1999, Lavinia has been a staple wine purveyor for Parisian wine lovers for over two decades. Now spearheaded by both Charlotte Servant, daughter of the original founders of Lavinia, and Matthieu Le Priol, Lavinia presents an impressive selection of over 6,500 wines and spirits sourced from 30 different countries, with 340+ references hailing from Burgundy. While certainly a great place to stock up on bottles to bring home, Lavinia also offers a space to enjoy purchases on-site, no corkage fee required – a rare feat to find amongst Paris’ wine scene. Heads up: While numerous past articles reference Lavinia’s 2nd arrondissement location, the shop has since moved to the city’s posh 16th arrondissement.

Vantre

19 Rue de la Fontaine au Roi, 75011

Nearly all wine industry professionals will agree – when it comes to drinking great wine (Burgundy included) in Paris, there’s no better restaurant to visit than Vantre. Founded by Canada-born Marco Pelletier, formerly the head sommelier at Tallivent and Epicure at the Hotel Le Bristol, Vantre first opened its doors in 2016 and has been captivating the hearts of wine lovers ever since. The bar’s Bible-like wine list boasts a jaw-dropping amount – around 3,000 references (with a similar quantity off the list) – including current releases, back vintages and large formats from natural-focused producers and classic estates alike. Come hungry, come thirsty – just don’t come on Saturday or Sunday, as the restaurant is closed on weekends.

Le Villaret

13 Rue Ternaux, 75011

Originally from northern France, chef Olivier Gaslain established Le Villaret in Paris’ 11th arrondissement back in 1992. For the past three decades, his bistro-inspired, seasonally-focused French fare has garnered the attention of locals and visitors alike – though the restaurant’s wine list is of equal renown. Today, Le Villaret’s list offers approximately 1,000 references, a good number of which hail from Burgundy. Fair warning, the menu leans meat heavy, so a call in advance to ask about dietary restrictions is recommended. (The space is pretty tiny, so reservations are encouraged regardless.)

Willi’s Wine Bar

13 Rue des Petits Champs, 75001

Willi’s Wine Bar has found itself atop Best Parisian Wine Bar lists for decades, and it’s really no surprise why. Tucked away on the Rue des Petits Champs, this diamond in the rough offers a place to drink seriously good wine at a not-so-serious price, and in a part of town rather overrun by tourist traps, no less. Originally from England, Mark Williamson opened Willi’s – which is named after a former neighbourhood dog – back in 1980. While the focus has long been on Rhône wines, an extensive offering of well-priced Burgundy is never in lack. Stop by after your jaunt at the Louvre, or simply stop in for a bottle before hitting the Tuileries to make the most out of this beautiful-yet-touristy part of town.

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New York City boasts one of the most robust – and diverse – natural wine scenes in the world, featuring everything from up-and-coming producers to cult favourites and beyond. While the scene’s offerings quickly expand across outer boroughs, Manhattan is still home to a slew of great places to drink. Not sure where to begin? Check out the best places to drink natural wine in Gotham below.

La Compagnie des Vins Surnaturels

249 Centre St, New York, NY 10013

Beloved by wine novices and industry folk alike, La Compagnie des Vins Surnaturels finds itself atop most best New York wine bar lists, and it’s no surprise. Founded by the group behind Experimental Cocktail Club, the bar’s sultry environment provides the perfect backdrop for casual dates or post-work drinks with friends. While the list incorporates a lengthy array of wine styles, it errs on the natural side of things, boasting ample selections from both Old and New World regions. Chef Eric Bolyard’s Mediterranean-inspired small plates and tasty snacks are produced from locally-sourced ingredients, which pair perfectly with the bar’s expansive bottle list. Fair warning, this may be your new favourite wine bar.

Parcelle

135 Division St, New York, NY 10002

Spearheaded by the brains behind the original namesake retail shop, Parcelle’s latest on-premise output is quickly becoming the go-to spot for both locals and industry folk. Decked out in Italian modernist-inspired furniture – curated in conjunction with designer Paul Renwick – the bar’s trendy-yet-welcoming atmosphere is perfect for enjoying a glass (or bottle) amongst friends. The bar’s list is broken into approachable sections, ranging from Natural to Chilled Reds to Under $75 and beyond. Don’t sleep on the Last Chance section, which regularly highlights a handful of on-their-way-out gems.

Peoples Wine Bar

115 Delancey St, New York, NY 10002

‘Wine of the people, by the people, and for the people’ – that’s the motto at Lower East Side-based Peoples Wine Bar. They were founded in 2019 by Jeremiah Stone, Fabián von Hauske Valtierra and Daryl Nuhn, three self-proclaimed longtime supporters of natural wine. This friendly neighbourhood bar focuses on the stories (and faces) behind the bottle, both at the bar and in the neighbouring retail shop. The trio’s passion for environmentally-friendly farming and socio-political issues collide at this new to-the-scene spot, which is simply unmissable for natural wine lovers.

Ruffian

125 E 7th St, New York, NY 10009

Located in the heart of the East Village, Ruffian has become an institution for New York-based natural wine drinkers. Founded in 2016, this small-yet-cosy bar – now with ample heated sidewalk seating – features a primarily vegetarian menu, available in both à la carte and tasting menu formats (gluten-free and vegan options are also available). The bar is best known for its extensive skin-contact wine offerings and its vast selection from eastern Europe. In-person classes are regularly hosted (eight people per class maximum), and the use of the bar as a private event space is also available.

St. Jardim

183 W 10th St, New York, NY 10014

Situated in the former location of long-standing West Village haunt Bar Sardine, St. Jardim officially opened its doors last year and has quickly become one of the neighbourhood’s buzziest places to eat and drink. Founded by Andrew Dete and Christa Alexander, alongside consulting chef Tony Nassif (Black Seed Bagels), this homey nook offers freshly shucked oysters, Mediterranean-inspired small plates, and Lebanese fare. All are served up alongside a small yet well-curated all-natural wine list. Expect a solid selection of bubbles, ample skin-contact pours, and a variety of red and white Old World favourites (as well as the Last Call section).

Skin Contact

76 Orchard St, New York, NY 10002

Finding top-notch places to drink tasty natural wine that won’t break the bank can be a difficult feat in Manhattan these days, though thankfully, Skin Contact offers a pleasant reprieve. Founder Eben Lillie, son of the founder of Chambers Street Wines, grew up around – and developed a passion for – natural wines at a young age. This is reflected in the bar’s friendly yet knowledgeable environment. Sidewalk, backyard and indoor seating are all available and an average glass of wine will run you less than $15 a pour. Expect a 200-ish selection list and around 15 by-the-glass pours at any given moment.

Soda Club

155 Avenue B, New York, NY 10009

Vegan wine and pasta bar? Sign us up. Located on Avenue B, Soda Club is the newest plant-based, all-natural-wine-focused establishment from Overthrow Hospitality. The bar’s extensive 200-bottle list is curated by co-owner and wine director Drew Brady, who hand selects every bottle with the kitchen’s meticulously-executed pasta dishes in mind. While you may be sceptical about vegan pasta, we honestly cannot rave about the place enough. From bucatini arrabbiata to cappelletti with morel mushrooms, vegetable brodo, smoked olive oil and more, the kitchen’s flavour-packed dishes provide something for every palate – wine included. Pull up a velvet chair and get ready to discover your new favourite date night spot.

The Ten Bells

247 Broome St, New York, NY 10002

It’s impossible to discuss the history of New York’s natural wine scene without mentioning The Ten Bells. Founded in 2008 in the city’s Lower East Side neighbourhood, the bar was one of the first natural wine-exclusive establishments to open up shop in town. And at a time when the style was far less fashionable than it is today. Expect small plates, tapas, and $1 oyster happy hours to grace the bar’s food menu, which is offered alongside $18 carafes of wine from opening through 7 pm daily. Gather around the wraparound bar, peruse the bible-like list, and raise a glass to this foundational, long-standing natural wine institution.

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Home to various bars and restaurants, this bustling New York borough has something to offer every palate preference, with an insider’s perspective. Check out 10 top places to drink natural wine in Kings County.

& Sons Ham Bar (Prospect Lefferts Gardens)

447 Rogers Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11225

& Sons Ham Bar is one of the newest – and most exciting – places to enjoy natural wine, especially if you’re a big fan of ham. This small, 20-seat joint offers an impressive list of curated country hams and a variety of cheeses, ribs and small plates. The bar’s all-American wine list offers five reds and five whites by the glass at all times, as well as a handful of rosé and bubbles. According to the establishment, & Sons Ham Bar celebrates the ‘culture, heritage, and flavour of America’s charcuterie’ while highlighting a variety of international cured sausages, pâtés, and more.

The Four Horsemen (Williamsburg)

295 Grand St, Brooklyn, NY 11211

In the realm of natural wine bars, The Four Horsemen is simply the OG. Co-owned by LCD Soundsystem’s James Murphy, his wife Christina Topsøe and Justin Chearno, this small-yet-fierce Williamsburg haunt was pioneering natural wine far before it was fashionable. Their 57-page wine list runs French-heavy. Yet hundreds of gems from all over the world are available – with many below the $100 (£95) mark. By-the-glass offerings generally come in beneath the $15 (£13) price point, which is unheard of in the city these days. Expect expertly-crafted small plates and an overall relaxing ambience.

Have & Meyer (Williamsburg)

103 Havemeyer St, Brooklyn, NY 11211

Looking to taste through a slew of natural wines without a full bottle commitment? Have & Meyer is the place to be. This Williamsburg establishment offers over 90 natural wines by the glass at any given moment, making discovering new, low-intervention wines to love more effortless than ever. The list is concentrated on Italian producers. Food highlights sustainable Italian fare, including burrata, seasonal salads and various savoury pasta dishes. Whether the dimly lit interior or buzzy sidewalk seating is more your style, one thing’s for sure – this place promises a seriously memorable time.

June (Cobble Hill)

231 Court St, Brooklyn, NY 11201

Since its opening in 2015, June has become a go-to favourite for Brooklyn-based natural wine lovers, particularly those with an affinity with European hits. Located in the borough’s Cobble Hill neighbourhood, this cosy, brick-lined bar focuses on off-the-beaten-path hits – think sparkling skin-contact wines from central Italy and aromatic white blends from Germany and central Europe. Food offerings range from bite-sized olives to larger steak and fish-based entrées, though the true gems lie in the small plates section (don’t skip on the whipped ricotta, grilled squash, and Tokyo turnips). On warm weather days, head to the back and check out the bar’s cosy patio.

King Mother (Ditmas Park)

1205 Cortelyou Rd, Brooklyn, NY 11218

Although Ditmas Park hasn’t reached peak popularity as other Brooklyn neighbourhoods, up-and-coming places are popping up left and right, with Cortelyou Road as the area’s epicentre. Founded by Erika Lesser and Katie Richey in 2019, this laid-back wine bar highlights convivial food offerings (fondue, raclette and more), as well as Schaller & Weber hot dogs, schnitzel and a variety of salads. All this is served alongside a slew of natural, organic and biodynamic wine offerings. Best of all, each wine on the list boasts a small anecdote from the bar’s owners, making navigating the list’s offerings easy and accessible.

LaLou (Prospect Heights)

581 Vanderbilt Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11238

Vanderbilt Avenue is home to a slew of great places to eat and drink, though when it comes to the street’s best wine list, LaLou is where it’s at. Founded by beloved New York restaurateur Joe Campanale, this airy wine bar features a diverse natural wine list with an Old-World concentration alongside well-crafted small plates and snacks. The emphasis is on French and Italian bottles. Whether you sit at the bar peering into the open kitchen, or enjoying the back patio, LaLou offers a friendly, low-key atmosphere dominated by local wine lovers.

PIPS (Brooklyn Heights)

129 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11201

Created by the team behind Colonie and Gran Electrica, PIPS is Brooklyn Heights’ newest place for natural wine, Italian-inspired apéritifs and other delicious libations. Influenced by the flavours and flare of coastal Italy, PIPS’ flavour-packed small plates are outdone by their seafood and pasta dishes. They all pair beautifully with the bar’s solid selection of low-intervention wines, available both by the glass and by the bottle – think skin-fermented Italian Pignoletto, chillable red blends from Matthiasson and everything in between.

Rhodora Wine Bar (Fort Greene)

197 Adelphi St, Brooklyn, NY 11205

Founded by the same brains behind June, Rhodora Wine Bar first opened its Fort Greene-based doors in 2019. Upon converting the space’s wood-fired restaurant into a full-blown wine bar, proprietor Henry Rich’s main goal with the spot is to follow a zero-waste model. Expect favourites from Corsica, central Italy and Spain’s Catalonia region to be served with European-inspired bites – such as rillettes, tinned fish and more. Pop in after an afternoon at Fort Greene park and enjoy. Follow along on Instagram to stay tuned on Rhodora’s latest pop-ups and events.

Sauced (Williamsburg)

331 Bedford Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11211

Conveniently located on Williamsburg’s bustling Bedford Avenue, Sauced offers a quiet reprieve from the energy of the neighbourhood’s busy streets. Founder Jordan Veran purposely created the spot without a list or menu to personally lead guests to their perfect bottle based on preference and personal taste. The bar’s quaint indoor ambience is somehow surpassed by its cosy backyard, which is home to a variety of outdoor games, as well as frequently hosting live music, karaoke nights, and more. Simply put, walking into Sauced feels like entering your best friend’s home.

Terre (Park Slope)

341 5th Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11215

Looking for a new casual date night spot that promises a unique experience every time? Park Slope-based Terre is just the ticket. Founded by the same folks behind Have & Meyer, this similarly conceptualised model offers over 100 natural wines by the glass at all times (making repeat selections only possible if you find something you truly love). Insider tip: come hungry – the bar/restaurant’s extensive charcuterie and homemade pasta offerings are to die for. (The folks at Terre have also opened D’Antan, in Crown Heights. This Italian-focused joint offers over 100 natural wines by the glass at any moment.)

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I first contributed to Decanter back in November 1988; the hundreds of columns and articles I’ve written since constitute a journey of discovery. I squirm, though, if I’m described as a ‘wine expert’. Whatever wine knowledge we acquire quickly cools, congeals and crusts over, like custard or gravy, as the years pass. The wine world expands at a clip. Every vintage rewrites history.

