Over the last decade the Marlborough region in New Zealand has developed into one of the most well known wine regions of the world, creating dynamic wines that – in the case of Sauvignon Blanc at least – portray a unique identity and style.

However, five artisanal wineries in the region believe a change of attitude is needed in terms of the way wineries look at their region’s viticulture and environmental impact, and have formed MANA (Marlborough Natural Winegrowers) to promote what they term as natural wines from Marlborough.

The five wineries are Fromm, Herzog, Seresin, Te Whare Ra, and Huia. This is how they describe their joint philosophy:

“We share a common belief in traditional, natural, artisanal winegrowing to create truly expressive and unique wines. All winegrowing involves human intervention – but how much is a choice.  Natural winegrowing suggests “less is more” – the less the soil, grapes and wines are artificially manipulated, the more the wines can express where they come from.”

In practice, MANA is about promoting environmentally-friendly biodynamic viticulture to allow “regional, sub-regional and vineyard influences” to shine through in their individual wines.

One of the first challenges for the group was to set strict standards for membership.  Claire Allan of Huia, commented that, “owing to MANA’s strict requirement for 85% of the vineyard growing organically grown grapes, one wine company found they could not yet fit this criteria and have delayed their entry for a few years to allow time for the conversion.  We believe robust entry criteria such as this, will set a high standard of grape growing within the alliance.  I very much believe that this wine company and many more in the region will within no time be hitting MANA’s requirements, and producing better quality wines for their investment in more natural methods.”

For its members one of the key benefits of the alliance is the ability to share ideas and resources, creating a practical and social network for all the members.  This assists the producers in the development of their wines, but also providing a platform for the group to present their wines to the world.

Claire believes this will really benefit the producers of Marlborough, as they share experences and knowledge on natural production methods.  “Earlier this year the alliance met during the March Equinox to bury enough cow horns at Te Whare Ra for all of the MANA group.  These cow horns come from a local organic cattle farmer, and can be reused up to three or four times, the manure that is stuffed inside the horns is then sprayed on our vineyards as part of our biodynamical programme. This is just one small example of how the group is benefitting from sharing resources and ideas, and creating a community of like minded vine growers.”

You can read more about MANA and its members on their website: www.naturalwine.org.nz and look out for future posts about the project from Claire and the team at Huia here on Bibendum Times.

Spaghetti Bolognese is a fine meal, albeit one that depends on the love, care, time and ingredients lavished on the ragu. I have a personal preference for making the ragu from duck; pot roasting the bird with a thick, winey, tomato base and then adding the shredded meat to the sauce. Now, this could easily be called Pappardelle al Ragu d’Anatra but it is really just a poshed up spag bol, and at the same time a tremendous vehicle for red wine.

On Sunday, I um’d and ah’d about whether to open a bottle or not. I was dining alone, Monday’s to-do-list loomed and I had been suitably refreshed the day before whilst watching some rugby. The sensible answer was no. But spag bol – poshed up or otherwise – without a glass of vino rosso is as unthinkable as an afternoon at The Stoop without a pint of Guinness. I reached for the corkscrew.

The bottle in question was Alois Lageder’s first red wine to be certified as biodynamic, his Beta Delta Lagrein/Merlot 2008 from Alto Adige in the far German-speaking north of Italy. I am a mite sceptical about biodynamics – although perhaps not as sceptical as this B Times contributor – but I do know many of my favourite wines are made this way.

A blend of local Lagrein and international Merlot, it is beautifully balanced with floral dark fruit, sweet spices and wonderful freshness. The tannins are ripe and rounded and the finish, long and bright. It is a school-night-friendly 12.8% abv too.

The remarkable aspect of this wine, however, is its energy and vivacity; something tasters frequently note in biodynamic wines. It is somehow more than the sum of its parts with the fruit, tannin, oak, alcohol and acidity combining to refresh the parts other wines just can’t reach. It buzzes and crackles with life.

And it goes perfectly with spag bol.

Find out more about this wine

The biodynamic line up

Organic and biodynamic practices are all around nowadays covering everything from chocolate to whiskey but what does it mean in the wine trade and does it actually make wine taste better? As a host/tutor for Wine Unearthed I am often asked this question in our wine tasting workshops so I felt it was merely my duty to try and find out a bit more about it. No, it’s ok….. I insist!

I attended a biodynamic wine tasting on what was, according to the biodynamic calendar, the ‘best’ day that month to taste wine. All the forces of the universe were impacting on the wine so it tastes at its best. All days fall on either a fruit, root, flower or leaf day; fruit obviously being the best one to taste wine on. The fact that the wines are made using biodynamic practices just makes it a double whammy and so I had very high hopes for the offerings at The Winery in Maida vale.

