Natural wines: the backlash

It's inevitable given the amount of publicity that's been accorded to natural wines lately that some will be less enraptured than others. This latest post from wine writer Quentin Sadler being typical of the sceptics' position.

I haven't got time for a considered response today but two quick points.

The term 'natural' I agree does have its downside. It puts up the back of conscientious winemakers who don't choose to engage with any certification scheme but still make good wines, with care. But it engages the public in a way that 'organic' alone never did. And it's easy to get bogged down in semantics.

Finding wines you don't like at a tasting is normal. Every tasting I go to that happens to me - conventional wines as well as natural ones. So I don't think that makes natural wines especially unreliable.

I'll return to all of this when I have a moment

Le Blanc qui Tente

If ever a wine was well named it's Le Blanc qui Tente - the tempting white - a really stunning semillon we picked up in Wholefoods Kensington a couple of weeks ago then managed to mislay.

It's made by Stéphanie Roussel of Chateau Lasolle in the Côtes du Marmandais in the south-west of France apparently just next to one of our other favourite producers Elian da Ros. It's also described as a vin de nature and is exactly that - biodynamic, no artificial yeasts or added sulphur, unfined and unfiltered. But it's the taste that's so amazing - classic rich lush waxy semillon: it could be a top white Bordeaux.

The only problem is I'm not sure which vintage it is. As it's a vin de table it hasn't got a date on the bottle. The current release seems to be 2007 but Aubert & Mascoli the importers seem to have the 2005. I'll update you when I find out.

Although the vintage Wholefoods has - whatever it is - is ace, I'd be inclined to pick it up in France if you can where it only costs €10.70 rather than the £16 odd it costs here

Interestingly we tried another 2007 last night, Catherine and Pierre Breton's Beaumont Chinon which was very disappointing - oddly tarry, earthy and lacking in fruit. I just tried it again, hoping it would have improved overnight but it hasn't (despite the fact it's a fruit day for what that's worth. Yesterday was a leaf day). I guess it's designed to be drunk young and has just passed its 'drink by' date. Not good though.

Blacks: a London club with natural wine

I've recently revived my membership of Blacks , not on the basis that I needed a London club living out of town - useful though that is - but for the somewhat frivolous reason that they have an extensive natural wine list.

They probably did when I belonged to it a few years ago except no-one talked about natural wine in those days. The wine, chosen by Giuseppe Mascoli was always good though - usually from small (in capacity not size) Italian producers.

Mascoli is also the other half of Aubert & Mascoli who are one of the leading importers of natural wine and one of the participants in the recent Natural Wine Fair. He also created the highly successful mini pizza chain Franco Manca.

Most of the current Blacks list is now organic and a number of wines sulphur free including the very attractive and reasonably priced Terragno Dolcetto, Colli Tortonesi from Valli Unite we had at lunch today. (It could have done with being a shade cooler but when we asked if we could have an ice bucket they mysteriously brought along a bucket of cold water without ice. Maybe they regard ice as unnatural?)

They also produce a very well-designed free newsletter called The Carafe with profiles of their producers and - this appears to the food and wine matching geek in me - suggest pairings for each course on the main dining room menu.

The place is wonderfully raffish and decadent. I love it.

Natural Wine meets Cantillon

Those who like to keep up to speed with the growing natural wine roadshow may like to know there's a natural wine fair in Belgium the week after next, at Wijnfolie in Aalter on Sunday June 5th and the Cantillon brewery in Brussels the following day - full details on the Wijnfolie website here. You can also follow them on Twitter @Wijnfolie.

I like the idea of holding an event at Cantillon. There are strong parallels between natural wines and gueuze I've been thinking about for a while and to which I'll return.

Alice and Jancis talk natural wine

Having whizzed off to the Jura this week I've not yet had time to go through my notes on the wines I tasted at the Natural Wine Fair but here's an interesting short video from Jancis Robinson's website of her interview with US natural wine champion Alice Feiring . . .

And you'll find Alice's own thoughts on the difference in attitude between Britain and the US towards natural wine here.

Her main point is that the UK trade and critics are too influenced by formal wine education such as the MW and WSET qualifications, a criticism from which she absolves Jancis. Quite rightly. I've noticed she is notably open-minded on the subject.