It’s the chance to share discoveries – not just about wines, but about people, places and the act of drinking itself – which makes work in this field such a privilege. The Académie du Vin Library is publishing a collection of my writings on wine (many of them originally written for Decanter or ‘Jefford on Monday’ on decanter.com, though all have been revised) in September: the book is called Drinking with the Valkyries. It’s my book of discoveries.

It’s not scholarship, nor a reference tome; it won’t get you through your WSET Diploma, help stock your cellar or land you a job in Beaune. The book is about feeling, tasting and describing the beauty of wine, as well as understanding the intensity of emotion that wine can engender. Thirty-four years on, those are the things that mean the most to me.

Telling stories

I began as an imposter, writing an introductory book on Port without ever having had the chance even to visit Portugal. It was that book which opened the Decanter door – and many others, since I quickly learned (by contacting Port producers, including the thoughtful and intuitive 23-year-old Dirk Niepoort, the charming, courteous Cristiano van Zeller and wise elder statesman Michael Symington) that the wine world liked nothing more than to tell its stories. I leapt at the chance to tell these stories for a living, and was soon off and about, discovering as voraciously as I could.

The timing was fortunate: the pace of wine change will surely never be as frenzied as it was between 1990 and 2020. When I arrived at the then 13-year-old Decanter, its remit was European classics; by the time I began my column for the magazine a decade later, what was called the ‘New World’ was firmly in the ascendant. This was a time of blithe innocence: flying winemakers such as Hugh Ryman and Jacques and François Lurton raced like swifts about the skies. We chased after them, without ever realising that the tonnes of carbon dioxide we deposited in the process might, a couple of decades later, pose problems.

What those winemakers brought was literacy and confidence, not formulae and rigidity; they enabled many of the hidden, overlooked or nascent places in the wine world to find their voice, and step into prominence. They soon rendered themselves superfluous: job done.

Having been Old World and then New World, Decanter has now settled down into being One World: much of the running over the past few years has been made by countries like Georgia, Greece, Croatia and Slovenia, as long-forgotten varieties and traditions assume a new, contemporary importance. Germany and Austria are changed utterly; Italy, Spain and Portugal walk tall with France; the post-Parker era in the fine-wine world brings a new plurality of aesthetic approaches in Bordeaux, Napa and elsewhere; Burgundy’s apotheosis has come, with alarming showers of gold; while Australia, New Zealand, Argentina and Chile apply themselves more seriously than ever before to the grown-up challenges of making true wines of place. No single individual can track even a fraction of this change, which is why it’s our group work as a press cohort which matters more than any individual byline. My respect for my knowledge-gathering colleagues grows with every year, and I salute those younger writers prepared to take up the wine discovery challenge with energy and imagination.

Challenges ahead

Place forms the core of wine’s beauty, leaving its quiet print on every wine, even the most modest… though never more memorably than when distinguished sites and well-adapted varieties combine with limpid winemaking. When I think about my work, I think about places. It was the realisation (some time in 1974, when I was working as a nursing assistant) that wine is an emotional and sensual way of apprehending place, and thereby drawing closer to our earthly home, that has driven me throughout.

It now comes with alarm. There are shadows across the world of wine; these provide the substance of two sections of the book. The dual challenge of decarbonising our atmosphere and checking the extinction episode we have haplessly set in train will dominate the century to come, and wine (as the world’s most prized, most scrutinised and most lavishly rewarded agricultural product) cannot escape its key part in tracking climate change and our response to it. Nothing, now, can be taken for granted in wine. Shock after shock lies ahead.

I urge every reader to enjoy wine thoughtfully, which means seeing it in its largest context: not only a way for us to celebrate what we have, but to ensure it has a future. Ground your wine-drinking in discovery; let it bring you closer to the earth, to the other, to difference and to place; use it to deepen friendship, family ties, shared experiences, human solidarity, planetary custodianship. If my little book can help readers to reach wine’s widest horizons, I’ll be happy.

In my glass this month

I hugely enjoyed, with two old friends, the Agrapart, Minéral Blanc de Blancs Extra Brut 2013 – a zero-dosage blanc de blancs Champagne that was rich, bready, saline, almost opulent. Truly ‘mineral’? Yes, if you like, meaning its beauty of flavour was unfruity, suggesting in some way trodden stone, worked earth. Billecart-Salmon’s impeccably sculpted Louis Salmon Blanc de Blancs Brut 2008, launched during the DWWA judging week, epitomised that ‘mineral’ character still more memorably. Wonderful wines.

Drinking with the Valkyries: Writings on Wine by Andrew Jefford is published by the Académie du Vin Library (£25, September 2022). Use the code DECANTER22 when ordering at academieduvinlibrary.com for a £5 discount.

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Electric pink, burnished orange, pineapple yellow, ochre, coral, deep ruby, blood red: the possibilities are endless. But always effervescent. Pét-nat – the now widely accepted shorthand for ‘pétillant naturel’ – is a style of sparkling wine that has deep historical roots. It’s thought to be the oldest method of making sparkling wine, pre-dating Champagne, hence its alternative name: méthode ancestrale.

Unlike Champagne, which undergoes two fermentations, the second of which takes place in the bottle to create the fizz, the méthode ancestrale involves bottling the wine before it completes its first fermentation. The process continues in the bottle, capturing the resulting CO2 to produce a bubbly wine. There is no dosage (in traditional-method sparkling wines, the addition of sugar after the second fermentation to determine the final sweetness), and most are bottled using a simple crown cap, like you would see on a bottle of beer or a soft drink – although you do occasionally see some with a cork and cage.

Scroll down to see tasting notes and scores for 30 top pét-nat wines

The price point for a pét-nat is often more approachable compared to Champagne, so it offers vibrant bubbles that can be enjoyed at any time, no matter the occasion. Pét-nat as a style has experienced a new lease of life in the past 10-15 years, and has an air of lighthearted enjoyment and fun around it, tied in to the (re)emergence of natural wine.

Inside the bottle

There is no official definition or legal status for pétillant naturel wines – it is very much an informal label. Pét-nat can be made from any grape variety, in any region of any country in the world – though there are a handful of appellations in France where this style of winemaking is the norm: Limoux’s Blanquette Méthode Ancestrale, Gaillac’s Méthode Gaillacoise, the Alps’ Bugey-Cerdon and the Rhone’s Clairette de Die Tradition are pét-nats in all but name, with each having its own unique heritage, regulations and flavours.

Aromatic white varieties such as Riesling and Muscat perform well in pét-nats, as do those bringing good acidity to the wine, but juicy red grapes like Gamay can also work fantastically.

Fruitiness, freshness and extreme drinkability are usually the desired result. This is aided by the bubbles being more gentle compared to traditional-method (refermented in the bottle) sparklings, and by generally modest alcohol levels. Haziness is a signature trait, and you can expect to find some cloudiness and fine sediment in most, as they are generally unfined, unfiltered and often not disgorged (see below) .

You might find a little residual sweetness in some pét-nats, as fermentation doesn’t always fully finish in the bottle. The South African Testalonga, I Wish I Was a Ninja, with 8.5% alcohol, is fresh and aromatic with perceptible sweetness in the mouth, but it’s wonderfully drinkable and delicious.

In general, pét-nats are not made for ageing, and should be enjoyed young, shortly after bottling, when the aromatic and fruity flavours are at their biggest and brightest. Flavour and aroma profiles will vary hugely depending on region, climate and grape, but pét-nats should always be refreshing, fun and frighteningly easy to drink. In the best, there’s an energy and wildness that lifts the soul.

To disgorge or not to disgorge: the cloudy question

Most still and sparkling wines on the market today are clear and not cloudy. They are filtered and fined to remove particles and thus leave a clear liquid. In traditional-method sparkling production, after the second fermentation the bottles are riddled – gradually inverted and rotated – in order to nudge the spent yeasts down into the cap. The sediment is then removed (‘disgorged’) through a process of freezing the neck and releasing the pressure. However, some winemakers choose not to fine, filter or remove sediment, arguing that this process can strip flavour from the wine, and opinions are split over whether or not to disgorge a pét-nat.

Undisgorged pét-nats can appear with varying degrees of cloudiness and sediment. ‘A pét-nat with a nice little bit of natural sediment is the closest thing to milk straight from the cow,’ says winemaker Tim Wildman MW. There’s nothing wrong with a little cloudiness – it adds to the density, texture and mouthfeel, elongating the finish and bringing complexity, though too much sludge at the bottom of a bottle can lead to a rather challenging final glass.

Not disgorging can also have explosive results. The presence of too much sediment and/or tartrate crystals (a deposit that can occur naturally in any wine) in the final wine can lead to what is sometimes called ‘gushing’ – visceral enough to need no explanation, and leaving behind not only a sticky situation to clear up, but also only a third of the liquid left in the bottle.

Who’s making pét-nat?

Pét-nat as a category in its current form is linked to the late Loire producer Christian Chaussard, who inadvertently produced a pétillant naturel wine in the early 1990s (harking back tidily to the monks in Limoux who accidentally discovered the méthode ancestrale in the 1500s). Other Loire producers cottoned on to the style, and the Montlouis appellation added Pétillant Originel to its regulations (joining the likes of Limoux, Gaillac, Bugey and Clairette de Die), highlighting the importance of the style in the Loire.

Pét-nat is becoming increasingly widely available and its growth goes hand in hand with the resurgence of the natural wine movement. They share the same philosophy: organic or biodynamic farming, minimal to zero use of sulphur, fermenting with natural yeasts and avoiding fining and filtration. ‘It’s the only way you can make sparkling wine naturally, without having to manipulate it into a certain thing,’ says Doug Wregg of UK importer Les Caves de Pyrene.

A number of wine shops and bars now focus exclusively on natural wines, and alongside pét-nats these wines are found increasingly on the wine lists of Michelin-starred establishments. In Australia and the US, where natural wine has a strong, sympathetic following, there has been a rise in the production of pét-nats. When Tim Wildman MW made his first pét-nat in the Adelaide Hills in 2014, he says it was one of about five or six Australian versions. Now, there are probably hundreds.

Of course, as more pét-nat appears on the market, it becomes clear that not all are created equal. This is one of the simplest ways to make wine, yet it would be foolish to underestimate the winemaking instinct and skill required to get everything right.

They are at risk of the same faults that sometimes befall natural wines, such as excessive brettanomyces or volatile acidity, or, at worst, a ‘mousiness’ to the flavour. Some questionable wines do end up on the market, but the good ones really are worth shouting about.

The pét-nat future

Fred Grappe of UK wine importer Dynamic Vines notes that as Champagne gets more expensive, it makes room for other styles of sparkling wine on the market, and pét-nat slots right in. If you can get your hands on the best ones before they sell out (as they’re often made in tiny quantities), your thirst for frolicsome fizz will be quenched without having to dig too deep into your pockets.

‘It’s a really fun, accessible style of sparkling wine with more integrity than any other style of lower-priced sparkling wine’, says Alex Thorpe of UK importer and retailer Wines Under the Bonnet. Jiří Majerik of Basket Press Wines, a Central and Eastern Europe specialist importer in the UK, thinks there’s scope for the category to diversify further as producers experiment with extended lees ageing and use of different grape varieties.

You can’t make Champagne outside the Champagne region, nor Franciacorta outside Franciacorta in Lombardy, northern Italy. But you can make pét-nat anywhere.

By its very nature it’s inclusive and experimental, and at the moment it’s at the right price point to be accessible. The unpredictability of what you’ll find in the bottle is part of the fun; and when pét-nat is done well, it is uncomplicated and joyous. A vibrant, animated, exciting pét-nat, enjoyed with friends, can be one of life’s simplest but purest pleasures.

Pét-nat and food pairings

Made in myriad colours and styles, pét-nats can offer both aperitif-style sips as well as more versatile and complex matches for sweet and savoury dishes. London-based sommelier and wine consultant Amber Gardner has some food-pairing tips…

‘A dry rosé pét-nat, such as Reynald Héaulé’s flirtatious Silice en Bulles Rosé 2019 from the Loire, pairs perfectly with any ocean delight cooked on a sizzling plancha – like a big plate of fresh scallops barbecued to perfection.

‘Staying with pink bubbles, this time with a touch of sweetness, Domaine Le Roc’s Roc’Ambulle dances hand-in-hand with any feisty Mexican flavour, such as prawn tacos with vibrant herbs and piping hot chillies.

‘The Portuguese dry white Folias de Baco, Uivo PT Nat Branco 2020 from the Douro offers ripe lemon, nashi pear and mouthwatering salinity, pairing brilliantly with dishes that make the best of the summer’s garden bounty.’

Other key pét-nat producers to look out for

• Alex & Maria Koppitsch Burgenland, Austria
• Brand Bros Pfalz, Germany
• Château Barouillet Bergerac, Southwest France
• Domaine Frantz Saumon Loire, France
• Domaine Mosse Loire, France
• Intellego Swartland, South Africa
• Jauma McLaren Vale, South Australia
• Les Capriades Loire, France
• Lise & Bertrand Jousset Loire, France
• Loimer Langenlois and Gumpoldskirchen, Austria
• Tillingham Wines East Sussex, England

Pét-nat: 30 bottles that put the fun into fizz

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Whenever I visit Domaine Richaud, just outside the village of Cairanne, the winemaking team remind me of friends I made at free parties in the 1990s in fields and disused warehouses. I’m not talking dreadlocks and dogs on strings, but there’s always an anarchic frisson in the air. You get the impression they know how to enjoy themselves.

Perhaps it’s to be expected, given the radical furrow Marcel Richaud has ploughed. He’s approaching 70 now, but still thrums with pent-up energy, his ice-blue eyes as bright as ever.

When I arrived at his winery, he was surprised to hear who I was writing for. ‘Decanter? Well, you better like natural wines!’.

Scroll down to see Matt Walls’ tasting notes and scores for eight Domaine Richaud wines

I must admit I’m not really concerned if a wine is natural or not. I’m simply interested in authentic, enjoyable wines with something to say. And there are always plenty of wines like that at this address.

