Organic Wines Uncorked: Rutherford AVA - The AVA With the Most Certified Organic Vintners?

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Rutherford AVA - The AVA With the Most Certified Organic Vintners?

I'm heading up to the Rutherford Dust Society tasting (a press event) at Beaulieu today to sample the wines of this renowned Napa region, located just north of the Oakville AVA and just south of St. Helena AVA.

To see this map bigger, click here.

It's home to some of the most historic vineyards in the valley - Inglenook, the George de Latour vineyard (part of Beaulieu today, but alas, not organic), and others. And it's still home to some of the greatest names in wine today: DANA, whose wines received 100 points from Robert Parker and Staglin Family, another supersonic scorer.

André Tchelistcheff, the French-educated Napa
pied piper who led the valley on the path
to great winemaking liked Rutherford's red
soils so much he coined the famous and
often repeated observation, "It takes
Rutherford Dust to make great Cabernet."
Of course, others would dispute that today,
but Rutherford can be a hallmark of high quality.

I've been looking at the society's detailed map showing (almost) all of the vineyard names in the AVA and noticing that a large number of organic vintners in Napa are from this region. (You can purchase a print version of the map online if you're interested - or buy it in Napa). Specifically the following vineyards are certified organic:
Caspar Estate
Chavez and Leeds (sells grapes to Frogs Leap)
DANA Estates
Flora Springs
Frogs Leap
Grgich Hills (biodynamic)
Hall
Heitz Cellars (mostly organic)
Inglenook
Long Meadow Ranch
Neal Family Vineyards
Peju (partially organic)
Raymond (partially biodynamic)
Staglin Family
Tres Sabores

Usually in a tasting event, there are just a few organically grown wines I can find. So it's a pleasure to contemplate going to a tasting that, uniquely, has this high a percentage of wines grown from organic vines.

If you're interested in tasting Rutherford wines, the Rutherford Dust Society will be holding its annual Rutherford Block Party Sunday August 4. It's open to the public. Tickets are $45 and may be obtained online here.

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Wines We Cover

We publish information about wines grown from certified organic or Biodynamic vineyards that are generally made with sulfites (which are usually added in small amounts to preserve the wine).

That includes these certification types:

ORGANIC WINE CERTIFICATIONS

• Made with Organic Grapes

Vineyards: certified organic

Vinification: less than 100 ppm of sulfites (i.e. a normal range)

Winery: certified organic facility

Labeling: front or back label

• Ingredients: Organic Grapes

Vineyards: certified organic

Vinification: up to 350 ppm of sulfites (same as for any non organic wine)

Labeling: back label only

BIODYNAMIC® CERTIFICATIONS

• Biodynamic Wine

Vineyards: certified biodynamic

Yeasts: native

Vinification: less than 100 ppm of sulfites; no additives of any kind

Winery: certified biodynamic facility

Labeling: front or back label; Demeter logo may appear

• Made with Biodynamic Grapes

Vineyards: certified biodynamic

Yeasts: native or organic

Vinification: less than 100 ppm of sulfites; limited number of additives permitted

Winery: certified biodynamic facility

Labeling: front or back

Note: unlike organically grown wines, for which there is a category called "Ingredients: Organic Grapes," wines sourced from biodynamic grapes may not make any biodynamic claim on the bottle label. Bottle labeling is reserved for Demeter certified wines only.

SULFITES IN CONTEXT

According to U.C. Davis, the average among all wines in the U.S. (as well as globally) is 80 ppm.

WHAT THE USDA CALLS ORGANIC WINES

Unlike any other nation, the U.S. oddly imposes a no sulfite restriction on wines in order for them to be called Organic Wine. These wines are also called NSA or NAS wines (which stands for "No Sulfites Added" or "No Added Sulfites.")

From the above description, one can see that there are in fact three types of organically grown wines:

1. Organic Wine (less than 15% of all organically grown wine)

2. Made with Organic Grapes

3. Ingredients: Organic Grapes

The vast majority of wines from organic grapes are labeled Made with Organic Grapes, Ingredients: Organic Grapes or are blended with nonorganic grapes and unlabeled.

Fine winemakers do not generally make wine without sulfites and a number of large wine retailers like BevMo do not sell wine in the category of "USDA Organic Wine."

With rare exceptions, this blog does not cover what the USDA calls "Organic Wine."

We are hopeful that the USDA will revise the categorization of organically grown wines and make NSA or NAS wines a category of their own.

This would put the U.S. in accord with the rest of the world, where "Organic Wine" means a wine from certified grapes made within limits on sulfites (generally under 100-150 ppm).

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Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Rutherford AVA - The AVA With the Most Certified Organic Vintners?

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