Climate Chaos

00:00:00: Welcome to another episode of Just Another Wine Podcast. I'm Emily Harman.

00:00:23: I'm Jamie Good and I'm Doug Gregg. Today we're going to be talking about climate

00:00:29: change and the effect that it has or will have on wine. Now Jamie, you just came back from a

00:00:35: cool climate conference in Copenhagen, I understand. Yes, this is really good. So this was an organised

00:00:43: by the called Jan Eggers and some of his friends in Denmark and it brought together proper cool

00:00:51: climate wine regions, including Denmark, Poland and Sweden, you know, wine regions that just

00:00:58: becoming established because, you know, one of the effects of climate change or as I prefer

00:01:03: to call it climate chaos, because it's not just a warming trend, it's unpredictability as well.

00:01:09: It means that it's pushed the wine map further north and we've seen that in the UK. Now we've

00:01:15: got 4,209 officially hectares of vineyards here, which are a lot and it's growing quite fast.

00:01:23: And, you know, previously this simply would not have been possible. It was, you know, really

00:01:30: only economically possible to make wine here using those early ripening Germanic varieties.

00:01:35: And now that you can regularly ripen Chardonnay Pinamunier to sparkling wine ripeness,

00:01:42: there's economics there for growing wine grapes. And so this is a conference looking at lots of

00:01:50: these things. And one of the discussion points was obviously the climate and how that's changed

00:01:57: and how it's continuing to change. And I was giving a talk there and I was asked to talk about

00:02:04: sort of trends in cool climate wine. So what I opted to do was looking at building resilience

00:02:09: into cool climate vineyards because it's not just a warming trend, it's also uncertainty,

00:02:18: unpredictability. I thought it'd be really good to talk about how we can tharm vineyards

00:02:24: in a way that they're resilient to these sort of changes. I really enjoyed the conference,

00:02:30: tasted a lot of wines from countries where I really haven't tasted many wines from before.

00:02:35: It's just really exciting. Good. I mean, I have to say as a wine importer we're not on the front

00:02:43: line because the growers on the front line of climate catastrophe, I would call it as well as

00:02:48: chaos. And what we've noticed is variability of vintages and that's a euphemism for terrible

00:02:56: vintages. It used to be that you could sort of predict that two out of three years you get an

00:03:01: average yield or above average yield and now it's probably one out of four or five years. And it's

00:03:07: not just, you know, it's not just getting warmer but there are climatic events like more hailstorms,

00:03:15: later frosts and mildew, particularly you're getting a lot of wet summers and this is reducing

00:03:26: the crop yields in vineyards immeasurably. And I think some growers have been driven to despair

00:03:32: and have given up and even taken their own lives because their vineyards are not sort of livelihoods

00:03:39: for them anymore. And this is something we need to think about. I mean, how do individual producers

00:03:45: cope? What are their strategies? You know, do they plant in cooler places? Do they replant their

00:03:50: vineyards? We're talking about dissing like maybe generations of traditions. You know, where it

00:03:59: works to the advantages of English producers, yeah, now you can instead of having the Germanic

00:04:05: hybrids, you can ripen Pinot Noir naturally to 13 or 14 percent sometimes. Not sure that's a good

00:04:12: thing at this stage, it just shows the acceleration in climate change. And yes, it's interesting in

00:04:19: the fact that you can grow 60 or 70, you know, Vitus vinifera grapes in the UK now, whereas a few

00:04:25: years ago was pretty difficult. I'm not sure the rate of increase is a positive thing necessarily,

00:04:33: although we'll probably have a window of very interesting drinking for the next 10 to 15 years.

00:04:39: But I'm more concerned about what's happening in other countries. And it's all over. I mean,

00:04:45: France badly affected Italy, Chile, California, of course. I mean, it seems to take turns sometimes

00:04:52: some years are just disastrous. But there is global heating. And of course, year by year,

00:04:59: the I think the targets set 2030 targets are going to be missed massively. And as the oceans

00:05:08: warm and as currents change, you're going to see more extreme climatic events. And of course,

00:05:14: vineyards don't have a chance to recover. And just one little story, I was visiting Austria,

00:05:21: Syria, which is actually quite, it's quite a cool region normally. And, you know, quite consistent.

00:05:29: I mean, it's quite on the edge in terms of ripening. And they do have quite a lot of sort of like,

00:05:34: you know, difficult, difficult years. But at least they knew what they were, you know,

00:05:40: what was happening in the winter. It's known that the vines were able to rest, you know,

00:05:45: be dormant. But now they don't get winters in the old fashioned sense. So the vines start ripening

00:05:52: really early, you know, so the grapes start ripening, the vines are active really early.

00:05:57: And this is stressing, stressing them and stressing the vineyard. And it's just becoming more difficult

00:06:03: to make wine, the growing seasons are, you know, changing. Whereas once upon a time, they would

00:06:08: harvest mid and mid end of October, for let's say so when you're on Chardonnay. Now it's mid

00:06:14: September and month is a lot. Shorter growing seasons, perhaps mean, I don't know, less,

00:06:20: you know, you know, less interesting wines. I don't know. I mean, that's something we can discuss,

00:06:27: whether where the abbreviation of the growing seasons has an effect on the flavour components

00:06:32: of the wines themselves. Emily, what are your thoughts on that? From a buying perspective,

00:06:36: both as an importer and as a sommelier, it's it can only echo what you both said, because

00:06:42: it's not just a couple of producers talking about it now. I think everybody's kind of

00:06:47: communicating about it. And, and we're seeing it like I mean, Chianti Classco is a really good

00:06:52: example of that. If you look at the wines from the 80s and the early 90s, most of the wines are sort

00:06:58: of 13, 13 and a half. And now we're in the sort of 14, 14 and a half, sometimes 15, same wines,

00:07:05: also from producers that haven't necessarily changed anything. So,

00:07:10: and I don't really even consider Chianti Classco as a region that's radically affected by climate

00:07:16: chaos. I think where it does get complex is is exactly the chaos aspect of the fluctuations,

00:07:24: right, like these unexpected flooding events, for example, in Germany, last year being very,

00:07:30: very cool, actually, because it's like we talk about the heating, there's a lot of

00:07:33: areas that also affected by adverse cold weather and lack of sunshine or lack of dry days.

