The Auswine Forum

Just saw this comment on an article on a major news site:

"Wine connoisseurs are the laughing stock of those who actually know. Wine is toxic sludge, if the contents appeared on the label you'd think it good for polishing furniture. Taste, texture, smell are all engineered with industrial chemicals, tools and techniques after all things living and taste giving in the grape juice have been killed with sulphites, i.e. antibiotics.

To understand better, check http://www.thatcrazyfrenchwoman.com/natural-wine

If it isn't natural wine, it isn't wine, just a chemical soup"

So I checked out the website referenced:

"Wine started life a simple commodity but it has now been hijacked by fashion and consumerism. Natural wines are a nostalgic snapshot of what wine was like before hi-tech got involved. Understanding the science behind making wine has been very positive but we have gone too far and rather than using science to produce wines with as little intervention as possible we use it to gain absolute control over every single aspect of growing grapes and making wine. Very little is left to nature.

For me, natural wines are about coming full circle and going back to basics and simplicity. They are real and raw....

We have a romantic view of wine. We think all wine is natural when it isn’t. In fact most wine isn't (be it cheap or iconic) but we are sold the illusion through successful marketing (pretty labels, rows of green vines, sunshine). Meanwhile, back at the vineyard and winery, all sorts of stuff is added and the goodness of the wine is removed by fining, filtering, reverse osmosis and dozens of other processes and gadgetry. Pesticides, herbicides and fungicides are routinely used in vineyards, which is not only questionable for biodiversity but can also end up in the wines we drink. As microbiologist Claude Bourguignon puts it "there is more life in the Sahara than in many vineyards in Burgundy".

Wine today is far removed from its original definition of fermented grape juice. It is the by-product of chemically induced and tightly controlled fermentation through the aid of additives and structure-altering equipment."

OK in full disclosure I have a long standing argument with the natural wine movement but honestly people are reading this and believing it...

If you go to certain countries you can buy your meat from a person at the side of the road, in an un-refrigerated stall swarming with flies. Their cleanliness, for practical reasons, is doubtful.... But I guess this logic is right: to use refrigeration and hand soap is to remove the product from its original definition via other processes and gadgetry. So that's the way it should be, dysentery be damned.

sjw_11 wrote:OK in full disclosure I have a long standing argument with the natural wine movement but honestly people are reading this and believing it...

If you go to certain countries you can buy your meat from a person at the side of the road, in an un-refrigerated stall swarming with flies. Their cleanliness, for practical reasons, is doubtful.... But I guess this logic is right: to use refrigeration and hand soap is to remove the product from its original definition via other processes and gadgetry. So that's the way it should be, dysentery be damned.

Personally I'm not following or getting into the 'natural wine' movement myself, I'm not seeing anything that I enjoy, in fact its detracting.

Nick Ryan wrote a good article about this a few months ago, ending with the summary, there is a lot of respect for the wineries like Wendouree, using traditional winemaking without ''intervention'. I called it 'primitive' but that was tongue in cheek because it is traditional vs what others are doing.

What I will say, there is a large degree of truth in this article, particularly for large commercial companies, but it is flowing down to smaller companies. There are chemical / additive concoctions for just about everything. A wine can be 'tricked up' very easily. I've mentioned previously the issue of oak maturation vs oak treatment, it's a mine field, there are oak compounds available now. Most consumers probably would not know the difference. Another example is water addition has now been 'legalised', so it's easy to reduce the alcohol content also without RO machines.

I guess it raises the debate of art vs science.

I have no time for extremist positions (in either camp) in the natural wine debate, and this is just provocative bullshit from one side. It's not worth any more words.

Ian S wrote:I have no time for extremist positions (in either camp) in the natural wine debate, and this is just provocative bullshit from one side. It's not worth any more words.

This

Cheers

Michael

In a world where there is said to be a maximum of six degrees of separation between any two persons you may choose in the world, I hope that all vegans and all natural wine hippies are at least five of those degrees away

I think it is great when you can find great natural wines...I think there is a balance there though...A little funk, va, mousiness...that's fine..too much, no way...for some people, even a little is too much..

