ShowViniste The Citizen Wine Blog

The natural wine is a current booming wine growers, young enough, and wine shops to promote the wines without inputs.
Ie wine without addition of pesticides and with minimal human intervention during the fermentation .
Obviously, some grape diseases and some hygiene rules require the use of copper and sulfur although purists do absolutely nothing working.
The goal is to return to a wine "natural" speech live with a local development of new varieties.
This philosophy is against the current movement of wines and this globalized trend to try to accelerate while in this world, to meet an urgent desire for immediate snapshot, serving the digital!
Making organic wine in biodynamic and natural takes time, effort, everything that winemakers have sought to reduce to one on the market faster, and their wine for better stability.

It should be known today that most wines are made ​​as follows:
The vine is treated up to eradicate all life may bring diseases on grapes. The soil is compacted by the machine. Only the vine grows. There is no more diversity!
As a result, the skin of grapes, there is more "critters" that are called yeasts , needed for fermentation . And without fermentation , there is no wine. Since this is the transformation of grape sugar into alcohol. The resurrection of the grape, which, instead of rotting, reincarnates into wine!
So we buy this yeast to promote fermentation . Just pick the ones you want, for example those that give hints of white flowers on chardonnay or who gives a banana flavor. The choice is wide and meets consumer demand worldwide. It will be even happier to easily recognize what he drinks.
Good and then there are those who long soak wood chips, sawdust or oak planks, to again go faster.
In a business sense, it is obviously necessary to reduce manufacturing costs and the storage time.
It also explains the use of certain other practices such as thermo-vinification etc. ...
Going back to our chronology design wine, once the fermentation has been completed, we will put more or less rapidly in bottle. To do this, we filter the juice to make it as clear as possible. First, to avoid dead yeast (lees) are not breaking the wine and then a clear juice because it is reassuring, it's clean, it's healthy!
And finally, for the wine bottle does not move, for he has no fault, that would be caused by time or shipping worldwide, we'll inert. Basically, a good shot of the sulfur will stabilize. You may have a little headache but that's the price to pay to enjoy any bottle being sure that the wine is the same: in a word: death!
After this course, you can keep it in the cellar. He will not move!
Now you have a choice! Is why winemakers want to say loud and clear their commitment to a product true, authentic and natural. This is the game of "action reaction"!
I do not hide the natural wine is risky. It evolves, will be different depending on the day, will have his moods of wine alive. In my case, I have so far never been disappointed!
If I drank wine without sulfur which did not please me, I have chosen many more who came to give me pleasure and I open a new world of wine!
If you are interested, I invite you to my shop ShowVin . You will find packages and boxes specially designed to share these wines and enjoy this new world!

Go for a test box and choose your natural wine for an introduction to the new world of wine:

About sulfur, let us know what we mean:

The anhydride is so sour that some distrust more than others. There he is now present on labels of our favorite wines as an additional health message: Beware I am present in more than 10 mg per liter!

But what exactly is that the total SO2?

First, it has many names, which does not inspire confidence, certainly a sign of abuse or cover-up! Sulfur, sulphite, SO2, sulfur dioxide, sulfur dioxide, E220 ... here are some of these variations.

Then, just to make you even more afraid, the list of the most common methods to manufacture sulfur dioxide:

• Roasting all ores in furnaces sulfur, followed by purification (particle removal) and rapid liquefaction of sulfur dioxide formed by cooling with ice and salt or compression.
• Liquefaction of gas produced during melting of non-ferrous metals such as lead, copper or nickel.
• Combustion of sulfur plates, following the technique of wicking wooden casks, which is always used.

But what are the uses of sulfur? First, it serves to produce sulfites, bisulfites, metabisulfite, of hydrosulphites, and sulfuryles thionyles compounds, sulfones, carbon disulphide, the thiophene ... Then its antiparasitic and antiseptic effects, the food industry uses it, for example, for food storage.

Its history dates back to the man with the foundation of our history where we've seen that already at the time of Ancient Egypt it was used as a preservative. Indeed, his interest lies in its inhibitory potency of certain enzymes. Therefore, it prevents oxidation of foodstuffs and strengthens food conservation. Of course, if you take the idea of ​​a plate directly ingest or inhale sulfur dioxide a little, you immediately get a toxic reaction. Its use following regulatory procedures so that its "toxicity" is noticeable only in susceptible individuals, reactive, as are some asthmatics for example. This results in headaches, digestive disorders, respiratory problems. Therefore, its inclusion is mandatory beyond 10mg/litre for wine. And of course you find it on other products.

On wine, sulfur dioxide is used for reasons of health precautions of vineyards, cellar equipment, the grapes and wine. The maximum permitted doses of SO2 can be up to 160 mg / l for red wines, 210 mg / l for white and rosé, and up to 350 mg / l for dessert!
Technically, sulfur dioxide comes in two forms: free and combined. Free ie it is in the form of gas, it essentially protects from oxidation. Basically, it removes oxygen. CO2 is the same in the carbonic maceration. Combined as it is mostly associated with sugars and other molecules. This explains why more is needed for the sweet wines. Sorry for the worshipers of Sauternes ...

In general, the sulfur will be used at various different times. In the vineyard during the grape ripening as a fungicide. In the cellar, especially at harvest time to prevent the freshly picked grapes are partners too quickly fermentation . Then in vats to preserve some deviations during the fermentation . Finally, to bottling, in order to keep the wine bottle. If you want to make a wine standardized, with the same flavor regardless of the year, able to withstand handling in the cellar, the various modes of transportation around the world and indifferent to disease of the vine, you have any interest to you used copiously. It will address the remaining yeasts on the grape berry to standardize all of the grapes and make room for yeasts "exogenous" chosen by the winemaker, more or less industrial, expected for aromatic qualities. Its antibacterial action will consolidate and eliminate some pasteurization microbial activity which often competes with yeast activity that are there to convert sugar into alcohol.

In conclusion, we can deduce two simple principles:

More grapes are healthier and less sulfur will be needed!
We want a more natural wine and less sulfur is used!

I do not know what his time was up the wine, he already had a heavy hand on the sulfur or not, but it is true that like wine stemmed from the fermentation alcohol, he became a purified liquid of some bacteria which were found in abundance in contrast to water. Hence, this famous phrase, that we all hope authentic and valid today, Mr Shepherd: "The wine, the healthiest and most hygienic of beverages".

The Natural Wine : Living and authentic.