00:07:40: The chaotic element, yes. Yeah, and that's where I think what we're going to be talking about today

00:07:45: when we talk about peewee varieties is going to be really interesting because I think the

00:07:48: innovation that's coming out of this is quite promising. But it involves tough decisions. And

00:07:56: I think, like you said, especially if a parcel of land has been in the hands of a family for

00:08:04: generations or even centuries, the emotional ties to what's happening there can make it pretty

00:08:11: difficult to make some of those hard decisions of do we stop growing grapes here anymore,

00:08:16: because I think we're going to start to see why certain wine regions disappearing.

00:08:20: This is a thing, certainly in the Mediterranean, regions which have always been a little bit on

00:08:26: the cusp where there's not much runway left for them. So they're kind of like in an area which

00:08:32: typically, and this counts for places like California as well, where you just don't

00:08:36: get growing season rainfall at all. So you rely on the winter rainfall to recharge your soils,

00:08:43: and then you have this very long, warm, even hot dry summer where you're used to not having much

00:08:50: rain. And so that's fine. But then suddenly when you get heat spikes and when you don't have the

00:08:54: reserves where you have weather patterns that aren't predictable, so you go into a dry season

00:08:59: with no reserves. And this is a lot of regions now of kind of getting scared that they're going to

00:09:05: dry up. And I was at a conference in Austria in Lek in the Alps in December, and we had a session

00:09:14: on this, you know, water relations and drought. And you can have the most wonderful drought-resistant

00:09:19: combination of rootstock and, you know, your vine variety, but they still need water.

00:09:28: Fines still need water. And there's going to be some areas that are so dry that without

00:09:31: supplementary irrigation, obviously there's nothing wrong necessarily with irrigation.

00:09:36: This is another topic we could discuss. But, you know, some places just don't have the water to

00:09:42: do it. And so those vineyards, especially when your grapes are being sold for low prices,

00:09:47: like in the longer dock or something, you're in real trouble because you haven't got the money

00:09:51: to do the things you might want to do to save your vineyards. Whereas at least in

00:09:58: cooler regions, you've got some run my left. It's like if you need to, you can do something that's

00:10:03: very expensive to change a variety. And in some regions, it's very hard to let go of the famous

00:10:08: varieties that have made your region famous. But that could be an option. I had a conversation

00:10:15: with Victoria Torres actually in December, in Hamburg, about how things have been in the canaries

00:10:22: and how things have been in La Palma. And water is going to be a problem in the Canary Islands,

00:10:28: some more than others. I mean, Tenerife and La Palma are kind of the wetter islands for wine.

00:10:33: So they'll probably be a bit more stable. But it's complex there because even the water

00:10:38: has all been privatised. So to get access to water, there's a cost. And then if you,

00:10:44: they're talking about desalination, which brings a whole other array of things to consider. And

00:10:51: that sort of cost, because then you have to be pumping that water, you have to remove all the

00:10:56: salt. We know that that also then implicates sea water, sea life help. There's so many things to

00:11:04: think about. And I think it's interesting. I feel that in 50 years from now, we will have new regions,

00:11:11: but we'll also say goodbye to regions. We'll say goodbye to great varieties. I mean, it's kind of

00:11:16: astounding to me that Bordeaux, whilst the wines are often criticised for being sort of stuck in

00:11:23: its time and there being a lack of innovation in the winemaking, there's a lot more innovation in

00:11:28: terms of thinking outside of the Appalachian system, allow like granting in new great varieties,

00:11:33: try experimentation with new great varieties. I think there needs to be a lot more flexibility

00:11:38: with that. And there's going to be. Because if we're talking about, first of all, getting the

00:11:43: right crop, we're not even talking about what happens when the grapes get into the cellar,

00:11:47: because then there's people taking the grapes into the cellar. If they do get a decent crop,

00:11:51: but then the pHs are often then the fermentations don't go the same way. And that then maybe affects

00:11:56: your philosophy for winemaking, because you're going to have to start making different decisions

00:12:01: to manage your final products. So it's a matter of what we really want to do. If you're growing

00:12:07: grapes, you want to harvest them in autumnal conditions. So you want to be that last stage of

00:12:13: ripening to be taking place, not in the middle of summer, but when it's cooling down a bit.

00:12:17: So that your maturity advances at a speed that's slow enough that you can make good picking

00:12:25: decisions. And also that you can get that beautiful harmony between sugar ripeness and physiological

00:12:31: or flavor ripeness. And I think the problem is that with these climatic chaotic events,

00:12:37: you're seeing a decoupling between sugar ripeness and flavor ripeness to the point that

00:12:41: you know, people want flavor in the grapes, you don't want to pick grapes that taste unripe.

00:12:45: But then your sugar levels are ramping up so that even, you know, it's very hard to avoid

00:12:51: sometimes wines with high alcohol levels. And that affects flavor quite significantly.