Leading the way

Marcel took over his father’s vines at the age of 17 and was one of the first to make natural wines in the southern Rhône, along with Michèle Aubéry of Domaine Gramenon and Guy Julien of La Ferme Saint-Martin.

‘We were taken for Don Quixotes at the time,’ says Marcel, but since then many more have adopted their methods.

He’s grown the family estate significantly over the years to a whopping 80ha of terrain in and around Cairanne and Rasteau, 70ha of which is under vine. It’s a huge surface to farm biodynamically – and imagine picking all that by hand.

Exclusive Rhône Valley wine tour with Matt Walls:BOOK NOW12th-19th June 2022. Spaces stricly limited and selling fast.

Production methods

In the cellars of some natural winemakers, the first topic is sulphur dioxide – but not here. For Marcel, there’s a greater enemy.

‘Never excess extraction, it’s the fundamental thing’, he says, and his maceration times vary between eight and 12 days – a third of the length of some of his neighbours. Perhaps this is what makes his wines so drinkable, despite their concentration.

Minimal intervention in the winery is a noble aim; it can both help and hinder the expression of terroir. At Domane Richaud it is usually a positive.

Marcel doesn’t add tartaric acid, water or yeast, and the wines are bottled unfiltered and unfined. It makes for a very candid expression of the place. No sulphur is added until bottling, and then only small amounts. Sometimes none at all.

The hands-off approach – the benefits outweigh the risks

Working with minimal sulphur is a dangerous game. There are risks: the wines can be marked by unwelcome yeasts or bacteria that create flavours that, while not always unpleasant, can cover up the taste of the place and grape. But get it right and wines can be brighter, with a sense of plenitude, energy and immediacy. Marcel is more adept than most, and more often than not he reaps rewards.

At their best, his wines are the distilled essence of the Provençal landscape. They embrace the totality of their southern identity: sun-warmed, dark in colour, rich in flavour and alcohol. They ring with the song of the cicada. I love them for their drama, energy and the unconditional love of where they’re from.

The wine range

The Cairannes, particularly L’Ebrescade from a 300m vineyard near the border with Rasteau, brim with ripe black olives, bay leaves, late-season blackberries and dusty thyme.

The Rasteau – half Grenache, half Carignan – is sticky with fig paste.

He often plays with creating new cuvées, both from estate fruit and some purchased grapes. The Côtes-du-Rhônes and Vin de France bottlings punch well above their weight. These wines are never thin.

In part this is thanks to embracing local varieties. His excellent Côtes-du-Rhône, Terre des Galets, contains almost as much Counoise and Carignan as it does Grenache and Syrah. He’s planting more Counoise in fact, along with Cinsault and Muscardin.

The future of Domaine Richaud

Marcel is taking a step back now. He has stood up for his vision and successfully fought his corner. His son Thomas is taking over the production and his daughter Claire is now responsible for the commercial side.

They’ve inherited his piercing blue eyes – and I hope his rebellious spirit, the source of such brilliant wines.

See Matt Walls’ tasting notes and scores for eight Domaine Richaud wines:

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‘I don’t like using the term “natural wine” and prefer to talk about “low-intervention” wines instead. What is natural wine, after all? There’s no legal definition. And so unsurprisingly there’s a lot of confusion. The UK is now a wine-producing region, but we don’t yet have the culture that goes with that. Consumer knowledge of wine as a whole is still very low, let alone of natural wine. Even some natural wine bar owners themselves don’t understand the subject properly.

‘We’re focusing on wines made using organic or biodynamic fruit – though they may not be certified as such – and that follow a minimal-intervention approach in the winery. We want to tell people how the wine is low-intervention. We don’t want to tell them what it tastes like – tasting notes are subjective, so I don’t allow my team to talk about flavour profiles.

‘There are some common misconceptions. Many people think all natural wines taste funky. Some people think they won’t get a hangover from drinking these wines. They’ll soon learn that’s not true!

‘There are some regions in the world where it’s impossible to make natural wine. We do have a Texan Malbec on the list at Diogenes, but you won’t find any natural wine from Texas. People have tried, but the climate and soils there just won’t support it.’

Kath Osborne, by email, asks: I keep seeing the phrase ‘clean wine’. What is this? Is it the same as natural wine?

 Anne Krebiehl MW, a regular contributor to Decanter, replies: Clean wine is nothing but a marketing ploy that exploits consumer ignorance about how wine is made. This concept has worked in cosmetics for a long time, and now cynical marketeers are applying it to wine, declaring their product as ‘clean’, implying that it is produced to supposedly higher health standards than other wines – denigrating those in the process.

No wine is ‘clean’, because wine contains alcohol. ‘Clean’ wine cannot be compared to natural wine, which, without legal definition, usually means wine made from grapes grown with low environmental impact and vinified either without additives or with as few as possible, notably the preservative sulphur dioxide.

In a way, most of these wines are far ‘cleaner’ than those purporting to be ‘clean’.

Concerned consumers are better off looking for wines that have been certified organic, biodynamic or sustainable.

This was first published in the December 2020 issue of Decanter magazine. 

See also: 

What is vegan wine? Ask Decanter

Organic vs natural wine – What’s the difference?

Did sulfites cause my wine headache? 

For at least 8,000 years, wine has played a prominent role in the cultural and economic activities of these ancient lands. It was said that when the nation adopted Christianity as the national religion in the 4^th century, Saint Nino bore a cross made from vine wood.

The ‘buried’ wine

The nation is perhaps best known for its ancient winemaking tradition, which is still being followed by many of its modern winemakers. The earliest archaeological traces of winemaking in Georgia include grape seeds found in what the locals refer to as qvevri (ქვევრი, which literally means ‘buried’).

Scroll down for 17 top-rated Georgian wine tasting notes and scores

Qvevri are clay vessels coated with beeswax inside and lime outside. These egg-shaped pots do not usually have a flat base, thus are buried in the ground to stay upright. By doing this, these vessels naturally maintain a relatively constant temperature during fermentation, just like the contemporary temperature-controlled tanks. Their sizes can vary between 20 to 10,000 litres, according to the official body Wines of Georgia.

Traditionally, crushed grapes are fed into the quevri, then fermented and aged in contact with the stalks and skins. Wines made this way, including reds and ‘whites’ (more in golden or amber colour), tend to pick up a richer and more tannic texture.

This method was recognized by UNESCO as ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity’ in 2013.

Although qvevri wines only account for a small fraction of wines made in Georgia, the ancient method is now adopted and modernised by producers around the world, especially for making orange and natural wines.

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Geography

Georgia is situated south of the High Caucasus range, facing the Black Sea to the west. It borders Russia to the north, Azerbaijan to the east and Turkey and Armenia to the south.

A third of its land is mountainous, hosting a number of rivers and shielding the country from the cold air of the north. The Black Sea to the west provides increased rainfall and moderates the temperature. The complex topography means Georgia is home to varied microclimates and soil types.

Viticulture

Like many vineyards across Europe, Georgia was hit hard by phylloxera at the end of 19^th century, which devastated half of its vineyards.

However, today the nation still has a wealth of more than 525 recorded indigenous grape varieties, 38 of which are approved for commercial wine planting.

Although international varieties such as Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot are present, the vast majority of wines produced in Georgia are made from indigenous varieties with Rkatsiteli and Saperavi the most widely planted white and red grapes.

Rkatsiteli is high in acid and tends to give refreshing apple and stone fruit flavours.

Saperavi is native to Georgia, literally meaning ‘the place of colour’ and as the name suggests, is capable of making deeply coloured red wines with black fruit and meaty, spiced flavours.

The Russian influence

Throughout the last century, Georgia’s neighbouring countries have been one of the key factors in shaping its wine industry.

During the Soviet Union years from the early 20^th century, massive lands in Georgia were assigned to make wines in large quantities, at the expense of quality, to meet the thirst of the USSR market. Unsurprisingly, vineyard plantings in Georgia dropped sharply after the fall of the USSR in the 1990s.

The Russian market continued to consume 89% of wines produced in Georgia until 2006, when the Kremlin decided to ban all wines from the country, claiming that the public health authorities found heavy metals and pesticides in the Georgian wine exports.

The ban, which was imposed during a series of political disputes between the two countries, forced Georgian producers to improve the quality of their wines, while seeking new markets including Europe, the UK and Greater China.

Though the Russian ban was eventually lifted six years later, in 2013, Russian authorities again warned consumers about a ‘deterioration’ in the quality of Georgian wine when the political tension between the two countries arose.

Georgian Wine Appellations

Georgia has 10 registered wine regions, the principal being Kakheti in the southeast which contains the micro-regions of Telavi and Kvareli and is home to 72.1% of the country’s 55,000ha grape plantings.

In alphabetical orders the 10 appellations are*:

• Adjara
• Apkhazia
• Bolnisi (new in 2020)
• Guria
• Imereti
• Kakheti
• Kartli
• Meskheti
• Racha-Lechkhumi
• Samegrello

(*Source: Wines of Georgia)

See Decanter’s top selection of Georgian wines worth seeking out

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Five years is a long time in wine. When I first wrote at length about orange wines in Decanter, in 2015, many wine pundits still viewed the style with suspicion – if not downright derision. It felt slightly bleeding edge, even if these wines had been appearing on our shelves for more than a decade.

Now, in 2020, the fourth wine colour has elbowed its way into the hearts and minds of exponentially more adventurous drinkers around the globe, with orange wines produced and enjoyed on every continent. And justly so – with four possible combinations of red or white grapes with or without skins, why ignore 25% of wine’s possibilities?

Some are still perplexed by the style – or, more particularly, the name. If you accept the lexicon of red, white and rosé, then why not orange too? In actuality, all four terms describe the winemaking technique (grape colour, plus skins or not) rather than colour or style, per se.

It follows that not all orange wines are dark-amber coloured, tannic and cidery, just as not all red wines are mega-purple hued, grippy and oaky. Each of these four categories of wine offers up a multitude of taste, aroma and weight profiles.

Let’s tie down that definition: orange wines aren’t made from oranges any more than rosé wines are made from roses. The term, first coined in 2004, concisely describes wines made from white grapes that have been fermented with their skins, unlike mainstream white wines, where skins will be discarded beforehand (even if a pre-fermentation cold soak is part of the equation). These are white wines made like red wines, the perfect food-friendly marriage of a white grape’s acidity and freshness with the texture and structure more often experienced in reds.

A style with history

The concept is timeless. Georgia boasts archaeological finds indicating that wine has been fermented in amphorae (qvevris) made of clay for at least 6,000 years – and amber wines (made from white grapes) have always formed the cultural backbone of this important wine nation. Historical records and winemaking books from Austria and Slovenia show that skin-fermenting white grapes was common in many parts of the old Austro-Hungarian empire.

As New Zealand winemaker Theo Coles (The Hermit Ram) notes, ‘these are basically pre-technology wines’. The modern-day concept of a light-coloured, fresh-tasting white wine requires a press, a destemmer and most probably a temperature-controlled stainless steel tank and a filtration system. Orange wines have simpler needs: just perfect grapes and a vessel (be it clay, wood, steel or plastic) for fermentation.

Such simplicity in wine is a virtue that has come into much sharper focus with the increased interest in minimal-intervention or natural wines. The modern revival of orange wine overlaps with and has been underpinned by the natural wine community – it shouldn’t be forgotten, though, that the term ‘natural wine’ represents an overarching philosophy, whereas ‘orange wine’ describes a specific production technique.

The genius of modern-day Collio pioneers Joško Gravner and the late Stanko Radikon was breathing new life into an older style of winemaking that the world had largely forgotten by the 1950s. Their daring presentation of vino bianco macerato (macerated white wine) as fine wine rather than rustic vina da tavola acted as a catalyst.

It’s given a whole generation of younger Slovene and Italian winemakers the confidence to make similar stylistic decisions – and to take risks, knowing that there’s now a receptive audience for their output.

What’s old is new

While the technique of skin-fermenting white grapes has its deepest cultural roots in Georgia and central Europe (Slovenia, Croatia, northern Italy), many other countries and regions are now rediscovering their own similar traditions. In Portugal’s hot Alentejo region, making wine in large amphorae called talhas has a history that dates back to the Romans, yet its practice took place behind closed doors until very recently. As with Georgia, skin-fermented white grapes and thus amber or orange-tinged wines have always been to the fore – Alentejo’s reputation as a red wine region is a recent development.

Talha wines are traditionally consumed straight from the clay, with the cellars transforming into ad-hoc social spaces during the winter. However, since the creation of a talha wine DO in 2010, bottled examples also exist. Amphorae of all shapes and sizes are common in Spain too, and increasing numbers of artisan winemakers have equipped (or re-equipped) their cellars with tinajas in recent years. Staying in the Spanish-speaking world, Chile has an old tradition of producing roughly destemmed, barrel-fermented wines called pipeño, now being revitalised by producers such as Roberto Henríquez in Bío Bío. Both red (chiefly País) and white (Moscatel) varieties are skin-fermented.

Winemakers in New World countries are enthusiastically taking to the style – and often repurposing skin-fermentation in new or innovative ways. In Stellenbosch, Mick and Jeanine Craven use it as part of the blend, rather than going for a no-holds-barred ‘orange’ style. Deirdre Heekin, based in cold-climate Vermont, uses skin contact to add vital depth to her hybrid grape varieties. And in Central Otago, Japanese winemaker Yoshiaki Sato skin-ferments to create silky smooth, Burgundian-style cuvées where fruit and aromatics don’t overwhelm the other elements. The possibilities are endless.

Orange wine as a genre can now claim a number of seminal producers. Notable examples include Gravner, Radikon and Dario Prinčič in Oslavia; Mlečnik, Movia and Cotar in western Slovenia; and Vodopivec and Skerk in the Italian Carso.

For the recommendations here, though, I’m sharing recent discoveries, lesser-known producers and exciting new projects. The wines I’ve selected run a very broad gamut, whether your taste extends to lighter or heavier, aromatic or savoury, structured or supple. Uncork them with an open mind, don’t chill too much (12°C-14°C is about right) and if possible, combine with sustenance. Have fun, and let’s talk again in another five years?

