Written with Giorgio de Maria Fun Wines
There was a suggestion the first didn’t have enough wine, but then when I wrote the second it was suggested it had too much and maybe the first was better. So, here I am doubling down, ignoring all of that, and writing wine again. Afterall, it was the vineyards that had a story to tell this month!
I read (on a gardening post about the scourge of Australian grafted cherry blossoms, of all things) that we know the price of everything and the cost of nothing. A fair accusation. We’re conditioned to ignore the costs that have been sneakily and silently built into our future (namely the waste by-products, particularly the environmental ones) to get more out of the money in our pocket in the present.
This is a relatively obvious truth, but as these past months of economic squeeze have only highlighted the idea of good food and wine as “luxury”, it seems poignant to discuss it. Does economic pressure mean environment consciousness goes out the window? Can we focus on the two things at once? And if we can’t, how can we ask those that can never afford it, to do it?
This article in CivilEats, looking at some of the regenerative practices in vineyards, also got me thinking. Specifically looking at the impact of cover crops, grazing animals and deep-rooted perennials (including the vines themselves), the article suggests that these vineyards can be among the greatest carbon sinks – especially when compared with other mono-crops. They are also better able to guard against the vagaries of the weather we are facing through the climate crisis.
“The viticulture sector is notoriously one of these ‘bubble sectors’ that stays within itself and isn’t talking as much to the rest of the ag community … We’re talking about animal integration, we’re talking about integrating trees, we’re talking about integrating other crops. It really is regenerative agriculture, even if we might take a viticulture lens … and that when you mix different practices together, it actually increases the benefits.”
On the flip side of that, there was this post from Alice Feiring (and the ensuing argy bargy in the comments) about the state of things in Beaujolais. “I mean, dead is dead, and then it gets even more dead.” Are these, Alice asks, the producers screaming at the EU to not take their glyphosate away?
It is a pretty familiar tale, the shift in the 50s away from polyculture and into chemical farming, the subsequent loss of labour, the 30 or 40 “productive” years that followed and now the fallout (coupled with shifting weather patterns). Disaster. Add to that, the Beaujolais has many of its own unique attributes: the goblet trellesing and hilly parcels in particular. The post and its comments are strewn with fun little facts about the region and its farming. Fascinating if you want to know more.
(Inidentally, I remember feeling the same way when I was there in 2016 – have a look at this comparison.)
I feel like all of this is linked. I feel that “natural wine” (insert here your preferred term and subsequent rules) is the most obvious and tactile example of how things can be. I feel like its ahead of its time and yet buried deep in our agrarian traditions (maybe particularly because it’s buried in those traditions). I feel like the conversations and arguments of definition and semantics are actually what it’s all about. These are my people. These are our people. This is culture - culinary and otherwise. These are products we should be proud to sell and stories we should be honoured to share.
Producers:
- Pecora won the RAS President’s Medal this year. This award is designed to look at the triple bottom line for the producer, not just their product. Michael and Cress are doing such a wonderful job, not just in their cheese, but for their land, the sheep and their family – do seek them out.
- Feather and Bone are running a very excellent series of producer thoughts about the supermarkets:
Vince Heffernan at Moorelands talked about “enoughness” (a word and concept that has rolled around my mind ever since) - “Yes I love good food, but it can be something as simple as amazing mint I grow in my farm garden, or a lemon or tomato or the stellar Texel lamb I produce. Quality matters, but how it is produced matters too and the quality usually comes from the way it’s produced. Is it good for the planet? Are we focused on reducing Greenhouse gases? Are we aware of the damage that certain agricultural practices do to our land and water and the others that share it - the flora and fauna?”
Andrew and Therese Hearne of Near River – “Whilst society’s interest in stories has become voracious and quick with the advent of social media and AI generated newsletters, the stories behind the food you eat and the connection that provides … are all part of the fabric that builds culture, and food is the very basis of that, continually evolving. Sharing those stories, whether gathered around a table with friends and family, or over a quick snack at the kitchen bench, will always be one of life’s simple pleasures, and it gives us great joy to play a small part in that.”
Belinda and Jason Hagan of McIvor – “… the supermarket system offers very cheap food which makes us, by contrast, look really expensive … The TRUE cost of food production in a regenerative, respectful, environmental, wholesome manner is higher than what you’ll pay in a supermarket. But you’re not just paying for a product, you’re investing in your health and a better food future.”
- Joost Bakker has been doing his thing, this time building a (hemp-walled, fire-proof, green-roofed, rain-water-collecting, closed-loop) house for his mother. Whenever the world feels a bit too much for me, I check back in with his projects. They always makes me feel like change is possible. The exception being his plastic-waste-to-ethanol project. A travesty. If you’re looking for a life challenge …
Restaurants:
- Read Ruth Reichl on Zuni Cafe, one of the all-time classics in San Fran, or The New Yorker about the restaurant (buffet!!) cooking the classics in France. I love the former for the quiet achievements – 45 years of those pickles, the celery, parmesan and house-cured anchovy apero, that roast chook and its woodfired oven; I love the latter for its preservation of the classics (indeed, of culinary culture), for its brazenness and, while not in keeping with the rest of this issue, I’m giving them marks for decadence. “Les Grands Buffet takes a panoramic view of the French classics, ranging from the palace-hotel repertoire (lièvre à la royale, peach Melba) to bourgeois cooking (veal blanquette, bœuf bourguignonne), regional specialties (quenelles de brochet, pissaladière), and rustic dishes (snails, frogs’ legs). “More than a gargantuan orgy, … [it’s] a sort of conservatory of the nation’s gastronomy.” It is the only time I have ever thought to reconsider my no-buffet rule.
Should we include the vigneron pick here too?
Words:
- For a gentler view on French culinary canon, find a way to watch The Taste of Things/La Passion de Dodin-Bouffant. Somewhat akin to sharing a meal with Brillat-Savarin, it’s a meandering stroll through the cultural romance of food – the antithesis to The Bear, but every bit as fabulous. There’s more enoughness – “le bonheur, c’est de continuer à désirer ce que l’on possède” - and the delightful idea of being in the “autumn of our lives”. It’s exquisitely shot and set in the most perfect kitchen you have ever seen. (That diamond-shaped sole-poaching dish was a(nother) spectacular challenge to this enoughness palaver.)
- Aaron Ayscough had a little review of Le Dilettante, a 2021 book written by Bertin and Chavalier in conversation with natural wine making legend (and recluse) Jacques Neauport. “My own favorite passages were those in which the authors elicit detailed, practical natural winemaking techniques, of the kind that is rarely recorded anywhere. (For the simple reason that modern conventional winemaking texts do not contain them, while even older winemaking texts that predate modern enology often describe rather large-scale maneuvers aimed at cave cooperatives.)” He had a good crack at some of the questions, and the genre of natural wine publications in general (his own aside, obvs) and the complications of learning to work with nature and traditional wisdom when so much of that is still passed down verabally, often shoulder to shoulder.
- That leads nicely to the rather excellent looking poster being released this week by Mathieu Lapierre on carbonic maceration. Taking inspiration from those excellent French education posters, he has explained the process as Domain Lapierre use in their winery. I like.
- Finally, I stumbled upon this very pretty illustration of rewilding and integration in the vineyard via Chiara of Emidio Pepe. I noticed Katie at Maison Maenad also planting trees this past month. People are doing good things.