My first surprise when I saw the line up of wines was that out of the 10 only one of them was a New World wine, a Zinfandel from the Napa Valley in California, all the rest were from either Italy, France or Germany. There is a misconception that biodynamics is a New World phenomenon when in fact many winemakers in the Old World follow these practices and as with many things in the world of wine, the New World follows the Old. There are many merchants and wine bars these days specialising in organic and biodynamic wine so they really are presenting their case in the market and becoming easier to source locally.

The wines on offer ranged from a crisp appley German sparkling wine in the style of an Italian Prosecco, through to a rich floral Chenin Blanc from Anjou in Loire Valley to a fabulous Spatburgunder (Pinot Noir) from Ahr in Germany and several hearty, heady southern French reds before ending on a juicy, licorice laden Zinfandel from Napa Valley, California. Prices ranged from £9.99 to £22.99 of course my favourite of the day the Spatburgunder came in at £19.99 and was typically the second most expensive. It was fabulous though, I could have quite happily just smelled it for ages, the nose was so complex and dynamic with every swirl; loads of cherry pie, earth, and cranberry with just enough of a savoury, gamey quality to keep my interest.

In honesty none of the wines disappointed but there were realistically only 4 of the 10 that I would have happily bought there and then knowing I’d received value for money. However I refrained from making any purchases as a thought had struck me during the afternoon. If today is the best day of the month to taste wine, what are they going to taste like on a bad day and will I still consider them value for money?

As for the question of whether biodynamic practices produce better wine, I’m not entirely convinced. There were undoubtedly some very good, even excellent wines on offer but had they been compared against non-biodynamic wines of similar quality I’m not sure I would have noticed the difference. A common complaint of biodynamic wines is that they are a tad on the pricey side. Given that biodynamic wine is around 10 times more labour intensive than non- biodynamic wines to produce one can understand why the price tag is relatively high. However if one considers costs on a more environmental stage then biodynamic wines are definitely paying their own way by giving back to the land rather than taking away.

Overall I think I definitely need to drink more wines….er, I mean do more research… before my mind is made up either way but for now I think my safest standpoint is asking the question every time a try a wine, is it good quality and is it value for money? Like everything with wine tasting the concept of value for money is entirely subjective and whether or not I taste on a fruit or a root day to form my opinions just means I’ll have to keep trying. On your behalf of course J.

Rudolf Steiner

Biodynamic agriculture was developed in the early 1920s  by Rudolf Steiner. Seen by many as the first modern ecological farming system it is an holistic approach that tries to bring the soil, plants and animals to its original natural balance and harmony. Unlike the more general term natural wine (see earlier post), Biodynamic winemaking is to many the strictest method of viticulture and vinification. Very precise guidelines have to be followed in order to convert the soil back to its original composition. Certification is very difficult to obtain and at least 4 years of proven Biodynamic farming are required.

More and more top quality producers embrace Biodynamic farming, with the like of Leflaive, Zind-Humbrecht and Nicolas Joly leading the way. One of the most charismatic and knowledgeable follower of Biodynamics is Alto Adige’s Alois Lageder. A fierce and long time practiser of Biodynamic farming Alois has just released his first Demeter (the strictest Biodynamic certification) certified wine. Watch the video where Alois explains why Biodynamic farming is essential in order to restore the soil to its original composition and how it differs from organic farming.

Seen by many as the purest and ultimate winemaking approach, biodynamic wines have seen a huge growth of popularity in recent years. Sommeliers are increasingly populating their wine lists with biodynamic wines too. As the term is still unfamiliar to the average wine drinker sommelier’s see themselves as being at the vanguard of the drive to raise awareness of biodynamics. Watch Angus Macnab’s (Lanesborough Hotel) talking about biodynamic wines below:

Here’s Roberto delle Pietra (Roussillon restaurant) take on the Biodynamic farming concept and the danger of misusing the term:

It’s exciting to see so many  sommeliers engaging with biodynamics. They fully understand the philosophy behind the wines and by sharing their knowledge they seek to educate and enlighten their customers and convert them into the joys of biodynamic wines.

Strange things happen under a full Moon.  I came home one night this week to find half a tree and someone’s spare wheel on my doorstep.  Could this have been caused by schoolkids playing up due to the lunar influence? Perhaps madmen or werewolves, in their delirium dumping rubbish on people’s thresholds in some bizarre moonlit ritual?  Alas, nothing quite so exciting had occurred but it was lunar related. Spring tides, raising the river levels along with this phase of the moon, regular, predictable but impressive none the less. That’s the price one pays for living on the river I guess, although watching it sweep away unsuspecting Fulham FC supporters’ cars every so often certainly makes up for it.

Many legends surround the cycles of the Moon. A full Moon has traditionally been linked to crime, mental illness (it’s the origin of the word lunacy after all), were wolves and even patterns of financial trading.  The wine trade doesn’t appear to be immune either, with many claiming it is what makes their wine taste different on different days.  So, could it all be true?  I mean, hey, if the Moon can cause a BMW to float away it must have some effect on everything, right?