Simon Woolf’s top 30 orange wines

A formal charter for natural wine has launched in France under the name ‘vin méthode nature’. The Institute for Origins and Quality (INAO), the French Ministry for Agriculture and the French Fraud Control Office all recognise the new denomination.

It follows the creation by producers, merchants and consumers of The Union for the Defense of Natural Wines in October 2019 which has established a list of criteria dedicated to the new category.

The structure hopes to offer a robust definition for natural wine to consumers and clear up some of the confusion around natural wine and the often woolly terms which describe it. It will be subject to a three-year trial period.

How Vin Méthode Nature works

In order to use the denomination grapes must come from certified organic vines, be hand-picked and produced using indigenous yeast. Methods which are banned during the winemaking process include thermovinification, reverse osmosis, flash pasteurisation and cross-flow filtration. The complete charter can be found here in French.

An addition of up to 30 mg/L of sulphur dioxide is permitted in all types of wine across all appellations, but no additions are permitted before or during fermentation. Wines where no SO2 addition has been made can be labelled ‘vin méthode nature sans sulfites ajoutés’ (natural method without added sulfites) while those with a post-fermentation addition can carry the ‘vin méthode nature avec moins de 30 mg/l de sulfites ajoutés’ (natural method with less than 30 mg/l added sulfites) tag.

Each finished wine will undergo an external controlled assessment to determine if it conforms to the regulations. Those wines which do not must be marketed under a different brand.

It’s thought that over 100 French producers will sign up to the ‘vin méthode nature’ programme over the next few months, and similar systems are expected across Europe with Spain, Italy and Switzerland likely to follow suit soon.

WilderBoundary, 2-4 Boundary Street, London, E2 7DDwilderlondon.co.uk

• Style of food: Modern British
• Wine to try: Bénédicte & Stéphane Tissot, DD, Jura, France, 2018, £66
• Kitchen open: 5pm-11pm, Tuesday to Wednesday; 12pm-11pm Thursday; 12pm-12am, Friday; 5pm-12am Saturday; closed Sunday-Monday

Wilder review

Sustainability has become a watchword in the wine industry, as producers seek to ensure the health of their vineyards – and the planet – for future generations. The same trend has emerged in the global restaurant scene, with celebrated sustainable eateries such as Narisawa in Tokyo, Azurmendi in Spain’s Basque region, Mil in Peru’s Sacred Valley and Relae in Copenhagen, leading the charge.

London already boasts its fair share of sustainability champions, including Cub and Native, so perhaps it’s no surprise that Sir Terence Conran would join the fray with Wilder. The designer and serial restaurateur (this is his 52nd restaurant) has teamed up with chef Richard McLellan, previously of Typing Room, who won acclaim with his wild-food supper clubs.

Set in the basement of Conran’s Boundary Hotel, the space is low-lit and starkly decorated with exposed brick, plain rendered walls and ashwood tables. Two striking wild sculptures hang from the ceiling, drawing your eye up to the church-like double-height space.

It’s a darkly dramatic setting for some startlingly good food, which sees seasonal and foraged ingredients put to surprisingly sophisticated use. The humble stinging nettle becomes delicious nettle tempura; turnip is sweetly caramelised and served with a golden yolked egg, chanterelles and chestnuts for an umami-laden treat.

Characterised by intensity of flavour, the accomplished and innovative menu is backed by a sustainably focused wine list from charming consultant sommelier Lucy Ward, previously at Noble Rot and Dinner by Heston.

Interesting organic, biodynamic, natural and low-intervention bottles feature on her French-leaning list of exclusively Old World wines. Burgundy’s Frédéric Cossard and Cécile Tremblay, Rhône producer Vincent Paris and Jura’s Stéphane Tissot are included in the engaging line-up, which also takes in star names such as Barbaresco producer Bruno Giacosa and Spain’s Telmo Rodríguez.

A mineral and savoury Blanc de Blanc NV Champagne by grower Pierre Péters shone with creamy and intensely smoky Pyefleet oysters, topped with smoked apple vinegar and coal cream. While the vibrant and characterful red Joiseph Piroska 2018 from Austria’s Burgenland – a blend of Zweigelt, Pinot Noir and Blaufränkisch – made a fresh foil to the creaminess of a meticulously presented dish of raw beef, artfully topped with foraged leaves.

Ingredients are all caught, hunted, farmed or found in the UK – an ethos that extends to using British rapeseed oil instead of olive oil and homemade vinegars instead of citrus, for example. True: ingredients such as mugwort, pease pudding and beremeal might have you scratching your head and hoping for a history or botany lesson. But the creativity behind these dishes shines through – and most importantly, they really do taste delicious.

That beremeal – an ancient type of barley grown on the Orkney Islands since Viking times – appears not only in the bread but as an indulgent malty ice cream: a satisfyingly sweet treat to round off the meal. Paired with La Stoppa’s biodynamic Vigna del Volta 2007, a quirky passito-style sweet Malvasia from Italy’s Emilia-Romagna that’s packed with caramel and dried apricot notes, it’s proof that you should be taking a walk on the wilder side…

Both organic and natural wines share some common values, particularly around sustainability and environmental stewardship. Both have also become a much more common dinner party talking point.

But, organic and natural wines have important differences.

The rule of law

Organic wine has been legally defined in both the vineyard and the cellar, albeit certification rules may vary and not everybody agrees with the boundaries. At government level, the US and EU differ over the addition of sulphites, for example.

Natural wines have so far defied all attempts to create a legal definition.

Some supporters are relaxed about this. ‘It’s a bit of an anti-establishment movement,’ said Henry Poultney, co-founder of the recently-opened Kask wine bar in Bristol, UK, which specialises in ‘low intervention’ wines from natural to organic.

Isabelle Legeron MW, founder of RAW wine fair, said that ‘strictly speaking, natural wine is pure, fermented grape juice’ with nothing added. The aim is to ‘bottle a drink that is alive [and] full of the naturally occuring microbiology that existed on the grapes and in the cellar too’.

However, several winemakers who do not use the ‘natural wine’ term would argue that they share this goal and employ some of the techniques; critics say it is unhelpful to infer that other wines are somehow inferior or do not properly reflect their origins.

In the vineyard

Despite a lack of legal definition for natural wine, Legeron said ‘there is general acceptance in the natural wine community as to what is and is not permissible’.

Growing organic grapes is generally seen as a prerequisite for making natural wine.

That is the main reason why ‘all natural wines are organic but not all organic wines are natural’, said Legeron, speaking to Decanter ahead of Raw Wine London 2020, on 8 and 9 March. 

In the cellar

‘Where practices begin to diverge is in the cellar itself,’ Legeron said. 

While organic winemaking rules are stricter than for non-organic wines, and regulations differ between countries, Legeron said that, ‘broadly speaking, organic wine cellar regulations permit the use of additives, like yeast, winemaking aids, like fining agents, and processing, like sterile filtration and pasteurisation, that would not be allowed at all in natural winemaking.’

Sulphites and ‘low intervention’ wines

One divisive issue within the natural wine congregation is the use of sulphites.

Strictly speaking, natural wines would not contain sulphites added in the cellar, but some feel that low levels of sulphites are acceptable – albeit far below the maximum allowed in organic wines in the EU, for instance.

‘We make the distinction between “natural wines” and “low-intervention organic and biodynamic wines”,’ said Legeron. 

‘We accept both at the fair but refer to these different wines as two distinct categories,’ she said, adding that both are more natural than non-organic wines.

At Kask, organic and biodynamic bottles sit alongside natural wine styles, in what is described as a ‘low intervention’ range.

‘We label everything by their certified terms where possible,’ said Poultney, who believes the overall message is about transparency and ‘what goes into the liquid that we drink’.

See also:

What is natural wine? Ask Decanter

New Zealand organic wines to try

More wine questions answered

The avenue to Tokyo’s Meiji shrine is lined with 60 Burgundian oak barrels, stacked opposite a similar number of sake casks, as anyone visiting the city this summer for the 2020 Olympic Games will see.

Since the shrine was built to commemorate Emperor Meiji, who ruled Japan from 1867 to 1912, and sake plays a key role in Japan’s Shinto ceremonies, one might conclude that wine also has a prominent position.

In the late 19th century, Japan modernised, and an interest in wine ensued.

‘Japan shows evidence of a country defining its own wine culture’

Today, wine is not a part of daily life for most people, but there is a significant wine culture that spans formal dining to casual drinking.

France is central to Japanese wine culture. French cuisine, long seen as the pinnacle of western fine dining, has helped to cement the reputation of French wines.

Upmarket grocer Meidi-Ya promoted Château Lafite Rothschild back in 1908, for example. Christie’s conducted wine auctions in Tokyo in the 1990s – beneficiaries of the bubble economy were buyers of collectable Bordeaux.

However, it is Burgundy that has captured the imagination of connoisseurs.

Japan was relatively early to appreciate the Côte d’Or; department store Takashimaya has imported Domaine Leroy since 1972.

The barrels at Meiji shrine, installed in 2006, are testament to Burgundy’s prestige. The Japanese have traditionally favoured grand cru and premier cru over village wines.

Established restaurants age stock until it is nomigoro, or ready for drinking. Many of Japan’s fine-wine consumers are in their 60s and 70s and insist on the best.

However, even traditional restaurants use Coravin to offer smaller servings and combat rising prices and reduced consumption.

Sparkling wine is another favourite. For the past decade, Champagne has ridden a wave in Japan, which ranks only behind the UK and US in exports for volume and value.

Sommelier Makoto Abe reports that Dom Pérignon, Krug, Cristal and Belle Epoque lead the pack of prestige brands. In the clubs of Ginza, settai (business entertainment) drives consumption.

Meanwhile, private clients seek out grower Champagnes. Higher demand for Champagne has led to price rises and created a market opening for Cava, Franciacorta and other traditional-method, sparkling wines.

Japan was also early to champion natural and low-intervention wines.

In 1993, the late Shinsaku Katsuyama opened Shonzui, a Tokyo restaurant specialising in natural wines. Kenichi Ohashi MW published his book Vin Naturel in 2004.

A new generation of consumers took to the category, and natural wines are no longer confined to specialist venues. Entertaining at home is traditionally not common, and when dining out, the refrain ‘Omakase’, or ‘I leave it to you’, is often heard when ordering both food and wine.

Thus, sommeliers play a leading role in wine culture, and wine-pairing menus are popular. For these, sommeliers cast off classical ties to find the right match.

A recent lunch at L’Effervescence in Tokyo included an assemblage of sake and Barolo Chinato, a Bordeaux blend from Japanese cult producer Beau Paysage, Nicolas Joly’s Coulée de Serrant, Churton’s Petit Manseng from Marlborough and a Macvin du Jura.

This eclectic mix shows the growing appreciation of different regions and styles as more people travel abroad and see how wine is enjoyed without burdensome ceremony, then return to Japan to share their experiences.

Such insights, as well as a slowing economy, have led to a move away from formal dining and an increase in ienomi, or drinking at home.

The best retail options are department stores and independent specialists. Sadly, the emphasis on quality and variety hasn’t migrated to supermarkets.

Here, varietal labels have broadened wine’s appeal, but the selection is unlikely to inspire loyalty.

Japan has followed a well-worn path from the classic wines of France to other European regions, and to the New World.

However, Japan’s delight in high-end Burgundy, prestige cuvées and grower Champagnes, natural wines and, more recently, home-grown wines is evidence of a country defining its own wine culture.

Roddy Ropner is a wine writer based in Japan, focusing on the Japanese wine market

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William McMurray, Inverness, Scotland asks: Is it possible to discern that a wine has been aged in amphora when blind tasting? What kind of character would it give a wine in the glass?

Simon Woolf, an expert in natural wines and author of Amber Revolution, replies: This is an important question, as the use of amphorae for fermentation and ageing is spreading beyond their heartlands in Georgia or Italy to every corner of the globe.

The simple answer is no – it should not be possible to detect, blind, that a wine has been aged in amphora. The neutrality of clay as a storage medium is one of its prime attractions, compared to oak which often imparts flavour as well as promoting gentle oxidative ageing.

Tasters sometimes remark on earthy or earthenware-like notes in wines produced in amphora, but most experts agree that this only happens with dirty vessels. A perfectly cleaned and well maintained amphora, or qvevri, should not impart any flavour.

That said, the character of amphora-aged and/or fermented wines tends to show less oxidation than comparable ageing in wood, and less reduction than wines aged only in stainless steel. It’s possible that a very astute taster could hone in on these characteristics and make an educated guess.

This question first appeared in the April 2019 issue of Decanter magazine.

See more wine questions here

Jefford: Tasting Georgian wines – the challenge

Concrete eggs in the winery – ask Decanter

Backed by majestic snow-capped mountains, Chile's buzzing capital city offers a huge variety of cuisine and South American wines. See Alistair Cooper MW's top 10 places to dine.

Boragó

Rodolfo Guzmán can take credit for the reinvigoration of Chilean cuisine. Foraging from the Atacama down to Tierra del Fuego, expect surprises galore in the 20-dish tasting menu. Book now

Ambrosia

Located on a residential street in Vitacura, Ambrosia has a wonderfully tranquil, laid-back and zen feel, particularly in the courtyard area. Chef-patron Carolina Bazán effortlessly fuses Chilean ingredients with a distinct French twist in dishes that are unpretentious yet sophisticated. Varied wine list, with a good French and Italian selection too. Book now

Salvador Cocina y Café

A gem in downtown Santiago, open weekdays only. Rustic yet funky, with a simple wine selection, and a menu of market-fresh food. Daily changing set menus often feature unique takes on Chilean classics. Exceptional value. Find out more

José Ramón 277

Funky Lastarria venue with craft beers on tap and cracking sandwiches. Try the classic churrasco Italiano steak sandwich or black pudding with chilli. Chileans take sandwiches very seriously!