I want a great wine...so I'm not going turn my nose up on something that isn't natural, that just goes against the whole idea of having great wine...but would I like a wine to be both great and natural? Sure..of course...less other junk going in me, the more natural they can make it, that's a no brainer..but the wine has to be good...

there are so many misconceptions and untruths in the above piece of "writing" that not even the average villiage idiot would believe any of it for one second.
goody, yea, let's get rid of those foul and unhealthy preservatives. Stop pasteurising milk, treating drinking water, dis-infecting floors, using sanitation... indeed, let's have another massive dose of the plague. Ahhh, a return to the good old days, we really miss them!!

I actually rather like unpasteurised (full fat) milk. Definitely a resurgence in it around these parts and the Italians also seem to have latched onto it. A real shock to taste it again on breakfast cereals, with that creamy texture that I recall from my youth. However it's in cappuccino that it really excels, really filling the flavour out.

Chlorinated treated drinking water is overrated. Nothing like a bit of Giardia to get the bowels moving. Not to mention dysentery, typhoid, leptospirosis, cholera, botulism and a range of other fun diseases that will land you in hospital, with a new liver if you're one of the lucky ones.

On topic, my impression of the article is one of a smarmy, holier-than-thou, sanctimonious, self-righteous pious wankery.

Like polymer I find I can enjoy both well made low intervention/natural wines and high intervention commercial wines. Enjoyment of one does not require mutual exclusivity. I have no patience for extremists, nor luddites, xenophobes, and anti-vaxxers (or anyone else who readily dismisses science or scientists from behind their wifi-enabled, battery-powered portable computing devices connected via electromagnetic fields and fibre-optic cabling to rest of the world).

Man made chemicals have their place. If they hold true to their approach of refusing to put man made chemicals into their body, I expect they refuse anaesthesia when going into surgery, and turn down antibiotics when experiencing major infections.

Meanwhile in the third world where disease is rife, treated drinking water is scarce, life expectancy is short and vaxxination and antibiotics are a rare luxury, modern chemistry becomes a fair bit more appreciated and anti-science crusading becomes a first-world indulgence of those who have, ironically, most benefitted from science.

I am enjoying the reaction this provoked... I just couldn't believe what I read and thought the forum would get a laugh about it. Natural wine remains a pronounced hipster obsession here in London. I thought I would add in a quote from one of my favourite restaurant reviewers over here, Jay Rayner in the Guardian/Observer:

"I like language. I think it's a brilliant way of communicating stuff. Equally I get cross when it's used clumsily. The latest bit of food and drink language-torture to get me all peevish is "natural wine". The term is used to describe wines made without additives, often but not restricted to sulphur, which has been employed since the 15th century to control fermentation and stabilise the product. What a steaming pile of shameless old cobblers.

For a start there is the idea of "naturalness". A quick bit of undergraduate philosophy: if the human race is a natural phenomenon, then anything we do is natural, just as it's natural for ants to make ant hills and rabbits to dig holes. It doesn't mean everything we do is fine. But it does mean that calling one thing we do natural and something else unnatural is to take the English language, jump all over it, drive a stake through its heart, cover it in butane, drop a match on it and laugh at the guttering flames.

But here's what matters. Every natural wine I have ever tried has been horrible. It's felt like punishment; a sweet promise broken. If that's what additive-free wine is like – the whacking smell of a pigsty before it's been cleaned down, an acrid, grim burst of acid that makes you want to cry – then bring on the chemicals. Hurrah for sulphur. Hurrah for humankind and its ability to use all the tools at its disposal to make nice things to drink."

I'm not even sure I've had a "natural wine" in all my years of drinking. However, without putting too fine a point on it I do prefer the winemakers to approach winemaking with as little interference as the deem necessary to make the kind of wine they want. Once again: as they deem necessary. I have no compulsion to look for organic, biodynamic, natural wine, etc. Good wine is all I care about and I'm inclined to think that over-manipulation of any kind will not make for balanced, elegant wines. However I do think the article fairly reeks of smug, self righteousness.

