Essay Sample on Exploring Natural Wine: A Growing Trend Among Consumers

Introduction

Natural wine has transformed into a signifier of the middle-class taste in particular social circles and numerous menus in restaurants across the United States. Naturals wine are a reliable source of capital with various wine labels that are obsessed over. Nonetheless, whatever makes a wine natural has not been fully understood by most wine consumers, especially consumers who are fond of cheap wine. Numerous debates on defining natural characterize the wine industry, despite the issue being trendy natural wines historically existed since people fermented grape juice without using additives. As such, natural wine is no new phenomenon, but a traditional way of making wine.

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Defining a Natural Wine

Natural wine can get examined as a concept rather than a distinct category with established traits. In its wholesome form, natural wine is wine developed from untainted fermented grape juice with no additives (Legeron, West, Kingcome, & Zinonos, 2014, p.8). Different classifications of people, including winemakers, distributors, and writers, among other people, have had arguments on the term "natural wine" and have moved to uphold such terminologies as low-intervention wine, naked wine, or referred to it as raw wine (Legeron, West, Kingcome, & Zinonos, 2014, p.8). Nonetheless, natural wine is the terminology that is vastly utilized. Thus anyone dealing with wine either at a wine bar, restaurant, or a wine store understands the meaning of the term natural wine.

A breakdown explanation of natural wine explains it as wine flamed organically, which translates to the biodynamical application of permaculture, with the transformation undertaken without adding or eliminating anything in the wine-vault (Legeron, West, Kingcome, & Zinonos, 2014, p.5). Thus, with natural wine, there are no additives or processing applications employed in its creation. The wine forming process transpires naturally with the fermentation progression reserved at its lowest. Thus neither fining nor purification processes get deployed. Following this natural process offers a "living" wine, one that is wholesome and has naturally occurred microbiologically. Isabelle Legeron, the founder of raw wine fair, stated that natural wine is pure agitated grape sap with zero additives to bottle a naturally occurring drink (Legeron, West, Kingcome, & Zinonos, 2014, p.8).

Production of Natural Wines

Making natural wines begins with growing organic grapes, an aspect identified as a requirement to make natural wine (Smith, E., 2020). As such, all-natural wines are organic. However, not all organic wines get termed as natural due to their preparation processes. Making organic cellar wines entails strict rules and procedures that differ from those employed in the natural winemaking process (Smith, E., 2020). Winemaking rules vary from country to country. Making organic wine cellar rules might permit the deployment of additives such as yeast and some processing procedures, aspects that are not allowed under the natural winemaking process (Smith, E., 2020).

Organic Wine

Organic is the terminology employed for the use of grapes developed in line with organic farming principles (Smith, E., 2020). The process employed in the growing of these grapes includes restricting the use of artificial biochemical composts by elevating the soil with ordinary manures and minerals (Smith, E., 2020). The grape crop also gets cultivated without using pesticides and related herbicides. Grapes from organic farms must be certified as having been grown without the help of any agricultural chemicals but rather developed the natural way. However, many organic wine producers have been allowed to add sulfites to their wines. It ensures that wines are stable and helps deliver better wine to consumers for prolonged periods (Smith, E., 2020).

Biodynamic Farming and Wine

Organic farming involves more of the vineyards of the farming processes. On the other hand, biodynamic agriculture entails farming approaches’ impacts on the grapes. Biodynamic agriculture dates back to as early as 1920 and comprises numerous of strategies employed in biodynamic agriculture; for instance, no biochemical intrusion gets utilized with the farming approach (Castellini, Mauracher, and Troiano, 2017, p.3). Biodynamic agriculture entails established procedures and time-phases identified for bettering the topsoil, planting, thinning, and picking all guided by the phase of the moon combined with horoscopic signs. As such, biodynamic wines are made in harmony with the earth's cycle, thus exhibiting the terroir's most real expression. Notably, for biodynamic and organic wines, their source is critical. Some regions are better fit for these tactics than others, whereby areas with dryer climates and fewer pests offer better results than other areas. There have been established certifying bodies to monitor biodynamic wines' quality ensuring their processes are controlled (Castellini, Mauracher, and Troiano, 2017, p.7).

Natural Wines

Organic and biodynamic wines will focus on farming methods applied in the vineyards focusing on what gets used in the growth of the grapes. On the other hand, natural wines do not focus on the farming process but instead on the winemaking process. Thus, natural wines will focus on the processes undertaken following the grapes' maturity and not how they get treated during the farming process (Smith, E., 2020). However, it does not reflect that making natural wines involves the use of non-organic or non-biodynamic grapes. Natural wines are developed from organically produced grapes or in a biodynamical approach. With the natural winemaking process, the grapes are hand-selected and destemmed, with the sap not being exposed to any mechanical separation. The grapes are only hand-squeezed, and no additive added to the barrel other than the must wine (Smith, E., 2020). Thus, there are no additives characterized by acid or sugar to control the wine's alcohol content. Fermentation only occurs following the utilization of naturally occurring yeast under the process of spontaneous fermentation. Sulfites are not added to natural wines; thus, they are supposed to be consumed and not kept for long since they tend to pick undesirable sulfurous smells (Smith, E., 2020).

References

Smith, E., 2020, February 28. The Green Guide to Wine: Organic vs Biodynamic vs Natural. Retrieved from: https://upscapetravel.com/blog/green-guide-wine/

Castellini, A., Mauracher, C. and Troiano, S., 2017. An overview of the biodynamic winesector. International Journal of Wine Research, 9, pp.1-11.Retrieved from: https://www.dovepress.com/getfile.php?fileID=34882

Legeron, I., West, C., Kingcome, G. & Zinonos, A., 2014. Natural wine: an introduction toorganic and biodynamic wines made naturally. London New York: CICO Books.