Etniko

A long-standing favourite. Tricky to find, no sign and you must knock to gain entry. Great sushi, excellent cocktails and a funky vibe. DJs get the party started, making this a great spot to finish your evening. Book now

Bocanáriz

Santiago’s most famous wine bar is located in the heart of Lastarria, and offers more than 250 wines, including a huge selection by the glass and wine flights. The food selection is varied and excellent, and the daily lunch menu is great value. Book now

99

Located in the heart of Providencia, 99 oozes cool, with an open kitchen and extensive natural wine list. Chef Kurt Schmidt has worked at Boragó (above), Noma in Denmark and Azurmendi in Spain. Lunchtime is a relaxed set menu, while dinner is a six- or nine-course tasting menu. Book now

La Bodeguilla de Cristóbal

For unpretentious, home-cooked Spanish food look no further than this little-known delight. Spanish owner Cristóbal is always present, with a big smile on his face. There is very little corkage culture in Santiago, yet here for just £5 you can bring your own if you like – though the list is pretty good anyway! Find out more

Chipe Libre

‘The Independent Republic of Pisco’ – this specialist bar and restaurant is a must-visit. Try Peruvian and Chilean piscos, great ceviche, empanadas, seafood and more. Find out more

La Vinoteca

There are two branches of the excellent Vinoteca. The Vitacura site houses a deli, a casual dining room with great tapas and a high-end restaurant serving modern Chilean dishes. All wines from the on-site wine shop are available with no corkage. Find out more

Alistair Cooper MW spent years working for wineries in Chile and Argentina. He is a regular Decanter contributor and wine judge, and the resident wine expert for BBC Radio Oxford.

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 Andrew Jefford meets the Burgundy and Châteauneuf specialist Mounir Saouma...

“I was born in 1967. That’s what it says on the paper. But in reality I was born in 1867. They just put me in the Frigidaire and took me out again 100 years later.” The time traveller is Mounir Saouma: one of the most original thinkers working in French fine wine today.

He’s obsessed with a return to past ways of working with wine – though he has nothing to do with the ‘natural wine’ movement, and indeed derides “the ayatollahs, the fanatics of everything” who produce zero sulphur wines “which stink of the shit of a horse. I’m sorry, it’s natural, but I cannot drink it.” He doesn’t have much time, either, for the “biodynamic blah blah blah. Is it yummy? Are you enjoying? Are you finishing the bottle? Will you drink it the day after or not? Will you feel tired or not? Will you feel like a butterfly the next day?”

These are his desiderata, and his means of achieving them is by ensuring “that all the things that nature gave us are still in the wine. The proteins, the vitamins, the yeasts, the bacteria, the skins: everything that nature gave us is still inside the wines. They are digested. They help your system digest other things. The wines are full, not empty.”

I’ll tell you how he achieves this fullness in a moment; first, though, a little background. He and his wife Rotem established a Burgundy business (Lucien Le Moine) in the late 1990s – buying newly fermented wines from growers, raising them, then finally bottling them and selling them. If you think this is a straightforward matter, just wait.

In 2006 or so, the couple, who work unaided, decided they wanted to own land. Not in Burgundy, where it is dissuasively difficult to buy and where they would be competing with their growers and friends, but in Châteauneuf. Why there? I’ll tell you that shortly, too. “Impossible,” said friends, “to buy good land in Châteauneuf.” Cue more original thinking (yes, it’s coming). Now they have 8.4 ha in Châteauneuf, and more in Côtes du Rhône-Villages. Winemaking rather than raising and finishing has given Mounir and Rotem even more opportunity to burrow back in time.

Let’s return to the concept of ‘full’ wines. “When I arrived in Burgundy, I tried to guess how people made wine in the past. I have no knowledge; I have no pretension. I’m patient. I like to observe.” In particular, he noted the super-cleanness of modern juices, pneumatically pressed followed by settling and racking; he noticed the great attention paid to reductive handling … and he noticed the premox problems the region had with white wines.

It could not have been so in the past, he reasoned. Juices must have been more turbid, and given more exposure to air; wines must have remained with their lees during ageing, and been bottled later. So, at no small risk, the couple set off in this direction. Radically: if one of their growers produces six casks of a top Premier Cru, they will buy two – but ask for the lees of all six. The wine then remains on this profusion of lees for up to 36 months without racking.

“In my sixteen years at Lucien Le Moine, I have racked less than ten barrels, and rejected maybe four or five. And we have bottled more than 1,500 wines. We now raise 84 Grand Cru and Premier Cru wines every year with the totality of lees, with all the purity of nature. We start ageing with around eight litres of lees per barrel. By the end, only three are left. The other five are in your glass.” That, he says, is where the fullness comes from.

In the Rhône, he makes his own wines, and these methods have consequently gone much further. For white wines (and he’s enthusiastic about white Châteauneuf), he wants hard pressing (using a 1970s Vaslin) and hyper-oxidation of the juice. “Let’s go back to the roots. People used continuous presses, then sent the wine to the vat, and then they went off and did other things. So that’s what I do. With a continuous press, you put in two tonnes of grapes and you end up with a cake which is like concrete. Everthing else is in the juice, which is thick and viscous.” And brown – because of exposure to the air. It then ferments slowly and gently on the lees. In spring 2011, Saouma remembers, other growers were bottling their 2010 whites. His 2009 white was still doing its malolactic.

He tells me a story about that wine. “At harvest time in 2016, two other winemakers rung me up and said they wanted to come to see me. I said ‘Fine – come round.’ ‘We’re interested in white wines,’ they said. ‘We did a blind tasting – three bottles of white Châteauneuf, yours and ours. One bottle tasted fresh, but the other two seemed tired and old.’ Both growers assumed the fresh wine was their own – but it was the Saouma wine. They asked him to explain.

“I can’t,” Saouma said, “but please turn around and look away. I will then show you something and you will tell me the answer.” He gave them three glasses of wine. One was so brown he claims it looked like Guinness; another was pale, and the third one paler still. The brown one was his just-pressed 2016 juice, and the other two cask samples of the 2015 and 2014 white – hard pressed and juice-oxidised, then fermented and aged on lees.

For me, he takes a sample of the white 2017 from the barrel. Using a pipette, he then blows through it so violently that it bubbles and froths. He then sucks it up into the pipette and dumps it down into the glass with more frothing and seething. Finally, he lets it be. It settles. At the end of the process, it is paler than it was to start with, and has an attractive scent of blossom: an astonishing demonstration.

Reds, of course, are a different matter. “I found myself putting the grapes in a tank, no sulphur, no punching down, cold maceration, fourteen days, then fermentation for three weeks, no pumping over, then to barrel for three or four years; one has been five years in barrel, and never racked.” Eventually the journey back into the past led him to amphorae – unwaxed, of course. “I grew up in a village in the mountains of Lebanon where we took an amphora made in the village to a spring to get the water. That was the tool. No wax. So I just put the clusters inside. When it’s full, we close it. We leave it for a year, untouched. When we open it, we pray. And it works: extreme purity.” He is also experimenting with fermenting single-vineyard wines in vessels containing washed galets roulés taken from the vineyard from which the fruit has come; and he shows me different samples of his Omnia wine being aged in new foudres, in 500-litre casks and in concrete eggs. The experiments never stop.

But why Châteauneuf? “I compare Grenache Noir to Pinot Noir. They are both complicated varieties with white juice, and they can both make superfine wines which express the vineyard. Syrah tastes like Syrah, Sauvignon Blanc tastes like Sauvignon Blanc, Viognier tastes like Viognier, but Pinot Noir and Grenache taste like neutral fruit, like grapes. So do Chardonnay and Grenache Blanc. These neutral, empty varieties are the ambassadors of terroir. Because they are neutral, because they don’t have their own personality, they pump everything around them. If you want to send a message to someone, you don’t send a talker. You send a neutral person who will just say what you want him to say.”

The couple managed to acquire their nine parcels of land by working with the local SAFER (a government-backed sales intermediary in local land transactions) and then deliberately standing at the very end of the queue, behind the locals, taking only the parcels which no one else wanted. To their delight, this often included parcels of land in high-quality areas which were in a pitiful state, or which came with an obligation to buy poor quality land, buildings or superannuated machinery.

The very first parcel they acquired, thus, was in Pignan – but it contained one-third of dead vines, had suffered chronic erosion and draining problems and came with stocks of low-quality bulk wine. “Nobody wanted it because it was in a bad state but come on! It was Place Vendôme, the day after a Sunday market. OK, it’s dirty everywhere but it’s still Place Vendôme.” The couple replaced the eroded land, redrained the whole vineyard and replanted it. “Now we have two super hectares of Pignan, which is the king of Châteauneuf, the best terroir for finesse, facing north. When you are exposed north in Châteauneuf you are the luckiest person in the world because the Mistral will be crossing your vineyard more than 100 days a year, making you super maturity but keeping you a lot of vivacity, a lot of freshness.”

They also now have land in high-sited La Pointu; in the astonishing limestone-soiled Esqueirons “where you walk on pieces of yoghurt”; at Pierre Redon; in the galets roulés of La Bigote, and indeed in all of the five villages with land in the appellation. “Châteauneuf du Pape is the biggest mosaic in French wine,” says Saouma.

The aim behind his Omnia wine is to convey the mosaic itself (five villages, nine soil types and thirteen varieties), whereas the amphora single-site wines are sold unblended (as a collection), and the Arioso is made from the old-vine material in Pignan alone. Le Petit Livre de A.M.Bach (Bach’s St John Passion was playing in the cellar when I called) is a free-run-only version of Arioso bottled exclusively in magnums; the white wine is called Magis.

Best value of all, though, may be the Inopia, which comes from the ‘Clos Saouma’ vineyards sited in the Côtes du Rhône-Villages zone of Vieux Bouigard near Orange, surrounding the winery. The couple have nine hectares planted in this less expensive land – yet its soil potential is outstanding (clay over deep beds of river-rolled pebbles), and the wines – one third white, two thirds red – are made according to the same lees-nourished, unhurried principles.

A taste of Saouma Rhônes

Read more Andrew Jefford columns on Decanter.com

Natural wine has arguably been the major movement of the 21st Century wine world, and for some it has also become a 'lifetsyle choice', writes Elin McCoy, ahead of the Raw wine fair in London and after visiting the New York version of the show.

The setting of a trade and consumer tasting invariably projects the image of the wines you’re about to sample.

I had that thought in mind at New York’s second annual Raw Wine fair [November 2017], the global exposition of natural wines founded by Master of Wine Isabelle Legeron.

First off, the NY fair was squirreled away in a warehouse district in hipster Brooklyn, rather than in glitzy Manhattan. The producers’ tables were lined up in a reclaimed industrial space with a cavernous, artist’s loft appeal: high ceilings, rough brick walls, giant windows, exposed beams and concrete floors.

The unmistakable vibe of ‘We’re all rebel artisan producers here’ sent a warning and a promise: don’t expect polished or, heaven forbid, luxury bottles; this is the gritty, real stuff, made by real people from real grapes grown in real vineyards.

That image extended to the attendees – young (under 35) drinkers in worn jeans, fleece vests and scuffed designer boots – and to the food: grain bowls and pizza to wolf down at picnic tables in the gravel courtyard.

There’s been a lot of talk in the past year about whether natural wine (which as a category resists easy definition) has become mainstream or will be, but its casual image and ‘cool’ factor suggest many winemakers and aficionados may not actually want it to go there.

I get the idea some want it both ways – mainstream enough to sell but edgy enough to be, as one US food publication put it: ‘a thing your parents could never understand’.

Natural wine proponents play an insider/outsider game that includes the idea of a special community, where advocacy is more important than criticism.

For some, drinking natural has become a lifestyle choice that says you’re a person who values honesty, openness and emotion. (‘Raw Wine celebrates wines with emotion… that have a humanlike, or living presence,’ read the welcome in the tasting book.)

Noble intentions, of course, can’t excuse wines that taste like cider and carry whiffs of barnyard, vinegar and mousiness. Dismissing flaws as ‘a wider range of flavours’ doesn’t help either the wines or the winemakers.

Yet despite badly made examples, natural wine has arguably been the major movement of the 21st century wine world.

Though only accounting for a tiny amount of wine sold, the trend is growing in every country, and has had a serious impact on mainstream wines, in part by encouraging a new desire for freshness, as opposed to the once-popular heaviness of oaky, alcoholic bottles.

It’s influenced both top conventional winemakers and new young ones to experiment and embrace some of the core tenets of natural wines.

At the same time, the overall quality of natural wines has rapidly improved, too. Most of the 122 producers at Raw Wine poured reds and whites that impressed me with their subtlety, energy and individuality.

Winemakers whose wines often used to be hit-or-miss, such as those from Abe Schoener’s The Scholium Project, now show very assured winemaking. His skin-fermented Sauvignon Blanc, The Prince in his Caves 2015, was stunning.

The no-sulphur wines from Oregon’s Swick Wines had zing and structure; the low-sulphur Methode Sauvage Cabernet Franc from the Santa Cruz Mountains had the savour of a delicious Loire red.

I’m personally convinced that the route of organic and biodynamic viticulture – perhaps the first step towards natural wine – is essential in a world where herbicides and pesticides are adversely affecting the environment and human health.

If natural wine makes people think harder about how the wines they drink are produced, that’s a good thing. Having what natural wine stands for – the real deal – become what’s expected in wine would be, too.

But the movement’s ever-growing footprint in wine consciousness raises the possibility that future mainstream acceptance will eventually come at the price of losing the hipster street cred it now enjoys.

Will the wines still be considered ‘cool’ if they’re no longer part of a tribal culture?

Raw Wine takes place in London on 11 & 12 March.

This column first appeared in Decanter magazine’s April 2018 issue.

• Elin McCoy is an award-winning journalist and author who also writes for Bloomberg News

Tom Cannavan visits Italy’s far northeast to meet Joško Gravner, an enigmatic winemaker who inspires extremes of praise and scepticism alike.

Many things seem to have informed Joško Gravner’s decision, or decisions, to radically change his winemaking direction over the years. Those meant risking everything: his reputation, his thriving business, perhaps even his friends.

Today, Gravner is one of the most revered cult names of Italian winemaking, following a rigorous natural winemaking philosophy. The wine world – not just Italy – pays attention to what he does, and many follow his example. But it was not always thus.

