“I don’t know why everyone isn’t organic. I think it’s really simple,” says Claire Allan, winegrower and proprietor at Huia (pron. ‘who ee ah’), located in the Marlborough winegrowing region of New Zealand. “It’s just a simple set of rules that you adhere to.” Huia (named in honour of a native New Zealand bird, now … Continue reading Organics is Easy – Huia Vineyards, Marlborough, NZ
“In the new world, everyone talks about winemakers, like they’re heros,” says Hans Herzog, owner and vigneron at Hans Herzog Estate in Marlborough, New Zealand, “but we should be talking about the vineyard, and winegrowing, because that’s where wine really comes from.” Hans thinks of himself as a vigneron, a French term for someone who … Continue reading A Whole New World – Hans Herzog Estate, Marlborough N.Z.
May, 2012. Having quit my job at the BBC, and swapping it for a full time gig in a wine bar just down the road, I was asked by, my boss, to attend the first ever Real Wine Fair, in London. I was to attend, as a representative of the west London bar, Albertine, and report back, … Continue reading An Origin Story… Genesis – The Wine Idealist Is One Year Old
The Marlborough, well-known as home to one particular style of wine, where drinking it is, “like having sex for the first time“, that is, awkward, fumbling, constricting, and intoxicating, with a laughter track courtesy of a Seinfeld episode playing loudly on a TV in the next room. Oh yes, and that faint whiff of cat’s pee. … Continue reading Marlborough’s Rock Scene – Rock Ferry Wines
A Case for Biodynamics in The Wine Industry: “If you’ve been doing something all your life, and been trained in a certain way of thinking, when something comes along and turns that thinking upside down, it’s quite understandable that people aren’t going to jump at these ideas straight away”, says Hamish Mackay, educator in biodynamic … Continue reading – A Case For Biodynamics in The Wine Industry –
“We all just have to think back 150 years ago, it’s how all farming was done. There weren’t agricultural chemicals, so this notion of calling chemical agriculture ‘conventional’, I think is going to switch in years to come, and organic and biodynamic farming will be called conventional, while the other is going to be called … Continue reading Authentic Precision, 45º South – Felton Road, Central Otago, New Zealand.
The idea was simple. An informal degustation dinner to recognise four organic wineries in the Hunter Valley, and showcase their wines alongside a simple fair of food and good company. I wanted to promote the idea of wine idealism – wines that recognise their sense of time and place (terroir) in an authentic and honest … Continue reading What’s In Your Glass? – Newcastle’s First ‘Real Wine’ Event.
The story of a more sustainable approach to food production and, consequently, consumption, is played out every weekend at an increasing number of farmer’s markets right across Australia and New Zealand. Whether it be sunshine or rain, these primary producers wheel out, stack, and showcase their locally grown produce for local conscientious consumers to inspect, … Continue reading On The Frontline – The Sommeliers Story of Natural, Organic and Biodynamic Wines.
Despite it’s inclination towards natural and rural connotations, wine can sometimes be, very much, an industriously conceived product. Not to say that wine is made to a recipe, much the same as Coke or a McDonald’s cheeseburger (although some certainly are), but when you consider the amount of allowable additives that a winemaker can legally utilise to … Continue reading To Be Or Not To Be – Is Ingredient Labelling Necessary for Wine?
Preparation 501 is not the main ingredient used in a pair of button zipped Levi’s. Instead, it is one of the most important and most powerful elements of biodynamic agriculture. Made from crushed quartz crystal that has been buried within cow horns for 6 months during the ‘light’ time of the year – between spring … Continue reading Biodynamics 101 – Prep 501 – Use The Light Force
Welcome to Wine Idealism... 