ORGANIC, NATURAL, OR BIODYNAMIC WINE: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE, REALLY? A TALE OF CHEMISTS, PUNKS, AND SHAMANS

ORGANIC, NATURAL, OR BIODYNAMIC WINE:

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE, REALLY? A TALE OF CHEMISTS, PUNKS, AND SHAMANS

Fanny & Mark D’ONOFRIO

Last summer, during my tour of the Pays Nantais & Saumur wine regions, I would ask the vignerons the same question: how exactly does a biodynamic wine differ from an organic or even a natural wine? Their answers ranged from the technical to the esoteric. All were amusing. Some were bizarre. None settled the matter.

Organic wine seems to be the easiest label to define, probably because it’s the most regulated, so let’s start here. In France (and the EU) for instance, organic (or biologique) means that the raw material (grape / yeast) and the process (winemaking) shouldn’t be chemically manipulated. In other words, winemakers cannot use any pesticides or fertilizers and should limit the use of preservatives or additives (e.g., sulfites) to obtain the coveted EU “AB” label (AB stands for Agriculture Biologique). Such EU specifications are meticulously detailed (e.g., sulfites, again, should not exceed 100 milligrams per liter for red and 150 milligrams per liter for white and rosé). The catch, however, is that as consumers demand more of these sustainable, small-production organic wines, conventional winemakers adopt some, but not all, of the techniques of those in the organic trade, blurring the lines between what is and is not organic – a competitive marking practice which otherwise forces the French & EU authorities to further categorize and limit what wine is organic. It’s a vicious circle. One recurrent area of concern, for example, is again the permissible level of sulfites, the reduction of which sometimes stands as a proxy for what is more organic and which keeps shrinking to such imperceptible concentrations that even the most sustainable winemakers I met question its relevancy as a marker for truly organic wines.

This is where it gets confusing. Sulfite-free has also become the badge of honor for the more radical natural wine movement, which had started out as an ‘80s fringe group of anarchists in the Loire Valley who would make unfiltered, unaltered wines, using only indigenous grapes and yeast – the minimum. But the resulting wines became so popular for their punk-like austerity that the winemakers, some of whom even identified as punks and had their own manifesto, obtained their own certification last March. Their new “Vin Méthode Nature” label is way more restrictive than that of organic wine, prohibiting sulfites (at least before and during the fermentation process) or any other additives. But I don’t think this new certification really grasps the entirety of what defines a natural wine. The few natural winemakers I tracked down in the Saumur wine region, for instance, were like experimental archaeologists and landscape historians, constantly foraging for ancestral grapes, yeast, and winemaking techniques. In their atavistic quest for what they call the original taste of a grape, they cultivated crude, solid, and capricious wines, with no efforts to push forward any pleasant fruity or floral fingerprints.  

Biodynamic wine takes this back-to-the-land philosophy a bit further but instead with a strange New Age bent. The recognized biodynamic label Demeter, for example, defines biodynamic as an integrative farming practice that should respect, heal, and honor the Earth. In particular, under this Gaia-hypothesis-like philosophy, the vineyard is a living organism and its biodiversity – the soil, vines, and other native plants – should be preserved and regenerated by following the cycles of the sun and moon or by using plant compost or manure to detoxify the earth. Such peculiar and unregulated principles stem from the 1920s-era philosophy of Austrian scientist Rudolph Steneir, who pioneered sustainable farming values to combat the new intensive farming practices of the day, such as the introduction of modern fertilizers and pesticides. Steiner was also an esoteric, so his techniques included a dose of magic. Hence, when you interview biodynamic winemakers, they can sound like mystical Druids or shamans (which makes sense as the Pays Nantais draws from its Breton-Celtic heritage): One winemaker told me he would use his horse to till the land or sheep to get rid of weeds; another would synchronize the harvest with the tidal calendar (given the strategic proximity of the vineyard to the Atlantic ocean); yet another would use a fetid mixture of nettle as a substitute for pesticides. But by far the most interesting (and accomplished) winemaker swore by the “dung of horn” (or bouse de corne), an annual ritual in which a cow horn is filled with organic cow dung, buried just after the winter solstice, and then dug up after the summer solstice and pulverized on the vineyard soil. What did this accomplish? I have no idea, but the wine is excellent.

Originally published in Wine & Sommelier on May 29, 2020: https://www.wineandsommelier.com/organic-natural-or-biodynamic-wine/

References:

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 203/2012 of 8 March 2012 amending Regulation (EC) No 889/2008 laying down detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 834/2007, as regards detailed rules on organic wine: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A32012R0203

Terre de Vins Magazine, March 10, 2020: https://www.terredevins.com/actualites/la-denomination-vin-methode-nature-est-nee

Demeter, Agriculture Biodynamique: https://www.demeter.fr/biodynamie/

Fred Niger, Domaine de l’Ecu: https://domaine-ecu.com/la-biodynamie/