By the 1970s, the young Gravner had joined his family business in Oslavia, an Italian border town a stone’s throw from Slovenia, with vineyards running across that invisible dividing line. Full of confidence, he ignored advice to ‘do a little and do it well’, and instead set out to revolutionise the cellars and take more technical control of the winemaking. Stainless steel tanks replaced the old casks, French oak barriques were installed, and an array of modern equipment was purchased. And it worked. Soon his fragrant, fruity and delicate wines were being awarded the ultimate accolade of tre bicchieri from Italy’s wine bible Gambero Rosso. By the 1980s Gravner was flying high as the flagship producer of the area.

Radical shift

But a business trip to California in the late 1980s saw a road to Damascus moment: tasting many highly rated wines, he realised they ‘did nothing for him emotionally’, says his daughter Mateja. He suddenly understood the same could be said of his own wines: they had become too ‘international’. ‘Little by little I started to get rid of all the equipment,’ he says. Out went the shiny new toys, and back in came large oak casks and a mechanical basket press.

Gravner’s simplification of his winemaking effectively reversed 20 years of modernisation, and it is a path he has followed with absolute conviction since.

The second stopping point on his road to Damascus came in 1996, when hail destroyed 95% of his Ribolla crop, indigenous to the area and Gravner’s great love. With the meagre remaining harvest he decided to experiment, macerating his Ribolla with long skin contact and fermenting using only ambient yeasts.

The success of the experiment (‘The wine was a revelation,’ says Gravner) was not recognised by all. Now, Gambero Rosso’s headline was a different one, which he recalls with a rueful smile: ‘Joško Gravner has gone crazy – please come back Joško.’ If not regarded as ‘crazy’ by all, many viewed his change of direction with doubt, suspicion and, I suspect, fear that the Friuli apple cart was being so decisively overturned. It was a shock for followers of the estate, with more than half of his overseas distributors cancelling their orders in the wake of the Gambero Rosso article. That, points out Gravner, was without having tasted the wines.

Gravner is a quiet, seemingly reserved character, a combination of humble farmer in his working clothes and muddy boots, and Jesuit scholar with a keen intelligence shining behind his eyes. Clearly, he is both deeply thoughtful and stubbornly single-minded. As customers slowly began to appreciate his new amber-coloured wines, he extended his maceration for longer and delved deeper into the oldest wine production methods, culminating in a trip to Georgia in 2000.

Gravner at a glance

• Founded 1901
• Location Oslavia, in Friuli; vineyards in Italian Collio and Slovenian Brda
• Under vine 18ha
• Vineyards Runk in Italy; Hum and Dedno in Slovenia
• Viticulture Farmed organically and based on lunar calendar
• Vinification All fermentation in amphorae, with wild yeasts and no temperature control. All wines have skin contact maceration of about six months. Ribolla bottled after an extra six years in large casks. Riserva released after extra four years in cask and six years in bottle. Rosso released after extra five years in cask and five years in bottle
  

New obsessions

The traditional use of amphorae, or qvevri, buried underground became his next obsession. By 2001, an initial batch of 11 of these large, handmade, earthenware vessels made the perilous overland trip from Georgia to northern Italy, and a whole new phase of the Gravner story began.

The use of amphorae and other clay or cement pots to ferment and age wines has trended dramatically over the past 10 years or so: it has reached the point where it is rare to visit a wine cellar without at least one concrete egg or amphora standing alongside the steel tanks and barrels. The vast majority of these are ‘experimental’, or used to make one small, idiosyncratic cuvée to sit within a much larger portfolio. But for Gravner it was different: by 2005 the entire production, white and red, was being made in amphora.

Had Gravner finally found peace? Had his winemaking input been reduced enough, to its most fundamental conclusion with organic farming, minimum use of sulphur, wild yeasts, no temperature control and whole-berry maceration? It seems not. In 2012 came another radical decision, another bombshell: everything in his vineyards was grubbed up except the indigenous Ribolla for white wines and Pignolo for red wines. Over the years fans had loved his Breg Bianco, a blend of Riesling, Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay; but from 2012, it was no more.

Gravner professes to speak no English, and at times I suspect his boredom threshold for the translated questions and answers of the visiting journalist is set pretty low. During a visit to his newest vineyard in Dedno, Slovenia, he wanders off among the baby vines, plucking a leaf here, straightening a post there, leaving his guests in the capable hands of his daughters Jana and Mateja. At the age of 65, he just wants to get on with it.

This air of detachment should not fool you. Gravner doesn’t miss a trick and is utterly engaged with his wines and his beliefs. Tasting the Chardonnay 1992, I comment on how impressive it is at 25 years old. ‘I made good wine, even before amphora,’ he deadpans, dismissing it as worthy, but a relic of the past.

Making wines with long skin contact is an ancient tradition in this Collio and Brda region that straddles Italy and Slovenia respectively. To an extent Gravner is reviving local tradition, and his example has been followed by many producers on both sides of the border. But his influence is evident much further afield, even in countries with no such history, from California to Australia. He did not create the ‘natural wine’ movement on his own, but he is a role model for it.

I have racked my brains to think of any other winery outside Georgia that has switched 100% of its production to skin- contact wines in amphora. Several are doing far more than ‘playing’ with a vessel or two – José de Sousa in the Alentejo, COS in Sicily, Foradori in Trentino – but no other significant estate has so resolutely committed to these ancient methods. Something else must drive Gravner beyond issues of authenticity and quality, and on my visit a few clues emerged.

Gravner – a timeline

• 1970 Joško Gravner joins the family business
• 1987 Gravner visits California and tastes 1,000 ‘disappointing’ wines
• 1996 Extensive hail damage leads to experimental treatment of Ribolla
• 1997 First vintage released of skin-macerated Ribolla
• 1999 All barriques removed from cellar
• 2000 Gravner visits Georgia
• 2001 First amphora imported from Georgia
• 2005 All production has been moved to amphora
• 2012 All non-native vines grubbed up, leaving only Ribolla and Pignolo
• 2017 After more than a decade of preparation, new vineyards in Slovenia are planted
  

Unerring vision

Having eaten delicious but simple meals of soup, cheese and homemade salami at the family home, I was entertained one evening at the Michelin-starred La Subida, but Gravner did not join us. Daughter Mateja explained that in the mid-1990s, while carrying out the heavy work to build the terraces and prepare the ground for their new vineyards in Slovenia, Gravner suffered a serious fall. He insisted that he didn’t need to go to hospital, but overnight things took a dramatic turn and he needed emergency surgery for extensive internal injuries. This near-death moment left his digestive system chronically fragile. Today he is extremely careful about what he eats and drinks, is a passionate advocate for organic produce, and can only tolerate simple foods.

Gravner farms organically and works strictly according to the phases of the moon, following the calendar of biodynamics guru Maria Thun. Yet, even though simplicity and nature are at the heart of his philosophy, his wines are not certified organic, and he doesn’t follow all aspects of the biodynamic system.

His suspicion that certification is mostly to do with marketing is on record, but another very personal and poignant part of the story is revealed by Mateja: her brother, Miha, began working with their father in the early 2000s, the plan being that he’d take over the estate one day. He was working towards full biodynamic production when, in 2009, he was killed in a motorcycle accident. ‘My father did not have the heart to continue – this was Miha’s project,’ she tells me. Their sister Jana is now in charge of vineyards, and I’m told the topic is once again under discussion.

Love them or hate them, Gravner’s wines are remarkable. His standard Ribolla, for example, an amber wine, is macerated with skins for six months or more and aged for six or seven years before bottling. A Riserva 2003 has only just been introduced to the market after 14 years – and bottled only in magnum. A tiny production of sweet Ribolla named 8.9.10 is made from botrytis grapes from those three vintages, bottled only in 2015.

Visionary? Philosopher? Iconoclast? Yes to all, but Gravner has something profound to say and is part of nobody’s movement or bandwagon. He is an original thinker.

The Gravner difference: six of the best to try

Tom Cannavan is a widely published and awarded wine writer, journalist and broadcaster, and owner of www.wine-pages.com.

The man behind the iconic Cain Five, Chris Howell of Cain Vineyard & Winery in Napa Valley talks terroir and natural winemaking with Stephen Brook, explaining why he thinks wine is ‘intrinsically human’

Standing on a hillock overlooking the Cain vineyards on Spring Mountain, Chris Howell, slight and trim in build, is lord of all he surveys. Vines are planted in blocks among mountain meadows and rocky outcrops, and in the distance lie the Newton vineyards and the outline of Howell Mountain (no relation) on the skyline.

Howell has been the general manager here since 1990, and this is also his home, as the owners, Jim and Nancy Meadlock, do not live on the property. Most Napa winemakers have been rigorously trained at one of the California wine colleges and then enriched by experience in various parts of the world before being offered the plum jobs that they now occupy.

For Howell the journey to Cain was more circuitous. He was born in Washington state, and although his father’s work took him to Europe frequently, Howell was slow to follow. After studying philosophy and cultural criticism in Chicago, he began to visit France, as his first wife’s parents lived in Geneva and encouraged their wine travels. At the same time Howell was studying biochemistry, immunology, and other subjects in Seattle and working as an environmental chemist.

‘Someone in my lab suggested I try making my own wine. Some old-time home winemakers gave me a few tips. I made a Muscat – my first orange wine!’ Then in 1982 he went to Montpellier University in France, with Miguel Torres as one of his classmates, and also took courses at Bordeaux University. ‘But the courses were on winemaking, and it was terroir that intrigued me, and no one was teaching that.’On he went: some classes at UC Davis, a few months at Château Mouton Rothschild, a harvest in Stags Leap District. Then spells at Clos Pegase in Calistoga, where André Tchelistcheff was his mentor, and consulting with Marimar Torres (sister of his old classmate) and with Helen Turley at the Peter Michael winery. In 1990, Cain offered him a job, and he has been there ever since.

Howell at a glance

• Born 1952
• Education University of Chicago 1972-1975
• Wine studies Montpellier University 1982- 1984; Bordeaux University; UC Davis
• Hobbies Reading and music
  

Napa character

Cain had been founded in 1980, and its flagship wine Cain Five, a blend of the five principal Bordeaux varieties, already existed by 1990. Howell’s first project was to replant most of the vineyards, which had been planted on AXR1 rootstocks. in the meantime he created another blend: Cain Cuvée. ‘I didn’t want a wine that would essentially be a collection of leftovers. I wanted a style that was more immediate and approachable than Cain Five, with less extraction, more Merlot, less new oak.’ The portfolio of red wines was completed in 1997 with Cain Concept.

‘As our estate vineyards were still very young, Jim Meadlock wanted to know where the best vineyards were in Napa. I said around Rutherford, so we started buying grapes from the valley floor 700m below. We used much of it for Cain Five, but once the replanting was finished, it seemed a shame to give up those fruit sources, so we used them for the new wine, Cain Concept.’ In recent years Cain Concept differs significantly from Cain Five in that its fruit sources are completely different, from the Napa Valley floor and benchlands rather than the Spring Mountain estate. Cain Cuvée remains unchanged as a lighter, more accessible style, as described above.

All the Cain wines are Bordeaux-style blends, but Howell has always disliked the term. ‘I’d sooner wine was defined by vineyards than by variety. “Bordeaux blend” refers to a place that we’re not. Blends in Bordeaux have an economic element. They plant many varieties because they flower and ripen at different times. That’s not the case in Napa. Take Merlot: it is often thought of as a softening variety, but the best Napa Merlots aren’t at all soft. As for Petit Verdot, in Bordeaux it can fill out the structure, but Napa wines don’t lack structure. So here at Cain it seemed superfluous until I moderated the extraction, and found that the variety could instead contribute spicy, herbal aromas and add complexity.

‘What’s more, the term Bordeaux blend means little to many Americans who probably haven’t tasted much Bordeaux. It’ll be a sign that Napa has come of age when it no longer needs to refer to Bordeaux.’

Balanced philosophy

Howell is one of the most thoughtful of winemakers, and our stroll through the vines would prompt various ruminations. ‘When I came here in 1990, I was more influenced by a scientific approach than I am now. Today I feel more open and I’m conscious that we’re still learning. I’m a believer in less intervention, but not in no intervention.

‘Anyway, intervention applied to wine is a continuum; without some human intervention wine could not exist. I believe in terroir too, but it’s not straightforward. We recognise a certain site gives great wine, so we analyse the site and the soil and then assume that data is what explains its greatness. But that’s not necessarily the case. It’s not causal.’

Given the essential mysteriousness of terroir, and the ability of skilled winemakers to intervene to varying degrees in fashioning the expression of that terroir, where did the balance lie? ‘Winemaking can so easily obscure terroir,’ he says. ‘Here in Napa it’s unfortunate but true that winemakers have to make certain styles to get high scores. They’re under intense pressure from their owners.

‘Often it’s based on phenolic ripeness, as though the sole criterion in a wine’s balance is tannin. The problem with ripening is that you can’t go backwards. If you wait for phenolic ripeness, you may gain something but you may lose other things. Fruit doesn’t have to be fully expressive when you pick it. What matters is sensing how it will turn into wine. Defining levels of ripeness is cultural and personal too, so it’s blurred. Unfortunately blind tastings often favour sweet and loud.’

Yet, I tried to point out, US consumers have come to accept that Pinot Noir can be made in different styles: the burly, high-alcohol, Syrah-like wines in fashion a dozen years ago, and, in complete contrast, the slimmer, more fragrant and ethereal Pinots made today in coastal sites. Why doesn’t this apply to Cabernet? ‘To some extent it does,’ he explains. ‘Cathy Corison and Randy Dunn choose to harvest at lower ripeness. But Cabernet, unlike Pinot, is a status wine with consumer expectations. They’re very expensive and need to conform to a certain model. With Burgundian varieties, consumers are more open-minded. Of course Bordeaux is picking riper too – it’s a choice.

‘But you could also argue that even in Burgundy, the heartland of terroir, winemaking can impose itself on terroir. Echézeaux wines from Jayer or Dujac are poles apart in terms of their winemaking. So there too you could say that winemaking rules.’