00:12:55: I mean, I think we're talking a lot about red grape varieties here. So I want to sort of throw

00:13:00: in a couple of observations. One is when I was in Oregon a few years ago, and they were

00:13:06: brooding it as, you know, a really cool climate region, you know, like you're at Champaign,

00:13:11: then you're at Oregon, then Burgundy, let's say. And as we're sweltering in 100 degree Fahrenheit

00:13:17: day in June, I was saying, not very cool climate. I said, how often do you have like, what would

00:13:24: you call an average year? I said, oh, we haven't had an average year for about 10 years. And I said,

00:13:28: well, doesn't that suggest a pattern that it's not a cool climate region if you're getting

00:13:33: temperatures of 37, 38 degrees centigrade in June, when it used to be occasionally in August. So

00:13:43: a lot of producers, I think, or some producers are starting to pivot and grow up. And because

00:13:50: it's not ideal for Pinot Noir, this, this beautiful temperamental grape variety that

00:13:54: prefers long ripening seasons, you don't really want to pick it early when it's not, you know,

00:13:59: fully mature, is to plant or to graft on things like syrup, but even more white grape varieties.

00:14:07: Now, white grape varieties, you, Jamie, presumably you can pick earlier with higher levels of

00:14:12: acidity, you're not looking for the same sort of physiological rightness as red grape varieties,

00:14:18: and you can get something really positive out of it. I'm not saying the climate catastrophe is a

00:14:23: good idea. I'm just saying that there are ways of sort of pivoting. My other example would be,

00:14:29: we visited a producer in Minerva recently, and he's saying like, you know, I'm replanting

00:14:34: where I am, it's sort of more in the, not in the plains exactly, but, but we're not getting enough

00:14:40: water. It's too hot here. So we're replanting further north and west in the mountains, where

00:14:45: there's like, there seems to be sort of a decent amount of rainfall. But we're also

00:14:50: experimenting with old grape varieties with the long and big Pinot Noir, for example.

00:14:57: And these terry, terry noir as well. And these get ripe at 10 and a half, 11%. And they're never

00:15:04: going to make complex wines, but they make delicious wines. So maybe rather than making

00:15:09: these architectural wines from Syrah and Grenache, they're just going to have to bite the bullet.

00:15:15: And they can still make wine, but it won't be the same wine as perhaps 10, 15 years ago.

00:15:20: I mean, if you've got the land and the economic means to do that, that's great. But I guess there's

00:15:24: also going to be people that are going to be tied, which is where, you know, policy hopefully will

00:15:29: come in to be able to support people making a switch. People at advantage of the people who are

00:15:35: currently making wines that are blends, those regions that are known for their blended wines,

00:15:42: have got a lot more adaptability that then won't affect their sales because they're not,

00:15:48: it's very complicated if you're selling, even if you're in Alsace, you know, you're selling by

00:15:54: great variety. So some of those great varieties are prized and others aren't so prized. And

00:16:00: then you've moved to obviously Burgundy or Bourgogne, as we're supposed to call it now,

00:16:06: and it's very hard to get away from Chardonnay and Pinot, although there is increasing interest in

00:16:11: Alagoté. And I think that there's a, this isn't the, you know, the very top end of Bourgogne,

00:16:18: but it's a lot of people who are quite serious people at looking at Alagoté now.

00:16:23: And, you know, in Champagne's blended regions, they've brought in Voltis, which is a,

00:16:30: one of these new resistant varieties, but it's also got a longer cycle than Chardonnay. So it's

00:16:35: like it keeps its acidity longer than Chardonnay. So that's, you get the double benefit there of

00:16:41: having the disease resistance plus also a longer cycle. And obviously places in the south, they're

00:16:46: used to blending wines. I think they're in a good position, even the Rhône. Many areas are based

00:16:53: on blends. Obviously some are based on single varieties, Northern Rhône in particular.

00:16:57: But would it be the end of the wine world? If a lot of traditional regions blended in white grapes

00:17:04: to sort of ameliorate the red, I mean, it was done in Chianti. It's done in, obviously, in parts of

00:17:10: the Northern Rhône, you can find Hermitage or Côte Rotis with a little bit of white. It's done

00:17:16: elsewhere. I mean, even like 5-10%, if that sort of knocks it down a bit or just rebalances the wine,

00:17:23: I think the danger is these alcoholic wines that aren't ripe

00:17:27: and become undrinkable and no one wants to drink them because they have no flavour really.

00:17:36: They have no balance. They have no joy. The big question is sustainability, true sustainability.

00:17:42: And therefore we're looking at one level of financial sustainability. So guess what we've been

00:17:47: talking about now is the continued ability to produce decent yields of grapes across most

00:17:54: vintages so that you can have enough wine to sell. Then we've also got this issue of how do we farm

00:18:01: sustainably in the light of this climate chaos? Because if you're working with vittus vernifera,

00:18:07: which is the species that gives you all the varieties we know and love, then you don't have

00:18:13: resistance to powdery and downy mildew. Downy is the one that's been really problematic of late.

00:18:18: And certainly if you're farming organically, you're restricted to contact fungicides,

00:18:22: sulfur for powdery and copper-based solutions for downy. And that means if it rains, the guests

00:18:30: washed off here to go and reapply them. So you've got situations where in this last few years you've

00:18:35: got vintages like 21, 23, 24, 24 in particular, it was a horror show, where people are going 15 to

00:18:43: 20 times through their vineyard spraying these fungicides. So you've got the carbon footprint,

00:18:49: you've got the environmental impact of all these sprays, and then you've got the compaction issues

00:18:56: and the soils, which comes especially if it's damp, you know, when a lot of this spraying is needed,

00:19:01: then you don't always work to get life into your soils, and suddenly you're damaging it because

00:19:06: you're compacting them. So are gross abandoning organic practices in like recent vintages?

