Wine does not make itself and those who say it does (and believe it) do not take into account that wine is not made by nature alone but involves human intervention. Pressing grapes and letting the juice ferment by itself almost always produces poor results, what can be defined as “neglected” wine. On the other hand, there are wines that are produced respecting the environment yet made in a correct way. And they are entirely something else.
As I have been writing for years, I have nothing against those who produce wine respecting the environment, in fact, I am totally in favor of this. Then again, who wouldn’t? I only have some doubts on the correctness of calling them “natural” wines because, at present, there are no laws that regulate them and allow for controls. And I say this in the interest of consumers and not for any personal bias regarding certain types of wine.
Allow me to relate to you a conversation I heard at a wine bar involving a young wine lover who, when tasting a so-called “natural” wine said: “more than natural, I’d say this is a neglected wine, the kind my grandfather used to make, which was made with only grapes but which no one in the family would dare to drink because after a few months it had already gone off”.
Even if I am a lot older, I can remember the father of a girlfriend of mine who, knowing that I was taking wine appreciation courses at AIS, insisted that I taste the wine that he made, “only using grapes”, obviously. He would buy his grapes from a farmer, use the winemaking equipment he had in his garage to press them and ferment the juice. Once this was done, he would pour it into a demijohn jug with a little vaseline oil and a tab of potassium metabisulphite.
Needless to say, after a few months, his “potion” was undrinkable and yet he was proud of it just the same and I had to taste it and tell him it wasn’t that bad.
I have no intention to make any generalizations about “peasant” or “natural” wines, among which there are more and more excellent ones, but only wish to single out the idea of “neglected” wines, those that come out the way they come out, those in which there is little if any human intervention and which are rarely any good. This is because winemaking, like wine growing, is an “assisted” process.
Wine cannot be made unless, as a minimum, you plant a vine in the right place, graft the vines, prune them, harvest at the right time, press the grapes correctly, also respecting hygiene norms, and then ferment and age the wine. Human intervention is necessary in all these steps because wine does not make itself. All this is so obvious that it deserves no further comment, at least from me.
The alternative is “neglected” wine.