Deep engagement

Despite his scientific background, Howell takes a more relaxed approach to wine faults than most winemakers. ‘Wine is a fermented product, not fruit. You can’t completely preserve the integrity of that fruit as you’re transforming it into wine. Today natural wine and low-intervention wines expose faults anew! I find fault-free wines lack sensuality. Wine is about more than winemaking.

‘In the mid-19th century, Pasteur worked on identifying and curing maladies du vin. Today’s renaissance of minimal-intervention or “natural” wine allows us to experience the kinds of wines that Pasteur would have known. Now we can taste the relatively unaffected, uninflected wines of pre-technology. Here we can find the undeniable beauty of some of them, and also rediscover all the “wine diseases” that would have been familiar to that generation.

‘Perhaps unintentionally, the natural movement gives us a window into the pre-oenology wines of the past. There is something intrinsically human about wine – that’s what pulls us towards “real” or “natural” wines.’

It’s become an alternative for those who have come to distrust the AP or DOC or a fancy château label. Indeed, Howell is not unsympathetic towards the natural wine movement, and dislikes the false antithesis of ‘natural’ and ‘technological’.

‘Natural wine is by far the most interesting part of the world of wine today,’ he continues. ‘Here is the quest for honesty, and the pursuit of a deep engagement with nature. Why would you have 100,000 wines, or even 100 wines – if they don’t easily give us some unique expression and reflection of the place and time where they grew, and the hands that grew and made them? Wine is a conversation!’

Sometimes he may express himself cryptically, but Chris Howell sees himself less as a technician than, perhaps, an overseer, seeking to transform place into a living product: the wine in your glass. For him the mysteries resonate – whether of soil or terroir, or the imperfect control a winemaker has of the process he must undertake. Everything, one senses, is up for question, and there are no easy answers.

After a series of encounters with Howell in London and at his Spring Mountain stronghold, there are few more stimulating people with whom to share a finely crafted Napa blend.

Brook’s pick: five to try from Cain

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Find out how Uco Valley’s Luna Austral is bringing biodynamic natural wine production up to date, with tips from award-winning winemaker Alvaro Espinoza…

Biodynamic Argentina: Luna Austral is a force of nature

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Biodynamic wine pioneers in Uco Valley

Follow the Tunuyán river through the Andes, down the Uco Valley to the little town of La Consulta, and you’ll find a pioneer in biodynamic viticulture making its mark.

Luna Austral is currently a producer of high end wines, and the only Argentinean winery full Demeter certified, this means that all its process, vineyards and all its wines have got this certification, and they are leading the way for the region’s biodynamic wine scene.

But the biodynamic approach is not a new path for Luna Austral; it’s the founding philosophy. Since its inception in 2008, agronomist Mario Toso and his team have championed the use of biodynamic practices, to harness the power of a challenging terroir and drive that life force into their wines.

Bringing biodynamic up to date

Toso has adapted the original biodynamic standards set out by Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner in the 1920s, and brought them up to date in his 20 hectares of high altitude vineyards. The results are vibrant and distinctive wines, free from chemicals, with each vintage bringing a unique expression of the year it was made.

Luna Austral operates on the ethos, ‘nature is our director, and we are its most devoted performers’, striving for a harmony that’s reflected in the very architecture of their winery — built as a yin and yang symbol.

Their current wines include a single varietal Malbec, and a blend of Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Malbec — named Sintonia, or ‘Tuning’, relating to winemaking in harmony with nature.

The composer of this harmony is Alvaro Espinoza, Luna Austral’s winemaker and close friend of Toso. The duo have been working together for over a decade, united in their belief in sustainable and biodynamic enology.

How to grow biodynamically — Top five tips from the winemaker

Espinoza comes from a family of winemakers, but he cut his teeth in Chile before moving on to Bordeaux, where he earned his National Diploma of Enology. In 2015 he was recognised by Decanter as one of the top 50 most influential winemakers in the world.

Find a unique microclimate

La Consulta is 900 metres above sea level and enjoys a microclimate of hot days with intense sun exposure followed by cool dry nights — creating wines with vibrant fruit, supple tannins and good acidic structure, requiring minimal intervention.

Respond to nature

Each year is different, so it’s important to adapt our winemaking in response to the unique climate and conditions. We monitor soil of the vineyard throughout the year and add homeopathic preparations like camomile and silica, to activate the soil and create dynamic wines.

Unite plant and animal kingdoms

Biodynamic standards prohibit synthetic fertilisers, so the key is in our compost. We blend animal manure and plant matter from our farming community to create a rich all-natural mix of microorganisms and bacteria. These generate nutrients that work with biodynamic ingredients to enliven the minerality of the alluvial and calcareous soil of La Consulta.

Hand selection

Due to the microclimate, harvesting takes place very early in the morning when temperatures are low. The clusters are brought straight to the winery, where the team carefully selects the best berries by hand to ensure quality and freshness.

Minimal intervention in the winery

The winery is designed to allow for minimal intervention is the winemaking processes. It’s powered by gravity, meaning that following hand selection the berries move through through the winery with minimal interference. Concrete eggs are used to create purely terroir and fruit driven wines.

This content has been provided by Luna Austral, as part of a sponsored campaign on Decanter.com with Wines of Argentina.

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Extreme Argentina: New limits, new terroirs

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How Malbec shows Argentina’s diverse terroirs

Argentina’s new Geographical Indications: providing precise limits for wine.

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While there's no strict definition of natural wine, read Decanter's natural wine charter below...

What is natural wine? – ask Decanter

As there is no strict definition of ‘natural wine’, deciding the entry criteria for samples for our natural wine tasting was not easy.

To help, we sought advice from members of the industry noted for their expertise in natural wines: Doug Wregg from UK importer/retailer Les Caves de Pyrene, which is behind The Real Wine Fair; Isabelle Legeron MW, the creator of the RAW wine fairs in London, New York and Berlin; David Harvey of UK shipper and retailer Raeburn; Monty Waldin, author and consultant on organic, biodynamic and sustainable viticulture; and Simon Woolf, a writer who specialises in organic, biodynamic and natural wines.

• Biodynamic vs organic – ask Decanter

• Do we need a natural wine alternative?

• Sulfites in wine: Friend or foe?

After collating the responses, we came up with our own Decanter charter of quality for natural wines which we used as a basis for entry:

• Vineyards farmed organically or biodynamically – certification was strongly preferred, but uncertified wines were accepted

• Hand-harvested only

• Fermentation with indigenous (wild) yeasts

• No enzymes

• No additives added (such as acid, tannin, colouring) other than SO2

• SO2 levels no higher than 70mg/l total

• Unfined, and no (or light) filtration

• No other heavy manipulation (such as spinning cone, reverse osmosis, cryoextraction, rapid-finishing, Ultraviolet C irradiation)

• Got a question for Decanter’s experts? Email us: editor@decanter.com or using #askDecanter

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Natural wine is here to stay as a small but significant niche; the logical development of a back-to-the-roots movement that began with organic agriculture’s popularisation in the 1970s. It’s a term of convenience; two simple words to describe a complex, sprawling ideology that includes organic and biodynamic viticulture, minimal intervention in the winery, and sometimes radical views on sulphur dioxide.

Read our natural wine definition here. 

For the full article, subscribe to Decanter magazine – available in print and digital.

Simon Woolf: “I was delighted at the overall high quality of winemaking evident, and the lack of obvious faults. While I’m a strong proponent of minimal intervention, organics and biodynamics, I’m no lover of excess brettanomyces, volatile acidity or unintended oxidation. Only two of 122 wines tasted had a hint of mousiness.”

Andrew Jefford: “It’s impossible to ignore the extent to which this line of experimental enquiry is stimulating and intriguing even ‘conventional’ producers, so I’m convinced we will see more wine made in this way in future; I’m also convinced that the success rate of natural wines will steadily improve.”

Sarah Jane Evans MW: “Given the often heated, divisive debate around these wines, I was pleased to find plenty to recommend, scoring 32 wines 90 points or more. My top wines were full of energy and freshness. I was hoping to assess the effects of the containers used for winemaking, however there were not enough concrete egg or amphora examples to draw conclusions.”

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Decanter May 2017

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Producer profile: Masseto – This 100% Merlot, crafted by Axel Heinz, stands apart from its Bolgheri neighbours as a superb single-vineyard wine, says Stephen Brook

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This year's Raw Wine Fair in London underlined how natural and also organic and biodynamic wine producers are garnering a following, particularly among younger wine enthusiasts. Decanter tastings assistant Natalie Earl visited for the first time and, below, gives her initial impression of the show...

As a first time visitor to Raw Wine Fair and a relative newcomer to the natural wine scene, I thought it was important to arrive at 180 Strand in central London with an open mind.

I was keen to try some of the skin contact whites and overall I was thrilled by the diversity of styles available. But is that because I like things that are a little different; because I am seduced by the unconventional?

Slovenian producer Ivan Batič told me that skin contact is like spice. You have to be careful, in other words. Too much and you can mask the varietal character, and the expression of terroir that these wines seek to portray, he said.

The orange wines available had varying lengths of maceration.

Batič waved his hand to indicate the whole room. ‘Everyone is ok in their own vest,’ he said, putting his twist on the phrase ‘to each his own’.

Another style I was particularly taken by was the pét nats – or pétillant naturel wines. Among those I tried were Ancre Hill Estate’s NV Triomphe pét nat and Meinklang’s Foam Rot.

All of the producers that I spoke to at the fair were so honest and open, willing and eager to discuss their winemaking techniques and the decisions behind them.

Minimal intervention in the cellar was a common theme. Amandine Zeman, of Riecine winery in Tuscany, said that she didn’t believe in ‘magic recipes’. It’s important to let the wine lead the way, she said.

Something that also struck me was the conviction these producers had about sustainability and their philosophy towards the soil and the planet.

Martin Kerres, of Valdonica in Tuscany and medical doctor-turned-winemaker, spoke of the importance of allowing vines to build their own strength and defences.

Some of these approaches, and sustainability as a whole, obviously stretch beyond natural wine – and Raw includes organic and biodynamic producers who don’t necessarily identify as ‘natural’. But it was interesting to see how producers at the fair viewed themselves on that spectrum.

The natural wine movement itself clearly has a cult following.

It is a category that defies strict definition and certainly has its critics, but Raw is now in its sixth year and is expanding internationally, holding its first show in New York in 2016.

And if some people weren’t making good wine, then would so many visitors attend a fair like this? To each his, or her, own.

Editing by Chris Mercer

• Decanter magazine will publish a tasting of natural wines in its May issue, out on 5 April 2017. Subscribe now.

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Do we need a natural wine alternative…?

I’ve been caught out that way once or twice. With today’s new ideas of what’s deemed to be acceptable or appropriate, or even threatening, I’m not sure how to react.

Part of me says: ‘Come on, you old square. New generations see things in different ways.

‘Taste them differently too, no doubt. You’re not great on Tracey Emin, either, are you? Wines like unmade beds are the In Thing. Just right for confusion foods.’

If I go to an art gallery, the evidence is before my eyes: I can see, judge and not buy.

• Best natural wine bars in London

If there’s a cork between me and the evidence, things are different. Which is why wine depends on certain assumptions (of clarity, stability and a balance between strength, sweetness and acidity) and the sort of conventions enshrined in appellation systems.

‘Natural’ doesn’t come into it; these are works of craftsmanship; even, occasionally, art. Does a winemaker, then, have the right to sell me something that ignores, or flouts, the winemaking conventions that I rely on?

‘Is ‘natural’ a self-justifying word to cover any sort of accident? Or is ‘alternative’ a more accurate description?’

Is ‘natural’ a self-justifying word to cover any sort of accident? Or is ‘alternative’ a more accurate description?

Of course, the producer may have a lab and state-of-the art chemistry and simply choose not to intervene. There are highly reputed (and very expensive) ‘orange’ wines.

• Storing natural wine – ask Decanter

But I’ve also tasted ‘natural’ wines that remind me of Italy 50 years ago. Tipping grapes in the tub on the ox cart, breaking them up with a cudgel on the way back to the farm and leaving the rest to nature rarely had good results.

The sales pitch for ‘natural’ wines usually tells you that conventional wines contain a lot of non-grape juice gunk. Fish guts: horror. Egg whites: poison. Sulphites: allergens. Colouring: dishonest. Sugar: cheating.

There seems to be a high ground – is it moral, ethical, fashionable, hygienic? – shared by ‘naturalists’ and vegans. Then again, if you read the list of preservatives and allergens on any supermarket packet, you may want to give up eating altogether.

There’s too much vitriol spraying around on the subject of what’s ‘natural’ already. I don’t want to add to the shindig. (It reminds me of the man outside the Dublin pub: ‘Is this a private fight, or can anyone join in?’)

I just humbly suggest ‘alternative’ as an alternative.

• Do you love or loathe natural wine? Share your thoughts in the comments below, or Tweet us @Decanter. 

• This column first appeared in the February 2017 issue of Decanter. Subscribe to Decanter here. 

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Andrew Jefford meets the duo behind Caves de Pyrene.

Like it or not (battalions to both sides, no man’s land between), the major wine development of the century so far has been the move towards ‘natural’ wine. Shortly before Christmas, I got together with Eric Narioo and Doug Wregg of Les Caves de Pyrene, the British wine importer more closely associated with this groundswell than any other, to discuss that – and Les Caves’ strange success.

‘I wasn’t sure it would last. It nearly didn’t…’

Strange? The company was founded (as Santat Wines) by Narioo in 1988, and Wregg joined in 1996, by which time the name had changed. I interviewed them and wrote a piece about them in the London Evening Standard shortly afterwards. They weren’t typical wine traders. Narioo was a tall, fast-talking French nomad, only intermittently comprehensible, with fifteen ideas a minute; Wregg seemed more like an enthusiastic English literature professor who’d dozed off in a seminar room at Bangor University and woken up with a new life in a gastropub. I wasn’t sure it would last.

It nearly didn’t. “During the first fifteen years,” remembered Narioo, “were always a quarter behind with the VAT (sales tax). We never knew if we’d have enough to pay the staff or the growers at the end of the month. That’s why we grew; it was the only escape.”