00:19:13: Some people having to bite the bullet and say, you know, I need a livelihood. So although I would

00:19:18: love to farm organically, I just can't otherwise. I think I know some people who who are still organic

00:19:25: in their mindset, but have said, well, do you know what, maybe systemic fungicides aren't all that

00:19:30: bad, because it's the, it's the, you know, given the options, you know, do I kill my soils by

00:19:36: and my carbon footprint and my costs, because these things all cost money to spray, going up and down

00:19:42: the vineyard 20 times, or do I reduce my costs, save my soils and, you know, lose my organic

00:19:51: accreditation. So it's very complicated discussion. But then the other discussion, and I'd like to

00:19:56: know what both of you think about this, is, is there room for alternative varieties, for

00:20:02: resistant varieties, not just for making commercial wine, but for making fine wine?

00:20:07: What do you think, Emily? I think so. I think there's a, I mean, I'm very excited about

00:20:11: Peewee varietals in general. I think it's still early days that we haven't had enough.

00:20:17: Shall we explain what Peewee is, maybe for the listeners?

00:20:21: The term basically describing the modern hybrids that have been bred for disease resistance. So

00:20:26: what they'll take is, they'll take an American or Asian species of grapevine, which don't produce

00:20:34: grapes through all that nice, but which do have resistance, proper true resistance genes to powder

00:20:40: in dany mildew. Yeah. And then, then basically you cross with your variety of this is from nifera,

00:20:48: and then that's, you check that you've got the resistance, and then you back cross with

00:20:53: nifera again and again, until you've got something which is mostly nifera. So you're looking to get

00:20:58: grapes that produce wines that taste sort of like we expect wine to taste. And then,

00:21:06: but we should have the full resistance to these diseases, which mean that basically you,

00:21:12: you could not spray at all. But generally speaking, people spray one to three times

00:21:17: just to stop that resistance of the fungi to the defense mechanism of the vine from evolving.

00:21:24: And there's a big move to this now. And there were lots of, obviously the hybrids, first of all,

00:21:29: were developed in the USA and the eastern coast of USA, which was until the, maybe the 1850s was

00:21:35: producing most of the wine in the US. There's some really big wine industries on the east coast,

00:21:39: in the east or the eastern side of the USA, so New York state. And then there's the states alongside

00:21:45: that, which was based entirely on these sort of like accidental crosses between nifera when they

00:21:51: tried to grow it. And the wild... Nebraska. So things like Alexander was the first one. I think

00:22:00: that was in 1798 or 1802 or something. So really early on. And then there were things like Catorba,

00:22:06: Delaware, Isabella, all these varieties. They make kind of, you can sort of make quite interesting

00:22:11: wine with them if you're really careful, but they're too easy to make weird tasting wines from.

00:22:16: And then there was a load of hybrids produced in the late 19th century and the early 20th century

00:22:23: when they were trying to, where phloxal was a huge issue. And they were trying to make hybrids that

00:22:27: you could, were phloxal resistant, which you could actually grow the grapes and harvest the grapes

00:22:32: from. Then they worked out that maybe the best thing is to graft. And so that all these varieties

00:22:36: were planted, developed then. And they sort of became popular later on in France. And so even

00:22:42: in 1950s, early 1950s, there were 400,000 hectares of hybrids being grown in France because they

00:22:48: were much easier to treat. They were disease resistant and they produced really good yields.

00:22:52: But then that's gone down to about 6,000 hectares. They still use some of them for brandy

00:22:57: because they've kind of been outlawed because it's too easy to make lots of cheap wine from them.

00:23:02: But then there's 70s onwards. In Germany and France, in Switzerland, there've been some breeding

00:23:07: programmes to produce these new disease resistant varieties. And similarly, in the eastern USA and

00:23:14: Canada, there's been a lot of breeding work looking at producing hybrids. There, the worry

00:23:19: isn't so much disease resistance. They're more worried about cold hardiness because they have

00:23:22: super cold winters. And again, so if you go below minus 18 degrees C, bitters of aniferous tends to

00:23:28: die. So they need hybrids that can survive those very low winter temperatures. So the Peewees is

00:23:34: a term used for these modern disease resistant varieties in Europe. And there's a lot of them

00:23:39: being grown. It's really exciting. I've been trying more and more. I think it's a little bit like

00:23:44: when we talked about perceiving teowar and grape expression and skin contact. It's still early

00:23:51: days with Peewees. I think we haven't got enough people planting and producing wine for them to

00:23:58: really make a true assessment if you can make fine wines of the world from them because it's

00:24:02: still so early. Yes, you've got to commit to something. So I think, you know, at the moment

00:24:08: of the research, and it's very specific research, it has gone into resistance games, whatever

00:24:14: mildew it might be, or in the States, we're talking about hybrids and resisting having

00:24:21: to be able to thrive in very short summers and very, very cold winters. Those are very specific

00:24:27: things. But I suppose not many producers have said like, I really identify with this particular

00:24:33: hybrid or Peewee, and I want to take the taste profile to another level. And that's

00:24:40: We know that it doesn't happen overnight. It's like terroir isn't something you can snap a finger in. Oh, I've got terroir

00:24:46: You know the the plant needs to sort of put its roots in the soil

00:24:50: You need to understand the vineyard you to farm well and respectfully and I think we're a long way off, but there are

00:24:57: Examples now where when we taste the wines we say that's very interesting or even that's amazing

00:25:04: And I think we're gonna taste one such wine today. So Doug you've bought along a bottle from producers that this was I always thought that I

00:25:13: Believe there's a narrative that was taught to me in wine education that hybrids make terrible wine and

00:25:18: The one thing that changed my mind was I remember going to brawn with you to meet Deirdre and Caleb

00:25:25: Yes, like our Ajista. Yes, who are based in Vermont and you brought a bottle here for us to try tell us about this

00:25:32: And tell us about their project because this was for me that they work on is it exclusively with hybrids?

