A good wine can make or break the perfect meal on a Friday night. If you ever spent any time at a vaguely hipster wine bar, you’ve probably chatted with a millennial man bun who told you natural wine is better than bottles full of sulfites. But what does that even mean? Is there a difference between the wines that have the word natural on them and the ones that don’t? Do they taste different? Is one better for you? I spoke with Andrea, who requested the use of her first name only in this piece for privacy reasons, to appease my spiraling queries. Andrea is a self-taught wine enthusiast — a “non-somm,” as she calls it — and wine educator on TikTok and Instagram who gave me insights into natural wine and the best ways to enjoy it.
What is natural wine?
Natural wine, while not a standardized term, is a wine produced with very few additives and interferences to allow the flavors of the grapes and the growing environment to be most present.
“Natural wine is a philosophy in winemaking that often includes minimal intervention, traditional or ancient techniques, organic farming and very few (to zero) chemicals/additives,” Andrea said. “It is essentially the processes used to make wine long before industrialization came around.”
Due to the lack of pesticides and other chemicals used on the grapes and the environment, natural wine is generally more sustainable and the hope is that it is more beneficial to health. Unfortunately, for the people hopping on the natural wine train for the health benefits, there is actually very little evidence backing that belief.
Andrea made the analogy that it is similar to the whole versus processed foods conversation. She explained that she prefers to eat fewer packaged or processed foods and opts for natural wines as she feels it aligns with her preferences.
“Many conventional wines tend to have many additives, especially things like sugar or sulfur and are overly processed,” she said. “Natural wines do not have additives like added sugar or dyes and depending on your preference or expectation of food and beverage, this may or may not matter to you.”
The term “natural wine” has been shaking the wine industry and not in the most positive way. Even with a non-regulated definition of natural wine, the general idea is that there is little to no intervention in the winemaking process. With this, some leaders in the wine industry believe this is allowing winemakers to put out flawed, poor-quality wine and deem it natural rather than fixing the flaws.
“I see their point,” Andrea said when asked about this. “While I see wine as being on a spectrum and very subjective, I also think some things are pretty objective.”
Winemakers are trained to remove flaws, as well as create an experience specifically related to the location of the wine for people indulging in the drink. Qualities of the environment should be in wine, but natural winemakers might be taking this idea too far.
What does natural wine taste like?
Natural wine is an acquired taste. Many have described natural wine as tasting like “sourdough,” “funky,” and “nothing interesting, nothing special.”
While some people have given strong negative opinions towards the flavors of natural wines they have tried, others have certainly enjoyed what they have indulged in. Content creators have described natural wines as being “perfection,” “juicy” and “summer in a glass.”
“I have tried many beautiful natural wines that do not have flaws or ‘funky’ tasting notes and are often confused with not-natural wines,” Andrea said. “Unfortunately, these ultra funky wines are confusing the average consumer and leading them to believe that flawed wine is what is to be expected.
How has the perception of natural wine changed?
Brands such as Avaline, a zero-sugar organic wine brand, are opting to stay out of the natural wine space and instead be marketed as a “clean wine.”
“It’s not a defined category of wine,” said Helen Johannesen, owner of Helen’s Wines in the Everything is the Best podcast with host Pia Baroncini.
During the episode, Johannesen explains how the lines between wine categories are often blurred by consumers but are carefully treaded by companies. Individuals outside of the wine industry easily misconstrue terms like “natural wine” and place brands such as Avaline into the natural wine space when in reality that is not where they belong. The misconceptions and lack of clarity about what qualifies as a natural wine frustrates individuals within the wine industry.
With the upheaval of opinions surrounding natural wine, the state of the trend may be going downhill and causing spaces such as “clean wine” to arise. Clean wine is another term with no concrete definition yet allows for greater space to fall in a similar realm to natural wine with the inclusion of additives like sulfate.
“‘Clean wine’ is the same as green washing, and some brands are co-opting the aesthetics and buzz words around natural wine to sell a product that doesn’t not fall within the parameters of what most would consider a natural wine,” Andrea said. “Much like the issue with flawed wine vs natural wine, terms like clean wine are [micro]cosims of non-regulation.”