Not only has it evaded the clutches of the VAT man, but Wregg and Narioo seem to have created a weird new business model based principally on “the journey”. It’s successfully transplanted itself to Italy (where, amazingly enough, Les Caves de Pyrene Italia is now the country’s leading distributor of artisan wines and ‘vini di territorio’, with around 17 reps on the road), Spain (La Cava de Pyrene) and Australia (Puncheon Bottles Pty).

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Narioo and winemaker Anna Martens have six hectares of vineyard in Italy on Mount Etna (where else?) called Vino di Anna; Caves de Pyrene has a chain of wine-led restaurants (run as a separate company called Natural Wine Bars) in London, as well as similar joint-enterprises in Logroño and Melbourne; and Wregg and Narioo are the creators of The Real Wine Fair, the original natural/organic/biodynamic wine fair (the fifth edition will be 7-8 May 2017, at London’s Tobacco Dock). Caves de Pyrene is also, of course, a retail merchant in its own right – and the 400-page wine list (downloadable from the company website) is Wregg’s masterpiece; I hope somebody has saved a copy for the Bodleian Library. It’s packed with puns (he can pun like Grahm), quotations (everyone from Homer to Dolly Parton via Milton, Joyce, Neruda and Roland Barthes) and delicious disquisitions (busking in the best De Quincey tradition). There is nothing else in wine literature like it. It’s a treasure and if you’ve never spent an hour or two with it, make that one of your New Year resolutions.

I say ‘they’ – but the ownership of all of these ventures is a complicated one. “I started it all,” says Eric Narioo, “but whoever wanted then joined in. My idea was always to create a co-operative, but that doesn’t work because people don’t work at the same pace or put in the same effort. But the idea is still that if you want to take responsibility, you can.” Eleven of the 42 UK employees are shareholders, and all of the overseas ventures are partnerships. “The idea comes because the people are there. In Italy, we just allowed Christian Bucci (who had worked for us in the UK) to blossom. The only reason we started in Spain was because Alberto Ruiz was there. It’s the same with Christian McCabe and Patrick Sullivan in Australia. It’s not because we’re megalomaniac or like building an empire. What we like is taking a journey with people.”

There you are: the journey. Narioo is the only wine importer I have ever met who, when he wants to research a country, moves there first, on occasion uprooting his family – for three years in the case of Italy (where he still spends a quarter of the year) but for a few months in other places. “To us, wine wasn’t a business of selling; it was an activity that allowed us to have a journey and to travel the world. It was never about profit and dividends; it was always ‘let’s survive while we carry on doing what we like.’ Books are for sharing; music’s for sharing; wine’s no different. If you keep it to yourself, what’s the point?”

The same spirit animates the Real Wine Fair, which costs the company around £80,000 and takes up a quarter of Doug Wregg’s year, but which they regard as ‘an investment in communicating’. “I enjoy taking wines I really like and finding homes for them with people I really like,” says Wregg. “Forming a village community. Getting people in one place. Experiencing the whole thing. Putting back, to be sanctimonious about it.” Admirable – but all this can’t be easy. I don’t envy the company accountant.

And then came natural wines. These barely existed when I previously interviewed the wine trade’s odd couple. Many of the wines on the current list, too, are not made according to natural-wine tenets; Caves de Pyrene, happily, is not a fundamentalist wine merchant. But in any conversation you will soon come to realise that that is where the pair’s passion lies.

“There’s wine,” says Narioo, “and there’s chemical wine. My knowledge was built on chemical wines. And my palate; and my memory bank. When we began to move to wines that were not made in that way, I was thrown. But when I go down into my cellar now, I want to drink energy. Is the life and energy that exists in the vineyard allowed to go into the wine? Is it free wine? It’s such arrogance to believe that everything that matters about wine is what we’ve discovered in the last 50 years. What about the previous 4,000? Was it all rubbish wine? Of course not.” “The wheel is always turning,” adds Wregg. “Every revolution has a counter-revolution. Young growers like to be challenged. We ask them what would happen if they didn’t filter, or if they didn’t add sulphur. They say that it’s a good question; they try it. That’s our role. We can taste from tank or barrel, and commit to the wine. So the growers we are working with are changing all the time.”

Of course there have been plenty of ‘little accidents’ along the way. I recall the lament of another merchant: “If we sell a restaurant a wine like that, the sommelier rings us up and says it’s faulty. If he or she buys it from Cave de Pyrene, it’s great.”

Interlude

Eric: At lunchtime today, I drank Chaffardon’s L’Incrédule – you remember, the wine we couldn’t sell. We’ve sat on it for five years now. ‘What can we do with this wine?’ we used to say. It was refermenting like mad; it was reduced – if you gave it to the cook to cook with, the cook would send it back.

Doug: Was that the ’09 or the ’10?

Eric: The `10.

Doug: Oh yes, because the `09 was actually sweet. And it had brett. And VA.

Eric: But when we opened the ‘10 at lunch: wow. Just delicious; really refreshing; so much energy in it; the wine had found its place.

Battle-weary old hands might sigh at all this, but you couldn’t have a successful wine business in four countries with wine bar, restaurant and wine fair bolt-ons without filling a need and providing customers with wines which excite them, which they feel are good value and which they want to drink and drink again. ‘Public’ palates, particularly young palates, are not as fixed and calibrated as those of professionals. And there is a growing cohort of consumers who want the powerfully attractive notion of ‘goodness’ in all of the products they buy. When that notion takes hold (you can call it purity or energy if you want), it adjusts all your parameters.

Anyway, things are changing. In my column in the current, January edition of Decanter magazine, I suggest that we may now need two different definitions of purity in wine (“the purity of sulphured and unsulphured wines may be parallel but not identical”). The purity of a traditionally made 9% Mosel Riesling Spätlese — with the spellbinding tension between sweetness and fruity acidity, its non-fruit flavours to which the word ‘mineral’ is often attached, and its astonishingly limpid fruit allusions — is a true purity; it cannot be attained without sulphur. But perhaps there is no less purity in a wine like the deep gold Kloster Ebernach 2014 Orange/Riesling from the Terrassenmosel which its winemaker Martin Cooper recently sent over to me: dry, tart, full of crab-apple invigoration. The two are just different.

Natural wine and other artisan wine styles represent an alternative reality, a parallel universe. We should continue to criticise their failures and scoundrelly impostures (springing from what another winemaking friend recently suggested to me should properly be called ‘non-winemaking’); what else will drive improvement? But we shouldn’t fail to recognise, as Narioo and Wregg insist, that there are historical forms of beauty we had forgotten about in this way of doing things. Truly skilled natural-wine practitioners can dazzle us. Perhaps, at some unspecified point far away in the future, the parallel universes will begin to elide.

And Caves de Pyrene (which you couldn’t predict, which by any business-school logic shouldn’t work, and which helped change everything) may still be journeying on. Narioo’s unsulphured, wild-yeast ferment of ideas, after all, continues to bubble. He has bulk wine in his sights next. You have been warned.

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The wine world has lost a talented winemaker and one of its bravest, most original minds, following the death of Stanislao 'Stanko' Radikon in the early hours of 11 September, writes Simon Woolf.

In brief:

• Stanko Radikon, a giant of the natural and orange wine scene, has died from cancer aged 62

• He produced 36 vintages of Radikon wines from the family home in Friuli Collio in Italy

• Known for total overhaul of family estate’s production methods – especially extended use of skin contact

Full obituary

Stanko Radikon, considered one of the giants of the natural and orange wine scene, lost his long battle with cancer at the age of 62.

The Radikon family is based in the village of Oslavia, Friuli Collio in Italy, but its origins are Slovene.

Stanko Radikon was a humble yet restlessly intelligent and innovative man.

He produced 36 vintages of the now cult Radikon wines. During those 36 years, the winemaking style changed radically, pre-empting much of what would later become natural wine and orange wine trends.

Stanko’s major innovation was to realise that the region’s indigenous Ribolla Gialla grape required different handling to fully express its potential.

In 1995, he returned to his grandfather’s methods of vinification, using 7 days of skin maceration to extract more flavour and colour.

After much experimentation, the wines are now made with three months of skin contact, plus extended barrel and bottle ageing before release.

Switching the estate’s entire white wine production to this rediscovered method was initially unpopular. It took many years before customers and critics accepted the new style.

Together with Edi Kante, Radikon also developed the 500ml and one-litre bottles still in use at Radikon today.

The bottles use a special slimline cork, giving them the same proportions as a magnum, with the idea to mimic the larger format’s ageing potential.

Stanko realised that extended skin contact made the wines more robust and he could add less SO2. By 2003, he was confident enough to cease adding SO2.

Radikon’s wines, together with neighbour and erstwhile colleague Joško Gravner, achieved a remarkable consistency and character with their slightly wild, deep, autumnal flavours and beguiling complexity.

Stanko is survived by his wife Suzana, two daughters and son Saša.

Saša Radikon, himself now a father, has been heavily involved with production for the last decade, and Stanko’s legacy is assured in his firm pair of hands.

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Orange wines: it’s time to get in touch

It’s the new colour on the wine spectrum – white wine made as if it were a red...

France grapples with definition of natural wine

French wine officials have resolved to create a definition...

How to serve orange wine – ask Decanter

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Storing natural wine

Stephen Andressen, from Portsmouth, asks: My wife wants to have nothing but natural wines in the house from now on. I’m worried about storage. Do they have to be kept more carefully? And how long can I keep them?

Isabelle Legeron MW replies: Natural wines are much more resistant than people think.

I have been maturing lots of sulphite-free examples in my east London cellar for a number of years, and the wines are in perfect condition. It is very humid and naturally cool but not temperature-controlled.

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These wines are perhaps more sensitive than their conventional counterparts, because they are reactive to their environment. They are essentially a living product.

But, in any case, you would not want to store any wine at a consistently hot temperature, in the sunlight etc. The same applies to natural wine, so treat them as you would any other bottle.

‘In my personal experience, they can age for years and even decades in some cases’

Once open, natural wines actually last a lot longer than conventional examples. Just put the cork back in and most will hold their own in the fridge for days – sometimes weeks. I kept one example open for four months – an experiment I talk about in my book Natural Wine.

The ageability of a natural wine depends on how it is made and whether or not it’s for immediate consumption as some ‘vins de soif’ are bottled early and meant for drinking within the year.

In my personal experience, they can age for years and even decades in some cases. This usually seems to be down to the skill of the producer, starting with really healthy grapes and allowing the wines time to mature and stabilise properly before bottling.

There is no official definition of natural wines – ed.

Got a question? Email us: editor@decanter.com

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The recommendations below were taken from Decanter.com’s ultimate London wine bar guide – as chosen by our experts.

• Read here about the ongoing dispute surrounding the definition of natural wines.

Terroirs

For casual dining my first choice would have to be Terroirs for the simplicity of the food (think cheese, charcuterie and classic French bistro food), but most of all for the wine. I also like the relaxed and easy-going atmosphere. It’s definitely great value, with many small growers and natural wine producers. As well as older vintages available at affordable prices. Laure Patry

5 William IV Street, WC2N 4DW

+44 (0) 20 7036 0660

terroirswinebar.com

The Remedy

The Remedy gets just about everything spot on; loads of interesting and natural wines by the glass (especially old Madeira), delicious sharing plates and a laid-back atmosphere. Richard Hemming MW

Small, relaxed, informal and convivial The Remedy is a lovely little wine bar only a short walk from Oxford Street. They have a superlative collection of predominantly European wines, many with a nod towards the natural. Plus they’ll happily pour you half a bottle of any of their high-end wines for half the price. Matt Walls

124 Cleveland Street, W1T 6PG

+44 (0) 20 3489 3800

theremedylondon.com

• Six of the best London Sherry and tapas bars

The Winemaker’s Club

Walking under the arches in The Winemakers Club is like stepping back in time. It has the air of a private club, only without the stuffiness and membership fees. John, the brains behind the idea, has hand-picked some gems from unusual parts of the world – including Slovenia, Hungary, even Poland – but you’ll also find classic Claret at bargain prices. Christelle Guibert

This wineshop-cum-wine bar is the perfect place to relax and unwind after work with a plate of cheese and charcuterie. Boasting a wonderfully eclectic selection of natural, organic and biodynamic wines. Isabelle Legeron MW

A self-proclaimed ‘wine pub’, this authentically dank cellar is hidden away under a railway arch near the City. The Winemaker’s Club is home to a wine importer with a taste for unusual natural and biodynamic wines. There’s plenty to explore by the taste, glass or bottle. Matt Walls

41a Farringdon Street, EC4A 4AN

+44 (0) 20 7236 2936

thewinemakersclub.co.uk

• France grapples with definition of natural wine

40 Maltby Street

40 Maltby Street has a great natural wine list that is well-priced and served with beautiful food that’s centred around careful sourcing and seasonality. Buzzing atmosphere and wonderfully casual, with wines available to drink by the glass or bottle at the bar, or even to take home and enjoy. Isabelle Legeron MW

40 Maltby Street, SE1 3PA

+44 (0) 20 7237 9247

40maltbystreet.com

Naughty Piglets

Naughty Piglets effortlessly combines innovative cuisine, exceptional ingredients and an extensive natural wine selection. This hidden gem is tucked away down Brixton Water Lane and is perfect for any night of the week. Melanie Brown

28 Brixton Water Lane, SW2 1PE

+44 (0) 20 7274 7796

naughtypiglets.co.uk

• Top London wine bars as chosen by the experts

Elliot’s

Elliot’s Café benefits from the lively ambience of Borough market, whilst avoiding the hustle and bustle. One of my old favourites as it’s only a short stroll from Decanter HQ and offers fantastic tapas. The wine list has been put together by Isabelle Legeron MW, the queen of natural wine, so expect some quirky and exciting wines. The atmosphere is laid-back and just what you need after a long day at the office. Christelle Guibert

12 Stoney St, Borough Market, SE1 9AD

+44 (0) 20 7403 7436

elliotscafe.com

Original recommendations taken from Top London wine bars as chosen by the experts. This piece was edited by Laura Seal on Decanter.com

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