And there's more! Alice also interviewed Jancis on video. This is getting positively incestuous . . .

Six things that struck me at the Natural Wine Fair

I’ve spend a good part of the last two days at the Natural Wine Fair and frankly would have spent a third if I hadn’t got so much else on. It’s going to take a few days to pull together the highlights but here are a few immediate thoughts.


Natural wine is a broad church
The fair should have finally blown the myth that all natural wines are cloudy and cidery. There were wines of every description there from the utterly conventional to the wild and whacky. Something for everyone in other words. It was also fascinating to see how different the French and Italian approaches to winemaking were and how even a single winemaker could make wines in a number of different styles (the much derided Sébastien Riffault (above) comes to mind)


It arouses a lot of antipathy
Yes, still, judging by the talk by American wine writer Alice Feiring (below) and what I gather was an even edgier panel discussion on natural wine in restaurants. People get extraordinarily het up about natural wine for reasons I don’t fully understand. Does anyone get furious about the presence in shops of unpasteurised cheeses or castigate someone who likes a runny Brie or a stinky Epoisses?

Sceptics regard natural wine fans, I suspect, as bandwagon-jumpers, unable to identify a wine fault when it hits them in the face. Natural wine fans regard sceptics as blinkered and narrow-minded, expecting all wine to conform to an accepted paradigm. A gulf that shows no sign of being bridged at present.


Consumers seem to be ahead of the trade in this respect
Judging by the turnout of over 800 on the public day, the public have fewer issues with natural wine than the trade. Considering it was the first natural wine fair and not advertised in the national press I thought that was an impressive turnout. Maybe we all need to tiptoe less gingerly around natural wines and shouldn’t feel the need to ‘explain’ them.

Natural winemakers are not afraid of tannin . . .
Again, against conventional wisdom which says all reds must be rendered soft and fruity. The Italians in particular produce wines that are unabashedly tannic. Maybe because they wouldn’t dream of drinking them without food

. . . or colour
Ever seen a Pinot Grigio like this?


Or labels like these?

. . . or afraid of a little sly humour
I love the punning labels like this Boisson Rouge from Emile Heredia of Domaine de Montrieux (a pun on the French poisson rouge, the name for a goldfish). Delicious wine, actually


Natural wines are fun to drink
Maybe it was the outdoor - or partially outdoor - location and the fact that it didn’t rain but there was a really festive feel about the whole event. Just people enjoying wine and discovering new flavours. Isn’t that what wine is supposed to be about?


And just as a footnote and a sign of the times: I spotted one of Marks & Spencer's wine buyers at the fair on both days. Straw in the wind . . .

How to sell natural wine

I've been meaning to go to the Wholefoods store in Kensington for a while having heard it had a good range of organic and natural wines and finally made it this week which is part of Natural Wine Fortnight in the UK.

Like many other shops and bars they had a couple of natural wines open to taste - a Roagna Langhe Bianco and Dolcetto d'Alba, a bargain at £3.99 a glass and £13.99 a bottle, but it was their overall approach to natural wine that really impressed me.


First, they keep bottles with no added sulphites in the fridge.


They explain what natural wine actually is


And best of all, they flag up bottles which are low in sulphur which manager Peter Hogarth defines as under 50mg per litre with a Low SO2 label. This excludes a few bottles, he admits, which are natural in style but finds it a practical working definition.

He must stock about 30-40 wines that could be classified as natural but he's not doctrinaire about it and says there are several that he hasn't taken on that he knows would be too hard a job to sell. And he encourages customers to ask him or his colleagues if they're thinking of buying a natural wine so that they can explain what to expect and how to handle it.


I tasted a few others from their range of which I was particularly impressed by the Domaine de l'Ocre Rouge Pinot Noir 2009, a really gorgeous Pinot which had just come into stock and which I believe will sell for £17.99.

There's also a nice little wine bar where you can drink any of the bottles in the department for just £5 corkage with a plate of cheese or charcuterie from the next door counter - or a tartine. Apparently it's known as the Hidden Gem wine bar. With good reason.