On the Fifth Day of Christmas, My True Love Sent to Me: Five Organic Wine Guides
DaVero biodynamic farm saves seeds in this barn.
On the Fifth Day of Christmas, My True Love Sent to Me:
The fifth day of Christmas is today, December 29. It’s also the day for St Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury in the 12th century who was murdered on this day in 1170 for challenging the King’s authority over the Church.
Sounds a bit like organic and biodynamic farmers challenging the petrochemical laden establishment!
Animals like this pig are part of a biodynamic farm including this one at DaVero near Healdsburg.
My favorite authority when it comes to wine guides is Pam Strayer, and fortunately instead of FIVE GOLDEN RINGS, my true love sent to me FIVE ORGANIC WINE GUIDES by biodynamic wine expert Pam Strayer.
The guides cover four organic regions on the west coast, and the fifth guide is all about biodynamic wine.
Why are guides like this valuable and important?
Because even if you THINK you’re buying an organic or biodynamic wine, unless you see the certification on the bottle, it may not be!
About half of the fine wine wineries with certified organic vines also make wine from grapes grown with pesticides. While you might ASSUME because their estate wines are organic that the other wines are also, you’d probably be wrong , Pam told me in a recent email interview.
A BETTER ME AND A BETTER WE in 2021?
If this is one of your new year resolutions, there’s only one place on the internet to find organically or biodynamically grown wines from fine wine producers where only wines from certified vines are included: Pam Strayer’s Wine Country Geographic where you’ll find links to five different guides to help you get in your glass organic and biodynamic wine:
- Biodynamic® Wines & Vines
- Organically Oregon
- Organically Sonoma
- Organically Napa
- Organically Central Coast
Back in 2010, Pam started studying chemical use in vineyards, and she was shocked to see that wine grapes were being grown with such toxic materials.
Those producers using those chemicals including carcinogens, reproductive toxins and more “were among the loudest voices in the so-called sustainability movement,” she says. “No one was looking at the pesticide use records the state of California collects. So these marketers were doing a lot fake green marketing.”
Pesticides and toxic herbicides like Roundup that get sprayed on and around vines end up in wine. “We now have high tech mass spectrometry that shows us that conventional and sustainable wines have as much as 500-1000% more pesticide residues in them compared to organic or biodynamically grown wine,” writes Pam. “The latest science shows us these herbicides are are linked to cancer and liver diseases. And then there’s the fungicides: bee and bird toxins, neurotoxins and more. They’re in the wine, too. But only in the conventional and “sustainable” wines.”
In addition to being wines for a better WE, these wines are better for ME. In addition to being better for a healthy planet and the people who grow the grapes, they’re better tasting too:
“What has amazed me is how incredible the wines from wineries with organic vineyards are.”
Because while producing organic wine and getting certified is more expensive, most producers do it because they have a passion for the product and for the planet– not because they can make an extra buck.
“These sites are must have resources for all wine lovers who are concerned about greenwashing and want to know what wines are produced with certified organic or biodynamic grapes.”
Monty Waldin, author of numerous books on organic and biodynamic wines writes “Pam Strayer’s coverage of organic, biodynamic and natural wines stateside is based on rigorous research into individual wineries’ wine growing and winemaking practices.”
Mention Wine Predator to get all five guides for the price of four!
That’s a savings of $25 a year.
Read the original post on this at Wine Predator.
A small gazebo in the garden holds tastings at DaVero. Read more about DaVero and my visit to Healdsburg here.
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