In any case I've really enjoyed the commentary here, it's been a fun read.

Mahmoud.

The last paragraph from Rayner, either represents someone very unlucky, someone who hasn't tasted many, or almost certainly one whose own bigotry clouds their judgement. Just as stupid and extremist as the original article, and every reason this subject gets drowned in stupidity when people take to the trenches.

Amazing how certain wine personalities have seen fit to take such strident, pig-headed and bigoted positions on this subject, whereas most wine drinkers are happy to trust in 'in vino veritas'. We are right not to indulge their prejudices.

Ian S wrote: Amazing how certain wine personalities have seen fit to take such strident, pig-headed and bigoted positions on this subject, whereas most wine drinkers are happy to trust in 'in vino veritas'. We are right not to indulge their prejudices.

That's how you become a wine personality..

If you're in the middle..like most people...no one cares what you say...

But if you're on the extremes you'll have people that love you and people that hate you..but either way they're reading your stuff...

Ian S wrote:I actually rather like unpasteurised (full fat) milk. Definitely a resurgence in it around these parts and the Italians also seem to have latched onto it. A real shock to taste it again on breakfast cereals, with that creamy texture that I recall from my youth. However it's in cappuccino that it really excels, really filling the flavour out.

hehe, do you mean "unpasteurised" or "raw" milk.
until last year, the sale unpasteurised milk was illegal in Australia. Now, "raw" milk can be sold, but it is still treated (via water pressure, not heat, a process Louis Pasteur described anyway)
so effectively, "unpasteurised" milk is still "pasteurised", but not using the traditional heat method. Companies confusingly sell this as "raw" milk, but in fact, the sale of "raw milk" , i.e. untrteated, remains illegal in both the UK and Australia (and Italy for that matter)
sorry to burst your dream, but medically/scientifically speaking, there is no difference between traditional pasteurised milk and the so-called (trendy) "raw" milk now being sold, except for some absolute BS spun by the manufacturers of said product.

oh, and you can actually buy low fat "raw" milk hahah

Hi Felix
I just checked the website of the one we buy most of, and they say filtered & cooled, no mention of pasteurisation, and strong implication that they don't. Sales are very restricted, indeed I have a feeling buying direct for home use is the only allowable option - and definitely not legal to use it in a cafe for coffees etc.
Regards
Ian

p.s. a college friend used to argue that semi-skimmed was more f*cked about with than skimmed, and reading a little on the mass production techniques seems to explain that, in that they first remove the cream (creating skimmed milk), to which they add cream (butterfat) back in and homogenise so the cream doesn't settle out. I suspect that was his argument, that the skimmed had less processing than the other types.

Ian S wrote:Hi Felix
I just checked the website of the one we buy most of, and they say filtered & cooled, no mention of pasteurisation, and strong implication that they don't. Sales are very restricted, indeed I have a feeling buying direct for home use is the only allowable option - and definitely not legal to use it in a cafe for coffees etc.
Regards
Ian

p.s. a college friend used to argue that semi-skimmed was more f*cked about with than skimmed, and reading a little on the mass production techniques seems to explain that, in that they first remove the cream (creating skimmed milk), to which they add cream (butterfat) back in and homogenise so the cream doesn't settle out. I suspect that was his argument, that the skimmed had less processing than the other types.

yea, that is what I meant. Pressured/cooled is the alternate to heat Pasteurisation. But ol' Louis also described that method as a way of culling bacteria, so effectively the "cooled and filtered (pressurised) " method is an alternate form of Pasteurisation. Sorry if I didn't explain it too clearly!!!
here in Aus it is labelled as "raw" milk, which is simply a marketing gimmick, and absolutely not raw in any way. Interestingly, here the only people allowed to drink raw milk are the dairy farmers themselves, but rest assured, none of them do these days!!!
the manufacturers claim all sorts of BS, like the vitamins are not denatures in this process... all of it with absolutely no scientific proof whatsoever. It will only be a matter of time before the ACCC gets onto those little fish.