00:25:37: exclusively and they make and these are a

00:25:40: Singular wines, but under live undeniably. I think fine wines. So once upon a time. I think people try to produce

00:25:47: wines from vine affair in Vermont and

00:25:51: Those vines died after one year. That's more than north and then then Toronto, isn't it?

00:25:59: Yeah, but yeah, Vermont is is extraordinary. It's it's probably one of the most extreme doesn't it run up to Quebec

00:26:05: And that's on that side and the it's quite small state. Yeah, but it just it's surrounded by mountains. I mean, it's well known for skiing

00:26:12: That there's this the summer doesn't seem to start till June and seems to end

00:26:17: In sort of

00:26:20: Sort of mid-autumn. This sounds like your sort of place. Yeah, my son of place

00:26:25: Yeah, is that no beach though. There's no beach for you. There is a massive lake catch like one of the biggest lakes you can imagine and

00:26:33: Yeah, so

00:26:35: the producers in Vermont are using

00:26:38: hybrids which are pioneered by as far as I know the University of Minnesota which

00:26:44: It's a trialed hybrids a few years ago

00:26:49: For Canadian vineyards and very cold climate northeastern American vineyards

00:26:55: So I'm not saying Vermont is exclusive because I believe New Hampshire as well possibly and you'll find this great variety

00:27:02: That we're tasting also in Canada. So what I did is when it got poor. I was like, oh, it's orange. It's not red

00:27:08: This is a Vinu Janku Vinu Janku, which is it's a homage to

00:27:18: 40 is as homage to several forty and and the fact that if you went to an Italian vineyard

00:27:23: You know when they say like a white wine is often a skin contact wine, you know

00:27:29: Ages ago everyone like macerated wines on their skins because that was the way you did it. You don't have

00:27:36: thermo-regulated

00:27:38: sort of tanks and you know all all the

00:27:42: Technology D-stemo's so people just used to chuck a bunch of grapes in that forer and won't learn behold

00:27:49: maceration happens

00:27:52: Natural oxidation happens. So Vinu Janku is as Emily says, it's a homage to a vineyard

00:28:00: 1200 meter vineyard on the slopes of Mount Etna

00:28:07: Yeah, you know Deanna and Eric and Anna half of the vineyard they bought half it. Yes. It's an amazing vineyard

00:28:14: and this great variety here is a hybrid called la Crescent

00:28:19: which is

00:28:22: It's derived from an English grape variety the black muscat muscat of Omba muscat of Omba and

00:28:29: Deodre and Caleb made a pilgrimage to the most famous

00:28:36: Muscat of Omba grape in the world great vine at Hampton court. You know, I had a cutting of it

00:28:41: I grew it. Did you? Yeah, I grew up someone got a cutting when they pruned it

00:28:45: And I think it was first planted in 1757. It's in a greenhouse. Yes, I got a cutting of the same grew outside my house

00:28:51: I don't know what happened to it, but

00:28:53: Oh

00:28:57: Like my neighbor grows grows these grapes and he gave me some and I said he said I know you like wine

00:29:03: And I said like why are you giving me grapes and like in wine in tablet form and I said, do you did you just pick these now?

00:29:10: He said yes, I said, but it's August and like most kind of has quite low

00:29:15: Acidity, this is a serially high acidity

00:29:18: It just brought tears to my eyes. So what's the resistance partner for a la Crescent?

00:29:24: so the muscat of Omba is crossed with I think a

00:29:29: Paria grape, I'm not quite sure. This happened a long time ago. It's more recently. So this probably happened

00:29:35: Well, the crossings were done in in Minnesota ages ago in the 50 1950s

00:29:40: These vineyards are planted roughly I would say 12 to 15 years ago around Lake Champlain

00:29:48: So they they've got three different vineyards in around Champlain Lake

00:29:52: Which is sort of lower part of Vermont and a bit milder and they also have a vineyard by their house

00:29:58: Which is up on a mountain Bernard

00:30:00: And they're all grapes struggle to ripen a bit because it's that much colder

00:30:06: Now with this grape variety, they've made various styles of wine

00:30:12: One is a pet nat, which you'll remember

00:30:15: Called grace and favor I think after the Hampton we all have that together in brawn as well

00:30:23: Yeah, I'm in the basement. It's super delicious and sort of aromatic and wild minty

00:30:27: I should also say that Deirdre and Caleb they work what we call bi-dynamically or regeneratively

00:30:33: But certainly, you know using permaculture just allowing nature to sort of take its course

00:30:38: But a lot of really what I call creative and really good quality pruning as well, you know to encourage the vines

00:30:46: Whatever and over the over time. I've seen how this grape variety expresses itself into the

00:30:54: In in different plots, which are only, you know five

00:30:57: Kilometers apart almost and it's showing terroir already. So we're like a marine

00:31:03: Seabed soil says there's quite a lot of chalk in the soils gives the winds lovely lift and freshness

00:31:09: The wines all the wines that they make seem to be have

00:31:13: Beautiful brightness and some is like a fleshy quality, which you don't expect from yeah super cool climate

