Your Guide to Organic, Biodynamic and Natural Wine
From the Jenny & Francois blog, here’s an interview with Simone Roveglia of Cento Filari.
Simone Roveglia of Cento Filari from Jenny & François Selections on Vimeo.
International organic wine fair FIVE (Feria Internacional del Vino Ecologico) will be held online this year from June 21st to June 30th. The onsite fair with now be biennial. Registration on the site www.five-bio.com/ begins on May 24th.
Pedro López de Heredia has passed away at 85. Alice Feiring has posted a chapter from her book about him on her website.
From The New York Daily News:
State Sen. Jeff Klein’s campaign cup is spilling over with $33,000 in cash from a national wine distributor that would almost singularly benefit from a bill the Bronx lawmaker authored.But Klein’s re-election war chest is growing at the expense of small merchants and wine-loving consumers in New York, who could end up paying an extra $7 per bottle, critics charge. Empire Merchants LLC is pushing a measure that would require all wine to be warehoused in New York for at least one day before being sold in local stores. Empire has poured more than $500,000 over the last eight years into the coffers of Gov. Cuomo, state Senate co-leader Dean Skelos, Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver and other key lawmakers. Critics say the measure would destroy Empire’s small- and mid-size local competitors, which store their vino in cheaper New Jersey warehouses.
Some commentary over at Dr. Vino:
Clearly, this is absurd, and it serves no-one’s purpose other than a large distributor such as Empire. As with Amazon, most of the small and mid-sized wine distributors have chosen to warehouse in New Jersey. To force that warehousing to NY would create jobs–always appealing to politicians–but it would doubtless raise the cost of business to the small and mid-sized distributors, likely raising prices for consumers or forcing distributors to trim their portfolios. The worst case scenario is that they would go out of business. Ironically, the 2005 Granholm decision on direct wine shipping could be invoked since this law discriminates against out-of-state products, violating interstate commerce.
Organic Wine Journal’s Editor Adam Morganstern wrote about this last year on Huffington Post:
The most important wine region to New Yorkers isn’t Bordeaux, Tuscany or the Mosel. It’s New Jersey, where almost all the fine wine they drink is warehoused before being delivered to local stores and restaurants. An amendment before the New York Senate would end this practice, and require wines to be stored in-state for 48 hours. Small wholesalers are up in arms, claiming this is an attempt to drive them out of business by the state’s two biggest liquor distributors, Southern Wine & Spirits and Empire Merchants, who already have their storage facilities within state lines.
“It’s two very large companies trying to monopolize the fine wine market by squeezing us out,” says Tina Fischer of Polaner Selections. “It’s bad for our retail and restaurant customers, and bad for consumers. Prices will go up, selections will go down. The only people this is good for are Southern and Empire.”
Here is a video submitted by Jon Torodash, who is running for NYC City Council, where he questions NY State Senator Jose Peralta over his support for the legislation.
RAW is one of the most exciting, and certainly the largest, collection of fine, natural, organic and biodynamic wine artisans ever to come together in the capital. The two-day celebration of some of the best wine talent in the world offers visitors the chance to sample over 1000 different wines from more than 200 growers. As well as tastings, the show features talks from the world’s leading experts and a selection of incredible food by renowned artisan food producers and restaurants. The independent fair is organised by Isabelle Legeron MW – the first French female to earn the accolade of Master of Wine and the first MW to focus exclusively on natural wine.
Dates: 19th – 20th May 2013. Sunday – open to public and trade, Monday – open to trade in the day, public early evening
Times: Sunday (open to everyone) 10 am to 6 pm. Monday (open to trade) 10 am to 8 pm
Address: F BLOCK, The Old Truman Brewery, 83 Brick Ln, London E1 6QL.
The entrances to use are near the corner of Brick Lane and Hanbury Street.