Well, the answer is that yes it does, but probably not as much as you think.  Astronomers (they’re the ones who look through telescopes, not Mystic Meg) calculate that a mosquito sitting on your arm would exert a greater gravitational pull on your body than the Moon does from 400,000km above us.  It is able to move the tides around though so what about the water in our bodies and even in wine?  This is something of a misconception about the way that tides work and it’s only the unbounded nature of the oceans that allows tides to flow.  The water in your body or in the glass of wine in your hand remains virtually unaffected.

Undoubtedly there are many things that may be influenced by or linked to the Moon that we have not been able to prove yet.  If that is the case however, we will be able to measure their influence through objective testing.  While wine tasting has never been sufficiently tested all of the other myths surrounding the Moon have.  So is there any truth in them?  Well, in 1996 Ivan Kelly, James Rotton and Roger Culver examined over 100 studies and found no significant correlation on any of the following –

homicide rates
traffic accidents
crisis calls to police or fire stations
domestic violence
births of babies
suicide
major disasters
casino payout rates
assassinations
kidnappings
aggression by professional hockey players
violence in prisons
psychiatric admissions
agitated behavior by nursing home residents
assaults
gunshot wounds
stabbings
emergency room admissions
behavioral outbursts of psychologically challenged rural adults
lycanthropy
vampirism
alcoholism
sleep walking
epilepsy

We however, as confessed wine buffs and cork dorks know that there are days when wine just does not taste as good as others.  So what exactly is going on?  Something must be causing it, even if it is not the moon, right?

Well, of course, but as supposed expert tasters we have to understand there are confounding factors that influence how we taste.  The temperature of the room, the temperature of the wine, ambient aromas in the room, what we ate for lunch, who we are tasting with, how long we’ve been awake, how many wines we have already tasted.  Most people taste very subjectively and are very easily influenced by the (sometimes very vocal) opinions of others.  We are human beings after all, not lab equipment rationally analysing every aspect of the wine, but when a wine doesn’t taste as amazing as the last time we tried it we need to find a reason why.  Hey, we say, it’s not my irrational human brain, it must be that lump of rock up there in the sky.  That is what people do, we draw patterns where none exist (ever gazed at clouds and seen a dragon or Lion-O from Thundercats?), we cherry pick from our experiences to confirm our own prejudices.

Why should all this matter?  After all it’s pretty harmless to think that the moon is responsible for our tasting experiences and customers seem to like it so it’s surely all good, right?  Well I’m of the opinion that basing our judgements around this it clouds our thinking and we forget about what it is that truly makes a wine great.  Take this thinking further and we are in to the realms of dousing for water and using magical crystals to improve our wines.  Deep down we know that it’s not the burying of cow horns full of magic manure that create great wines, but the attention to detail and care taken in crafting the product through the rest of the process.

There is no doubt that implementing  ”green” winemaking practices can result in better wines. But should we really be crediting the moon and stars for this rather than more earthly factors?

Now, I have been tasting wine for much longer than I care to remember, and at the peak of my wine buying career I would easily sample 100+ wines a day. Today the demand on my tastebuds is much more restrained, and often limited to tasting a couple of dozen tanks in our own cellar (which I do with Angela on a pretty regular basis).

Of course our tanks are all 100% Albariño and therefore the differences from one tank to the next can be fairly miniscule, and the evolution over time very subtle, but then there is something else that I notice from time to time….

There are days when I emerge from the cellar positively glowing about the quality of our wine, and then there are other days, when I am not quite so ecstatic. Now, this could be down to me – perhaps my own palate is not as sharp as it should be on certain days, although this is not a phenomenon that I have been aware of in the past. So what could be the reason for this apparent variation in quality? Could it be the moon?

Some UK supermarkets are now actually arranging wine tasting sessions around good and bad days as determined by the lunar calendar. According to a German grandmother called Maria Thun (back in the 1950’s) the calendar should be divided into four categories according to the relative positions of moon and stars – “fruit”, “flower”, “leaf” and “root”. Wine is best on fruit days, followed by flower, leaf and root days (best avoided completely on a root day). Tesco and Marks & Spencer are the latest supporters of this philosophy, and the two supermarkets now have a policy of inviting press and wine critics to taste their wine only on days which the calendar says are favourable.

Of course sceptics say that there is no proof to support Ms Thun’s theory, whilst on the other side believers argue that wine is, after all, a living organism and can therefore be affected by cycles of the moon. Finally, the more logical, scientifically minded amongst us might simply say that the apparent variations in taste are more likely to be caused by changes in atmospheric pressure, but who really knows for sure – it could be just in our imagination?

Perhaps it’s appropriate, with Halloween just behind us, that it all sounds like a bit of witchcraft. Personally I quite like the moon theory, albeit that the logical part of my brain tells me that it all sounds just a little far-fetched!

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