How Low Can You Go?

If that weren’t enough, the trend in winemaking these days is to get even more low-tech. As a reaction against the "overprocessing" of wine--the gory details of which can include heavy doses of SO2, a good spin in a centrifuge, artificial yeasts, fining (sometimes with egg-whites, sometimes with chemicals), and filtration--many winemakers are returning to basics. And not out of some stubborn adherence to tradition, but to quality. These winemakers believe that so much tinkering strips the grapes of their individuality and ability to express their native soil, variety, and microclimate--what your pretentious wine steward will call "terroir."

The makers of low-tech wine are also making a statement against the demands of an increasingly global market, which they see as dictating drinkers’ tastes. Before hordes of wine newcomers such as myself started buying large quantities of fine wine, nobody cared that (for example) a little sediment collected at the bottom of her 1985 Chateau Margaux. Now, if a customer at a restaurant sees tartrate crystals on his $50 bottle of Macon white burgundy, he’ll pitch a fit and send it back.

Don't Mess With Mother Nature

But the truth is, a little sediment or tartrates are completely natural by-products of the aging process. They are either tasteless or they impart important, delicious flavors to the wine. Acknowledging this, low-tech vignerons are turning toward grape types other than Cabernet and Chardonnay, and turning their backs on any techniques that can rob their grapes of character. (As one maistre du chai in Bordeaux put it, "nature makes my grapes great; I simply try to keep from fucking them up.") They are weaning their wines off foreign yeasts, fining, and filtration.

The leaders in the low-tech wine movement come from all over the winemaking world, from New Zealand to Washington State. But the most successful proponents are the young stars from France’s Rhone Valley the Rhone-varietal advocates in California (sometimes referred to as "the Rhone Rangers"). I went to my tasting notes from the last month and selected some exemplary bottles of various origins, grape type, and prices.