00:31:20: Wines now this one is something they've gone out in a limb and made a sort of reserve version

00:31:25: You can see well good listener cannot see but I assure you it's a it's a beautiful amber color

00:31:31: It's amber isn't it with a little bit of it smells like those haribo peaches. Yes

00:31:36: Yes, it's a bit of raisin as well. Yeah, so extended this is 2018 vintage

00:31:41: Yes, so it's a reserve so they keep it extra length of time

00:31:45: Yeah, I mean they do age their wines anyway quite a bit and

00:31:49: So so it's

00:31:51: Any sulfites no sulfites no

00:31:54: So six years old. No sulfites. No, I think there's one see some

00:31:58: Sandstone and fora and they they they love using demi-johns

00:32:03: For aging or fermenting. Yeah

00:32:06: And when you go there, you just see like like a little sort of cellophane of demi-johns. Orange peel as well

00:32:12: Yeah, big roll

00:32:14: So it's got sweet it's almost sweet on the nose

00:32:17: Yeah, and the palette's got a rich texture

00:32:18: Yes, I mean I get I get your your peachiness

00:32:22: But I always get with their wines and maybe it's associated because of this in the vineyard wild mint and strawberries

00:32:28: And you know you get a little tiny wild strawberries and the mint is really really sort of like striking particularly on this it's rich

00:32:34: Is this your sugar there's no pretty no sugar. It's taste like it's ours. It does doesn't it? It's that richness and

00:32:39: Fruit sweetness, I think that makes you think oh, there's there's some sugar here

00:32:45: But it can't because it would have reframmented as textures and tannins and there's definitely tannic

00:32:50: You know some not fine tannic spice, but I think because there's a muscat

00:32:55: Origin element is always like, you know muscat grapes. I've always got that sort of perception of sugar must get always because it's relatively low in acid

00:33:03: And it makes you feel this like it's quite soft. Yeah, there's a viscosity there. Yeah, yeah, and it's layered as well

00:33:11: Quite complex wine. Yeah, still like some nice sort of pithy like

00:33:14: Extract on the palette as well that it's not just glycerol, you know, or the percept like this

00:33:20: Oiliness that's there. It's not just that. I think by using this sort of skin maceration

00:33:26: Also, it does add the layers and textures to the wine and I think there's also

00:33:31: When people say oh, yeah, but if you use if you do make orange wines or use skin maceration, you lose the terroir element

00:33:38: I think that's complete bologna. I

00:33:40: Think you you get something extra from the terroir because you're not throwing away the grape

00:33:46: You're using the whole the grape and the and I think I think this reflects whatever the vintage was like

00:33:52: And reflects a careful long slow

00:33:57: winemaking process where the wine was allowed to express itself in different. I mean

00:34:03: Different vessels as well. So I think I believe the M4 are made from the same

00:34:08: Biocanady and I'm for a make it from the same

00:34:11: Soils and stone, you know, yes and as as the late would have been in the lake years ago

00:34:17: So again, this is a homage to place very very strongly

00:34:20: Yeah, I'm like this one a lot. It's it's it's pure

00:34:26: And it's it's really well made. It's developing nicely, but it's not like anywhere like you don't feel like I've got to drink this up soon

00:34:33: And this is no cell fights at it. So that's really interesting. Yeah

00:34:38: and then

00:34:39: from a hybrid as well, which is

00:34:41: Very I think very interesting to see why it's like this and I think we need almost like a critical mass of people

00:34:47: And I was just tasting recently at the school climate conference and one producer who's just hybrid only based down in

00:34:54: Lake Constance and it's in the south of Germany heading towards the Alps and he's

00:35:00: focusing on

00:35:03: Yohannita and souvenir gris mainly and making some of these wines that in terms of complexity and texture and

00:35:10: Finesse reminded me of

00:35:12: Some of Ganavar's wines. I was thinking this is these are amazing and it's like it's certainly the case now

00:35:18: And I tried quite a few wines. I tried one from a juice in Denmark

00:35:22: On an island in Denmark

00:35:26: Hideaway vineyards, they make a red island of Bonhomme or no, it's another one. It begins. It's just short. I should know this but it's a

00:35:33: Anyway, no

00:35:36: Your chosen subject is Danish islands

00:35:47: Yeah, I know you wouldn't want to be on who wants a millionaire for that question. Would you you'd have to phone a lot of friends?

00:35:55: Yeah, so um

00:35:57: So, yeah, they they had a red blend that was a blend of four different

00:36:01: resistant varieties. I think there might have even been an older one like Rondeau

00:36:05: but some more modern ones and

00:36:08: My work this was good. It was like didn't need to make any apologies for it at all. It was like a and

00:36:14: You know, we have to acknowledge. Yes, there are sometimes there are some challenges working with some of the older hybrids in terms of wine chemistry

00:36:22: So sometimes they'll have like really high acidity, but really really high acidity and really high pH

00:36:28: So it's like they're inherently unstable. Yeah, and you can't acidify them because they already got high acidity

00:36:33: Yes, so it's like and also so if you want to make wines more naturally

00:36:37: You've got to kind of work hard and find the varieties that suit your place

00:36:42: There's lots of doing it. Yeah, I think the advantage of the natural pieces is you don't need to you can be natural in the vineyard as well

00:36:50: Matias Vaughan is another good example. He's been planting Peewees. Yeah, and Bianca and Daniel Schmidt

00:36:57: And and yeah, they you know, they one farms organically in the other by dynamically

00:37:03: And I think if you work carefully and sensitively in the vineyard

00:37:06: You're your vines respond and I've always said like when people say, oh