Untreated milk has been for sale in Australia supposedly for "cosmetic purposes" and "not for human consumption", which a cynical person may view as a legal loophole, with people doing things like feeding it to their toddlers.

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/toddler-d ... 24lx8.html

I'm fine drinking either heat-treated or cold-filtered milk and would only drink truly raw/untreated milk if it was freshly hand-milked into a clean (preferably sanitized) container.

This is the one Felix is talking about
http://www.madebycow.com.au/

I actually know and I too laugh at the connoisseurs when I drink it with my Milo.

No heart-shaped lattes, dave?

felixp21 wrote:i.e. untrteated, remains illegal in both the UK and Australia (and Italy for that matter)

This one's truly raw I believe:
http://www.hookandson.co.uk/Selfridges/index.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22454324

felixp21 wrote:The manufacturers claim all sorts of BS, like the vitamins are not denatures in this process... all of it with absolutely no scientific proof whatsoever. It will only be a matter of time before the ACCC gets onto those little fish.

IANAC (chemist) so can't speak to the vitamins etc. There's no doubting the flavour is different.

I've tasted freshly-milked, still-warm cow milk 30-odd years ago when as a kid my family stayed on a farm. The flavour was very "animale" - like certain wines, in fact (hello bretty CnDP)

felixp21 wrote:the only people allowed to drink raw milk are the dairy farmers themselves, but rest assured, none of them do these days!!!

"None of them" is a rather strong and exaggerated claim, assuming you haven't gone and interviewed each and every farmer in Australia. eg.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-28/dairy ... lk/7274634

Also as per mention above, the farm we used to stay on milked their own milk into a bucket and drank it fresh that day.

Hi Odyssey,
same as me, but 45 years ago!!! Used to drink it all the time up in our farm at Batemans Bay. Raw milk, in the true sense of the word, does indeed taste different, and "raw" milk, in the marketing sense, is also different, esp it's texture. 100% correct, far more "animale"
despite you and I drinking it all those years ago, it's all changed now, though, with the "proliferation" of slow viruses etc. (more a scare than a reality) and hygiene awareness. Pretty hard to find a dairy farmer that drinks the stuff, in Gippsland at least, not sure about the NSW guys to be fair. There is also a very high allergy rate to raw milk, might explain it also. And to be honest, it doesn't actually taste too good!!!
oh, and "raw" milk doesn't taste much like raw milk, if you get what I'm saying.

dave vino wrote:This is the one Felix is talking about
http://www.madebycow.com.au/

I actually know and I too laugh at the connoisseurs when I drink it with my Milo.

haha, thanks Dave. I haven't seen that web site before, but indeed, there are some absolutely outrageous and incorrect claims there!!! In fact, most of it is utter BS. I guess the ACCC have too many big fish to fry, and don't have time to deal with these jokers.

I like their disclaimer: "Made by Cow does not condone the purchase or drinking of un-treated milk."

So drink raw milk... just not raw, raw milk. Ya get me?

I like as you scroll down the page you first see
"Cold-pressed"
but then
"comes raw, straight from our cows"
and apparently
"un-messed with"
BUT! then followed by
"placed under extreme cold water pressure [...] that is equivalent to taking the milk six times deeper than the deepest part of the ocean"

Is it or bloodywell isn't it?

odyssey wrote:

felixp21 wrote:i.e. untrteated, remains illegal in both the UK and Australia (and Italy for that matter)

This one's truly raw I believe:
http://www.hookandson.co.uk/Selfridges/index.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22454324

That approach of only selling direct, is an exact mirror of what our local place has to adhere to.

Playing with words perhaps, but technically, pressure-treated milk is still "raw" (in the sense that it hasn't been heat treated/pasteurised). It's still treated, and it doesn't taste like it's straight from a cow's udder.

Evidence does seem to indicate that pressure-treated milk has less altered flavour, nutritional value and texture compared to heat treated milk, because the proteins, fats and sugars aren't as denatured as they are under heat treatment.

Made By Cow tastes pretty good to me BTW.