Today, the use of sulfur dioxide (SO2) is widely accepted as a useful winemaking aide. It is used as a preservative because of its anti-oxidative and anti-microbial properties in wine, but also as a cleaning agent for barrels and winery facilities.
Once upon a time, all food and wine was organic and it was not necessary to have a word associated with these products. It was just “food” and “wine”. What does the word organic really mean?
ating organic is no longer a trend. We have experienced a surge of national grocery store chains carrying organic products and even producing their own organic labels. We no longer live in a world where you have to belong to a coop or shop only at farmers markets to receive our organic goods.
It is no secret that many farmers use pesticides, herbicides or fungicides to rid their farms of pests, mold and other unwanted problems.
I thought all wine was natural”. This is the largest misconception that wineries, retailers, restaurants and wholesalers hear on a daily basis, but not too long ago this was true.
Terroir gives wine a sense of place. When the land, animals, and natural elements come together, the wine that is produced has a presence of the land embedded in its core.
Austria is one of the oldest wine growing countries in the world, with archeologial evidence of wine production dating back nearly 4000 years ago. Grape seeds have been found in urns within the country as early as 700BC.
It is easy to get the impression that, apart from conventional practices, there are only two options available in viticulture: organic and biodynamic. However, there are other methods being developed.
here is a lot of interest and a lot of confusion about organic wine these days. The interest stems from the increasing presence of wines with organic claims on store shelves and from wine consumers who want organic alternatives to conventional wines. Most of the confusion has to do with the labeling of these organic wines.
CCOF stands for California Certified Organic Farmers and is an organic certification program that certifies over 1,300 different organic crops and products ranging from apples to livestock to wine. Many vineyards choose to become certified with CCOF because it has similar certification standards in the vineyard as USDA and allows the vineyards to have a recognizable symbol on their wine labels. What it does not cover is certification in the winery, which has its own set of rules regulated by the USDA with, but at the very least it give consumers the confidence that their wines are “Made with Organic Grapes.” …
Organic winegrowing recognizes that healthy soils grow balanced grapes that produce the best wines. Organic vineyards are often small, family-owned and -operated properties.
Biodiversity is a vital part of nature’s system of checks and balances, keeping harmful populations of insects and weeds in control and providing a balanced environment for the vines.