00:37:10: Like what's this variety like? I think that's probably the least important question

00:37:16: You're going to ask I would say what's the farming like? What's the terroir like? What's the, you know, like

00:37:21: How do they work with with with the grapes? That's the important question the varietal

00:37:26: Or the variety I prefer to say is is the conduit for amazing farming and yes

00:37:33: It has some inherent character in itself, but actually the better the farming

00:37:38: The more careful the winemaking the more creative and imaginative the winemaking as well

00:37:43: That's what's going to determine and mark this wine for greatness. So for me, you know, going back to

00:37:49: You know, this vinajuanco is like it's amazing. It's it's unusual. It's for me

00:37:55: It's like it's a result of of a real passion project someone who's decided, you know

00:38:00: This is their homage to maybe a wine culture in another country

00:38:04: But she's creating her own like little local wine culture and influencing other growers to do the same thing

00:38:12: With the same great varieties. Yeah, and I think I'm

00:38:16: It's so interesting to see

00:38:20: Kind of like these new lenses, which you can then interpret to place places through and I that's why I quite

00:38:28: Like the fact that champagne have included volt is in their catalog and a lot of people are snooty snooty about it, you know

00:38:34: But this is this, you know in Bordeaux, they've included some

00:38:38: You know, as Emily mentioned earlier, and they've included some longer cycle grape varieties like truigonational

00:38:42: But they've also included some calorie. Yeah, some hybrids as well. And that's I think of

00:38:47: You know, we're going through a real time where people are questioning what they're doing and

00:38:53: um

00:38:55: I think big agriculture, you know, that's sort of like what that destroys soils

00:39:00: This time is limited and this is a big wider question about farming

00:39:03: um

00:39:06: And we can go on for this

00:39:08: Go on about this for ages, but I think that that this is a really a time a time of

00:39:12: Evolution but maybe revolution as well. We've had a steady evolution. Now. I think we'll see a bit of revolution because people would be forced to

00:39:20: um, this climate chaos that we're facing it's like

00:39:23: This is here to stay and so to make viticulture economic first of all, I don't think it's going to be economic to

00:39:32: um, produce very very cheap wines in the future. I think that

00:39:37: You know, if you want to be sustainable farm sustainably and you want to pay people a sustainable wage as well

00:39:42: And the very cheapest wines are going to have to go because they're simply not sustainable

00:39:48: um, then we've got to think about the

00:39:51: Way the vineyards are farmed and I think that's got to change not just for the luxury

00:39:55: End or the small boutique end. It's for the big end as well. You know, that it's got to change as well

00:40:01: um, I think there's a really important points and I totally agree with them, you know, like

00:40:05: Human beings are all the human race is by definition adaptable. You hope

00:40:10: But the practices we've been using the sort of industrial farming practices. I mean, they're destroying, you know, they're killing

00:40:19: They're killing the um goose golden goose really. Um, and I think

00:40:26: As Jamie says, we need to think that wine isn't an industrial cheap product

00:40:31: It's going to destroy the landscape and in the end it's going to eat itself

00:40:35: And we're going to have to be prepared to pay more for wine because

00:40:39: If you want the right wine done in the right way, you have to pay people you have to

00:40:44: You have to use practices in the vineyard, which are naturally more expensive, but

00:40:50: Much more sustainable and I think, you know, we don't I've always said and I always always frightens

00:40:56: People when I say this is we don't need wine in our lives that desperately

00:41:01: to sort of rape the earth and um

00:41:05: It's interesting you say that I'm going back again in my thoughts about this conversation around the conversation that I had with Victor Torres because

00:41:12: one of the things that she said to me was

00:41:14: um, the concept

00:41:16: of water the concept of

00:41:20: nature being infinite

00:41:22: is just unrealistic

00:41:25: And she's like these are finite things and we need to sort of get our head around the fact that

00:41:29: It can't just be something that's just available. Just it's you know, it's

00:41:34: It's it's not just money being printed in a mint. Is it like it's

00:41:38: It is actually something that you need to be realistic about what can be achieved and how much can actually be made from a place

00:41:44: Yeah, can we try one more wine before we finish? I don't know, Jamie

00:41:48: We can I'm sure so I just want to say that I like that's really opened up in the glass before we go on to that

00:41:54: So I don't want to just tip that away, but it's um

00:41:57: It's kind of the moose like the more that it's in the bottle

00:42:01: But maybe that's that botanical wedge coming out. Yes. Yeah, I yeah botanical is a really good way to describe it. I think yes

00:42:07: That's a good description. That's she very impressed. Um, right this next wine is from England

00:42:12: it is

00:42:15: made by

00:42:17: Someone until recently was a sommelier at one of London's best restaurants

00:42:20: It's donald ebbins who was the chief sommelier latron pet just left

00:42:23: He's going touring to make it some wine at get reals cloof at the moment

00:42:26: Is he? Go on in

00:42:29: And this is some mondays

00:42:32: Not my king. It's not vintage dated

00:42:35: But it was made by him at black book

00:42:39: And it's a combination of a of a new hybrid of pee we call pinotin, which I think is one of the black neck roses

00:42:47: and pinot noir

00:42:49: um

00:42:50: It's a lovely kind of like almost like rose. Yeah, a rose a color somewhere between a rose and a light of red

00:42:56: Um, and it's got a pink label on it

00:42:59: And it was made at black book winery

00:43:02: um

00:43:03: Which is a really interesting

00:43:05: Um still wine focused winery in the arches in is it Battersea? It is Battersea. Yes. Yeah