Nearest Tube: Liverpool Street Station (or Shoreditch High Street). RAW is a 5 to 10-minute walk from the station
Web Address: rawfair.com, Twitter @rawfair and Facebook: www.facebook.com/rawfair
Price: Sunday All day: £20 (fee included) – if bought in advance. All day: £25 – on the door Monday: 5pm to 8pm: £20 (fee included) – if bought in advance 5pm to 8pm: £25 – on the day (trade only in the day) Sunday & Monday tickets (i.e. all day Sunday and evening Monday): for £30.
Age Group: 18+
“Wine and the Environment, Organic, Biodynamic, and Natural,” the latest book by Britt and Per Karlsson (of BKWine), has won two prizes. It was first named “Best Wine Book for Professionals” in Sweden. Then it was awarded silver, second place, in the category “World’s Best Educational Wine Book 2012.” Both awards were given by the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards.
“Wine and the Environment” is the third book by Britt and Per Karlsson. It describes in detail organic wine growing and wine making and what organic wines are. It also explains other related concepts like biodynamic wine, natural wine, sustainability and fair trade. The book also contains a number of producer profiles of wine makers that the authors recommend. It is lavishly illustrated.
The text in the book is written by Britt and the photographs are by Per in this husband and wife author couple. It has taken the authors a year and a half to complete the book. Over that time they have visited and talked to hundreds of wine producers all over the world. Britt comments on the awards: “To make a book like this, full of facts and details, you need a lot of energy and drive. It is perhaps a little trite to say but we have really put our soul into it. Then it is fantastic to be acknowledged like this for all the work that you have done, both in Sweden and internationally.”
Gourmand World Cookbook Awards is the world biggest competition for wine and food literature. The first phase of the competition awards national prizes. These are then presented at the world finals where they compete for the international awards. The awards ceremony took place in Paris at the end of February. More than 10,000 books participate every year.
BKWine was founded in the 90s by Britt Karlsson, a Swede living in Paris. In the early ‘00s she was joined by her husband Per Karlsson in the business that now encompasses several different wine related activates. The main business is organising wine tours for wine enthusiasts and wine professionals who want to visit wine regions to learn more about wine. Each year BKWine organises some 30 wine tours. BKWine also publishes an online newsletter on wine, The BKWine Brief, which reaches some 20,000 subscribers. Britt and Per are members of the British Circle of Wine Writers (CWW), the International Wine Writers Federation (FIJEV), the French Wine Press Association (APV), the International Wine and Food Society (IWFS) and several other wine and gastronomic organisations.
What is that “organic taste” that, apparently, most organic wines suffer from? The writer from examiner.com doesn’t go into detail, but thank God that Grgich Hills avoids it:
Looking for a good organic wine that doesn’t have the “organic” taste? Grgich Hills has some of the very best selections of wines that come from certified organic & Biodynamic vineyards. They won’t make you feel guilty for spending a little more on vino and are great alone or with certain foods.
From The Guardian:
Forty Hall vineyard is the brainchild of Sarah Vaughan-Roberts, a Hackney resident who studied viticulture and became determined to create an organic vineyard in London. Eventually, she discovered the Jacobean mansion of Forty Hall, owned by Enfield council. Its organic farm, run by Capel Manor, the local horticultural college, had some underused, south-facing slopes with, crucially, light, gravelly soils, unlike the unsuitable heavy clays of most of London. With added lime to deliver the perfect pH, this soil could grow grapes.
Creating London’s first organic wine for 500 years or so has not been straightforward. An acre of bacchus grapes planted in 2009 failed to grow. “Planting was done haphazardly by students and volunteers. We were all learning,” says Mark Mendes, a former science teacher and volunteer. “The second field was much more successful.”
This field, poised to deliver its first crop this year, was planted in 2011 by a German team with laser-guided equipment, funded by lottery money and other grants. (The day after, the Germans headed off to Windsor to plant some vines for the Queen.) “You can see the straight lines on Google Earth. It’s fantastic,” enthuses Mendes.
