All About Natural, Organic & Biodynamic Wines

All About Natural, Organic & Biodynamic Wines

Natural Wines

More and more people are interested in and using the term “natural wine.” It’s a positive movement, for sure. But also one that people need to navigate with some shrewdness. Wine needs the same scrutiny as our pantry items and beauty products. But the wine industry is completely unregulated. There are no labelling requirements and not much advocacy for consumers, which means there’s a lot of room for greenwashing.

The term “natural wine” can be meaningless. That is because there’s no legal oversight, there are no standards and there is no required ingredient label, so people have no idea what’s in the wine. A lot of people assume that it is just grape juice, but there are so many different unnatural substances that are potentially in the wine you’re drinking.

Conventional Wine

Large-scale commercial winemaking often relies on chemical manipulations in both the vineyards and the cellar to ensure wine consistency. Conventional wine is also full of pesticides, additives and added sulfites (up to 350 ppm!). All of which are potentially harmful to human health.

Grapes and Wine

Grapes are one of the fruits that are the most sprayed with pesticides. And because of their thin and permeable skin, the chemicals often go directly into the fruit.

If you think about how wine is made, the grapes are crushed and the juice macerates with the skin—for hours, days, weeks, or even months depending on what the wine is. So what you’re drinking, from the very start, could be a chemical cocktail if you’re drinking wine made from conventionally grown grapes.

Additives

— Sulfites. A preservative and also toxic agent that kills bacteria. It is used during many steps in the winemaking process.

— Fining Agents. Reduce wine’s haziness and make it less bitter.

— Clarifying Agents. Clean up yeast and other stray particles.

— De-foaming Agents. Prevent wine from foaming.

— Preservatives. Prevent wine from spoiling.

— Fermentation enhancers. Speed up and standardize the fermentation process.

— Colorants. Change a wine’s color.

— Enrichment agents. Change a wine’s flavor.

— Sugars. Increase the final alcohol content in the finished wine.

— Yeast. A eukaryotic microorganism that turns sugar into alcohol through the process of fermentation. Often winemakers will add a commercial yeast that is made from a genetically modified yeast strain.

You have to consider that if you love to drink wine, these additives could be building up in your system.

Wine Terminology

When it comes down to avoiding pesticides and synthetic fertilisers, the best way to do that is to understand the labels.

Wine terminology can be confusing, and often changes depending on the country, but knowing what each label means is a step in the right direction.

Below is a list of the most common wine labels and what they mean:

Natural

Most of us would define natural wine as largely unmanipulated wine that is fermented spontaneously with native yeast and contains only trace amounts of naturally occurring sulfites and additives. However, there is absolutely no regulation regarding the terminology of natural wines, you may as well be buying a bottle of conventional wine.

Organic

Organic wine falls into two categories: wine made with organically grown grapes and wine that’s organic.

‘Made with Organic Grapes’

— This label pertains to how the grapes are farmed

— The wine is made entirely from certified organic grapes

— Wines must be produced and bottled in an organic facility

— Sulfites must be limited to 100 parts per million or less

Additional ingredients used in the winemaking process may not be organic, but they cannot be produced with the use of pesticides or synthetic fertilizers

— Organic does not mean that no preservatives or additives have been used. The vintner can still add a bunch of potentially toxic ingredients and do all kinds of manipulation that can change the chemistry of the wine. There’s an entire process that happens after the grapes are brought into the cellar and before the wine ends up in the bottle

‘Certified Organic’

— Made with 100% organically grown grapes, grown without the use of synthetic fertilizers

— All ingredients going into these wines, which includes yeast, must be certified organic

— Cannot have any added sulfites; it can only contain naturally occurring sulfites, as long as they don’t exceed 20 ppm

— Chemical herbicides and pesticides are banned; only certain natural preparations may be used against rot or mildew

— Yearly inspections must be carried out by a certifying body

— Organic still does not mean that no preservatives or additives have been used

Problems with Organic Certification

Even if a wine is certified organic, the certification doesn’t look at the additives other than the sulfite level. Therefore, the wine can still contain any of the other 76 additives.

You have to trust that somebody who’s going to the trouble of making certified organic wine isn’t going to include toxic additives. But we still don’t know for sure.

Biodynamic

Biodynamic farming is a more holistic and rigorous method of farming, which favours a biodiverse poly-agricultural environment versus just the monoculture of a grape. It was first introduced by the Austrian philosopher, Rudolf Steiner, in the 1920s in response to the introduction of chemical farming.

Biodynamic wine is the result of farming that encourages balanced and resilient land that is at its best without manipulation. The approach promotes biodiversity and crop rotation for optimal soil health.

To produce their vino, biodynamic winemakers focus on setting the stage with biodynamic farming techniques. These techniques create a self-sustaining, biodiverse ecosystem that fosters lush soil, healthy vines, and the highest quality grape the land can muster. Viticulturists’ diligence in tending to the land results in premium quality raw materials that don’t require the same manipulation necessary on conventional vineyards to achieve a great(er) taste. Biodynamic wines ensure that the wine is a true representation of the vineyard.

Biodynamic wine is the product of winemaking with the lowest intervention possible. That means:

— No chemicals are used to artificially nourish the soil

— Biodynamic vineyards depend on compost, rather than chemical fertilizers to nourish the soil. Compost recipes combine from-the-earth ingredients like plant materials and manure from animals.

— No added synthetic agents in the grape growing process

— No pesticides are used for short-term crop defense

— No herbicides

— In order to combat insect infestations, biodynamic farmers plant diverse botanical species around their vineyards to decrease the crops’ vulnerability to disease and infection, therefore naturally increasing their resilience.

— No GMOs

— Biodynamic wines employ organic practices

— No additives for post-harvest “corrections”

— No added sugars

— No added sulfites

— Following harvest, no foreign agents are added to the wine, meaning that everything in your glass is a naturally occurring element of the winemaking process.

— Farming by lunar cycles is one of the predominant cornerstones of biodynamic farming. Days are organized by fruit days (preferable for grape harvesting), root days (pruning), leaf days (watering) and flower days, where the vineyard should be untouched.

— To become a certified biodynamic farm, at least 10% of the land must be untouched and uncultivated to allow wildlife to flourish. This is because the ecosystems that thrive within them keep both the farm and planet healthy.

Organic vs Biodynamic

Both biodynamic and organic grapes are free from synthetic pesticides and herbicides, but this is where the similarity ends.

Organic farming can just be acres and acres of grapes. A biodynamic farm could include orchards, vegetable gardens, livestock, honeybees, and other things that feed the holistic entity. So it’s taking organic farming to a new level.

A wine that’s organic is not necessarily biodynamic, even if a wine that is biodynamic is often organic.

So while organic wine is a step in the right direction, with fewer chemicals than regular wine, biodynamically produced wine is organic and goes a step further by eradicating synthetic agents and additives, and taking that holistic approach to the process.

Choosing Wine

Unadulterated and Low-Intervention

The only way to ensure that you’re not getting a big cocktail of sulfur, additives and pesticides is to choose a natural wine made by a transparent winemaker that makes wine with the least possible use of chemicals and other interventions.

Labels to look for:

— Organic/ Biodynamic

— No added sulfites

— Free of toxic additives

— Vegan

— Fermented spontaneously with native yeast

— Sugar-free

— Neither filtered nor fined