00:43:12: So make them make some really good wines and this is his first wine

00:43:17: I really like that he's used a pee weave for this

00:43:20: Do you know if the grapes came from the two grapes came from the same vineyard? I don't know. No, I don't know

00:43:27: But yeah, this this is lifestyle rich quite fragrant. Yeah

00:43:34: aromatic

00:43:37: Wild strawberries a bit of cherry and you can I mean we've had this open now for a little while

00:43:41: There's still tiny little bubbles there and I get a little bit of a width of that co2 as well

00:43:45: Which is giving it a nice kind of lift on the palate freshness. Yeah. It's not a high acid wine even though

00:43:50: It's English. It's got no the acid's tending towards soft. Yeah, but that gives you a nice texture in the mouth

00:43:55: actually, no, it's

00:43:58: As I said, it's been it's a bit more open. Um, and actually it actually shows sometimes. I think the drink wines

00:44:03: too cold

00:44:06: And and then they really only express their breadth which is something I look at

00:44:12: You know, not just for acid, but I look for for mouth feel and texture and it sort of hasn't it's warmed up weirdly

00:44:19: It's become for me more wholesome. Yes, because I can feel it now in different parts of mouth

00:44:24: whereas before it was a bit like

00:44:26: The aromatics were a bit

00:44:28: Sort of straightforward a bit sort of, you know, in a nice way bubblegummy, sweetie

00:44:33: But now it's lost that it's like shed the puppy. So this was barrel fermented like in an eight used barrel or something

00:44:40: So I think it's that slight oxidative

00:44:42: Um regime has been really good for this wine. Yeah, there's a little same rich to it now. It's not just a techno fruity wine

00:44:48: Yes, you know a lot of English

00:44:50: Um still wines can be very techno fruity. They're stainless steel that added yeast

00:44:55: You know made to the book. Um, this is this is pretty freehand

00:45:00: Yes, and I quite like freehand wines and what I love though is

00:45:04: Is that someone's motivated enough to put their money in their pocket buy some grapes

00:45:09: Black some cellar space and produce something and then try and sell it

00:45:12: This is what makes wine really exciting for me. Um, I posted a review of a seminar I went to the weekend on polish wines

00:45:20: And someone responded on one of the social media things saying oh, just what we need in a world of overproduction

00:45:26: More people making wine, but the thing is a bit of an naive comment. No, isn't it? Well, it's like these people are

00:45:32: You know, there's like there's now 500 or 600 wineries in Poland

00:45:37: With around a thousand hectares. It's all small scale the biggest wineries about 40 or 50 hectares

00:45:42: There's only a few of them that are quite big the average medium size would be around six hectares. So this is this is

00:45:47: People and there's no growers market for grapes. It's all people making wine from their own grapes

00:45:51: And I kind of love that people are doing this stuff on a small scale a human scale

00:45:56: Um, they're mostly using pewee's in poland, but there's maybe 20 finifera

00:46:01: um, and

00:46:04: This and they found a market for their wine. They're selling their wine and they're this is agriculture

00:46:09: um on a human scale what people are

00:46:12: Making money making a living

00:46:15: Doing agriculture

00:46:18: And wine allows people without huge amounts tracks of land to do agriculture and make a living out of it. I think that's really cool

00:46:24: It is cool. I mean the criticism is a bit like saying oh not another person making cheese in the west country

00:46:31: I mean like this is like I think these are sustainable businesses small small farming

00:46:37: um, but also I think you learn a lot about

00:46:39: the local

00:46:41: Culture climate and also a sense. It doesn't grow unless you can you become the center of the community you employ

00:46:47: You know employ locals and you know teach maybe children about this sort of farming process. It's a really valuable

00:46:54: This is what we really need we need to you know, you know people

00:46:59: Kind of in our in our food system. We need this return to people actually farming farming well rather than commoditized agriculture where

00:47:09: um

00:47:11: You know it fascinates me

00:47:12: I really would love to see more people going back to the land and making a living out of it

00:47:15: The the the model of the biodynamic or or regenerative farm is to be the center of the community

00:47:21: um, which it would find and you know, um, you know the the way that

00:47:28: You know here here you like your employees. Well employees. I mean, you know, uh, children can like

00:47:33: Feed the chickens and

00:47:36: Yeah, collect the eggs. Yeah, collect the eggs and whatever but but they learn more about nature

00:47:41: You know in half a day

00:47:44: That's how I feel zoos should be I feel like I have a really strong opinion on zoos like I'm sure many people do

00:47:49: But I always think I imagine if all of the zoos in the world got transformed into like

00:47:54: farms where people could learn about the local

00:47:57: fauna and flora

00:47:59: they could learn maybe

00:48:01: um, basic foraging principles of plants that grow in their area and then learn about the wildlife that's in that place

00:48:08: And a bit about basic farming so the people of gardens know how to grow stuff

00:48:13: Yeah, it's just going back to something that was standard not so long ago. This wine smells a bit like a cheeseburger now

00:48:21: Are you hungry? I don't know

00:48:23: It does though. It smells a bit like a cold cheeseburger but I eat a lot of I eat a lot of burgers so

00:48:28: It does though the berlin burger. Yeah

00:48:31: Anyway, I think this draws us quite nicely to the end of our podcast

00:48:37: um, some really important issues discussed. Um, I don't think we've kind of

00:48:43: Finished working on some of these themes. They'll come up again. I'm sure a great teacher. Um, but yeah

00:48:50: Thank you all of you for listening. Thank you. I'm jamie good. I'm emily harman. You can find us on instagram

00:48:57: At just another wine podcast. Oh, i'm Doug red by the way

00:49:00: That was our slickest ending ever