Super article here Restaurant wine lists too trendy
Reminds me of a situation last year when my father rang me and asked for my recommendations from a Melbourne wine list in a trendy restaurant that he was set to visit. Of over 200 listings I only recognised 4 wines, and I know a little bit about wine.
Is this a global phenomenon?
I can’t wait for the the cult of biodynamics to disappear so that we can progress to environmentally beneficial agriculture without the weight of superstitious new age bullshit behind it. That’s all I can take from the article, but I may be biased.
Its interesting that both DRC and Dujac did test with biodynamic viticulture and felt the results were convincing enough to embrace the methodologies across the board. Ignoring the new age aspects of it, there was to be some merit.
And of course Leroy’s fanaticism on the subject.
I do not find it particularly interesting nor incredible that vineyards/wineries with proven track records for producing some of the world’s best wines felt there was merit in what is best described as a large scale placebo effect. I applaud their efforts for making the best wines they possibly can and for pursuing sustainable, environmentally friendly practices. I do not, however, endorse astrology, eugenics, nor any other mystical voodoo that Mr. Steiner espoused.
Have you considered the possibility that the viticultural attention to detail that biodynamics requires might have merit even if some of the metphysical stuff is not relevant? If straight shooters like guys at Dujac feel its worth their while then Im not going to write off the methodology completely even though I don’t feel any connection to Steiner’s religious beliefs.
I didn’t know she was biodynamic but Im not surprised at all.
Oh, c’mon, Berry! They’re really just rubes who are being sucked in by the placebo effect. Clearly they have no clue what they’re doing. ![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}
I consider viticultural attention to detail as having merit, just as I consider enological attention to detail as having merit. I understand the desire to attribute merit to a system of belief such as biodynamics because of the positive consequences of certain aspects of that belief. But I know that in order to truly progress in anything humankind must recognize what is wholly true and not simply partially true. That is to say that while there may be certain beneficial effects of biodynamic viticulture and enology, those beneficial effects can be isolated and recognized and the chaff - the bullshit, if we’re being honest - can be ignored.
Lalou is the godmother of byodynamic in Burgundy. From Leroy’s website:
In 1988 she founded Domaine Leroy by purchasing, for Leroy, the estates of Charles Noellat at Vosne-Romanée and of Philippe-Rémy at Gevrey-Chambertin. In total Domaine Leroy now has 21 hectares, 99 ares, 66 centiares.
She immediately began biodynamic cultivation on all the vineyards. From her profound belief that everything is alive: the soil, the grounds, plants, “…as alive as animals and humans…”, she immediately stopped using any products with synthetic chemicals on the vines. From September 1988, all the vines are completely and entirely cultivated under biodynamic principles.
Biodynamic farming—which is not simply a farming method or a trendy commercial practice, but a holistic system, from beginning to end–does not allow any chemical fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, or pesticides (according to Lalou Bize-Leroy, “all these things kill the life in both the plants and the soil”). Biodynamic farming views nature as a holistic interconnected system; it introduces and incorporates the knowledge of astrological and cosmic influences and its effects on the vines in order to care for them, repair the soil, work the soil, for the care given to the vines all year long, and for the care and methods to create the wines and ultimately until it is put in the bottle at Vosne-Romanée.
I will posit that many very intelligent people have fallen prey to much less believable placebo effects… or whatever you want to call them… than biodynamics. There are, at a quick count via wikipedia, 18 major world religions not counting those who consider themselves “non-religious” in some way. I would imagine some of those people are simultaneously very intelligent, good at what they do, and wrong.
I have no real interest in debating this. But I will say one more thing about Leroy. It may not be because of biodynamic. But she is absolutely taking terroir that’s not exalted – Pommard Vignots, Nuits Bas de Combe, Auxey (d’Auveney) – and making breathtaking wines, no doubt due to spectacularly accomplished winemaking practices. No one can know how much if any of that is due to the fact that she’s biodynamic, but it’s certainly relevant that she’s been doing it since 1988, and that DRC has now joined too.
I think it is fantastic that she is making outstanding wines. I think it is fantastic that she is doing so in an environmentally friendly way. What I feel that too many people do not address is that you can do these things without consulting an astrological calendar. Making wine and enjoying wine, while there may be basic objective measures to a wine’s quality, are ultimately very personal and intimate things. The human senses of smell and taste are very poorly developed compared to our other senses. (I cannot recall a direct source for this so I would welcome a correction.)
Because of the personal and intimate nature of both tasting and making wine, I believe that people who are very good at doing just that - both tasting and making wine - can be fooled by practices that have no basis in scientific reality. Neither eugenics nor astrology have scientific foundations. People believe in them for a variety of reasons but none of these reasons are scientifically verifiable. Biodynamics is bullshit not because every bit of it is bullshit, but because a significant portion of it is bullshit - and without that portion, it’s no longer Biodynamics.
I agree with 99% of you say. I guess my only position is that, as a drinker, all I care is that the best wines are produced. I don’t particularly care whether winemakers believe in astrology or not, but if that leads them to follow the good biodynamic principles, that’s all good with me. Whatever it takes to get the best wine in the bottle.
Well modern crop-science [clonal selection] is 100% eugenics.
And the anti-crop-science luddism [of preserving and propagating ancient grape varietals] is its own form of eugenics, just heading off into a slightly different [non-patentable] direction.
True anti-eugenicism would allow a vintner to only pluck grapes off of wild vines growing 75 feet up in the air on the canopy of the forest.
Biodynamie comprises a mix of scientifically valid and astrological/mythical techniques. I’m convinced that the quality improvements associated with biodynamie can be explained by the scientifically valid things that are done to improve the health of the vineyard, and that the wines would be just as good without the astrological/mythical components. But if someone wants to do both, fine by me. It’s what’s in the bottle that counts. The same goes for new technologies like spinning cones or reverse osmosis, as long as the end result is good wine.
Eugenics, as a matter of defintion, has nothing to do with breeding crops, livestock, pigeons, flowers or anything else non-human. It is the belief in improving the human gene pool by selective reproduction and elimination. I don’t know that Steiner has anything to do with it either.
With regard to the benefits that accrue to biodynamie from those aspects of it that lead to better vineyard practices, since the practices, if they work, should be justifiable by the usual biological explanations, the fact that biodynamie happens to support them amounts to a coincidence. The center of the practice is voodoo science.
Lots of voodoo science does uncover things that real scientific practices do not because the justificatory practices of science slow down (and rightly so) the acceptance of theory as proven. In this sense, they can be accidentally beneficial. It doesn’t stop them from being voodoo science.
it is great to be biodynamic if you own a monopole or Clos. But when you have two rows of vines here and three rows there, and are surrounded by other vignerons who fertilize and spray insecticides, the “secondhand smoke” is almost as “dangerous” as if you smoked, too.
I have read Rudolf Steiner’s work and find it interesting with a true connection to the earth, but the reality in viticulture is not as pure as one might be led to believe.
Great post.
Guys, the main bitch in the article in the OP is that there are too many NON Australian wines on the lists, the bits about biodynamie and orange wines are just asides.
The guy does seem to have a bit of “Oh, I don’t recognize any of the bands on the radio these days and…YOU…KID…get off my lawn!” about him though.
He’s pissed because Jacob’s Creek wines aren’t on the list of a fancy upscale joint???