Bring on the Natural Wines

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/03/t-magazine/food/natural-wines.html

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They’re rowdy, unfiltered and extremely unpredictable. Be prepared to have your mind blown.

When people describe their first encounters with natural wine, it can sound like a conversion experience — or like the euphoria of turning a corner and bumping into a wildly beautiful stranger. For the New York wine director Justin Chearno, what followed when he first dipped into a Lapierre Morgon, an unfiltered red, was an internal shift that changed the way he experienced his favorite drink. From then on, he says, natural wine “became my obsession.”

As is often the case with newfound zealotry, his quest became contagious and all-encompassing. Chearno is now one of the owners of the Four Horsemen, a bar in Brooklyn where natural wines are the main event. His vocabulary has become spiked with odd descriptors like ropiness, mousiness and brettanomyces. Even his wife can no longer drink conventional wine. “I can’t believe you did this to me,” she told him. Chearno has heard the same thing from his customers.

Conventional wines — those that we have drunk our entire lives, and that dominate the menus and shelves of restaurants and stores — can start to seem predictable after a dip into the funkier, cloudier, is-there-a-pasture-in-my-glass surprises of this category. There comes a surprise, too, when you learn what’s in a lot of conventional wines. To achieve the desired flavor, clarity, color and easy drinkability (so that a sauvignon blanc tastes the way a sauvignon blanc is traditionally supposed to, in other words), winemakers commonly add in sulfites, sugars, extra yeasts and fining agents that might be derived from egg whites, volcanic clay or fish bladders. None need to be listed on the bottle. “You can literally manipulate everything about a wine,” says Isabelle Legeron, the author of “Natural Wine” and the first French woman to earn the title of Master of Wine. Her mission, she adds, is to let the world know that most of what we drink is “grape juice and a bunch of other stuff.”

So what qualifies as natural? Either biodynamic or organic farming techniques are a must. There can also be unique approaches to the maceration of grapes and how the wine is aged and stored. But the most prominent signifier of naturalness, and the primary reason many people take their first sip, is the lack of additives. What keeps the sipper sticking around for the party (rather than summoning an Uber and fleeing for the exit), is, of course, taste. And when you leave additives out, that means anything goes, with flavors that can be all over the map. (Many are clear and smooth, but at their most extreme, some could be mistaken for cider or sherry.) That’s the wild trail you set out on when you let nature run its course.

Natural wines can taste tart, dirty, even barnyard-y, and that might be 100 percent intentional. Indeed, such traits may be integral to the beauty of the pour, and this is where the assurances of an expert come in. Without the new breed of sommeliers and shop owners who really know the natural terrain, it can take time to figure out whether a wine seems “off” — or if it actually is.

In downtown Manhattan, at the restaurant Rouge Tomate Chelsea, the sommelier Pascaline Lepeltier is a captivating guide, attuned to factors like the temperature outside as you drink (it makes a difference), the cycles of the moon, the way that being hauled all the way from France or Italy or Spain may have altered the contents of a bottle, the radical fluctuations of wine that’s made when nobody gets in the way. “Natural wines are the toughest to serve in a restaurant because you need to know when not to serve them,” Lepeltier says. “And because every single bottle is its own individual.” Her love affair with natural wines occurred precisely because the vintners have “decided not to hide the imperfections.”

This grape revolution runs in sync, of course, with a concurrent revolution in gastronomy. We’re long past the days when a classic Gallic feast reflexively required bottles of classic Bordeaux and Burgundy; when a night out can go in countless directions — from a New Nordic tasting menu to a Momofuku-style smorgasbord — natural wines lend themselves to the intrinsic flux of all those unexpected flavors. An earthier trend has already established a sturdy beachhead in parts of Europe. Consider Copenhagen: At top restaurants like Noma, Amass, 108, Relae, Kodbyens Fiskebar and Manfreds, you are unlikely to be poured anything besides natural wines. In the United States growth has been slower, but purveyors and proselytizers are now cropping up across the country — in restaurants, shops and bars in Los Angeles, Detroit, Houston, New Orleans and Boston. (Legeron’s annual Raw Wine Fair will plant its stakes in America for the first time in early November, uncorking the new gospel in Brooklyn.)

At the critically celebrated side-by-side restaurants Wildair and Contra on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, regulars know the secret weapon is Jorge Riera, a man whose glass-by-glass selections can make him seem more telepath than mere wine director. He’ll be the first one to tell you that a wine is not automatically good just because it’s natural. He sees his job as introducing you to what is good as well as what’s good for you. “I gauge everyone,” Riera says. “If they say, ‘I want something crazy and weird,’ I ask, ‘What do you mean by crazy and weird?’ Because what’s crazy and weird for me might not be the same for you.”

What he’s really looking for is a certain flare of light in the eyes. “When a person seems open, I go there with them,” he says. He’s not just talking about wine; he’s talking about consciousness itself. He makes a selection. He pours. He watches. “All of a sudden,” he says, “they’ve been transformed.”

Recommended by Contra sommelier Jorge Riera.

LAUREANO SERRES-MONTAGUT, Mendall, Abeurador 2015, from Terra Alta in Tarragona, Catalonia. “A brilliant expression of Macabeu, with a long-lasting finish. It’s a macerated white, with about a week of skin contact, which explains the turbidity in the glass. You never want to stop drinking this.”

ESCODA-SANAHUJA, Els Bassots 2007, from Conca de Barberà in Tarragona, Catalonia. “A signature white made of Chenin, which is rare for Spain. Bracing with acidity and deep minerality.”

VINCENT MARIE, DOMAINE NO CONTROL, Magma Rock 2015, from Auvergne, France. “This is a favorite region of mine, and Vince does lovely wines. This one, a Gamay, is round and soft — just goes down!”

GABRIO BINI, Az. Agr. Serraghia, Rosso Fanino 2012, from Pantelleria, Italy. “Gabrio is a legend! This is a blend of red and white grapes, 50 percent Pignatello and 50 percent Catarratto. It’s full of minerals and very delicately perfumed.”

TOM LUBBE, DOMAINE MATASSA, Brutal 2015, from Côtes Catalanes in Languedoc-Roussillon, France. “Another Macabeu with fresh fleshy fruits and supple tannins. Easy drinking.”

ACI URBAJS, Modri Pinot 2007, from Rifnik, Slovenia. “One of the gems on Wildair’s list — a Pinot Noir brimming with beautiful ripe fruits and a long finish.”