Organic Wine Company Also Does Vegan
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 05.30.05
Here’s a company that obviously enjoys their work. And they seem to have been doing so for 25 years, when they began importing organic wine to the US. Now their selection includes local wine, alongside that of France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and New Zealand. Being organic wines they are free of synthetic agricultural chemicals. Why? Well, as EcoWine (as they are also known) say: “Make no mistake, grapes are one of the most heavily sprayed crops around. When pesticides are sprayed on the grape skins to protect them from disease, they end up as residue in the wine (by being washed from the grapes as they are pressed or put in the vat). And then there are the systemic pesticides which are sprayed on the ground, absorbed by the vine roots, end up in the grape pulp, and therefore inevitably as residue in the wine.”
The sort of residue your delicate system could well do without. Of course, avoiding such toxic ingredients is more labor-intensive and might cost an average 20% more per unit, but isn’t your health and that of the land worth it? And what of the all important taste. Mmmm. Again we quote: “.... many organic vineyards harvest by hand, rather than using mechanical pickers. This allows only the ripest and healthiest bunches to be picked, with the minimum amount of stress to the vine, fruit or soil.”
They even do Vegan wines that are devoid of animal products, which apparently are often used to clear or ‘fine’ wine by attracting cloudy matter from the mix. Egg whites, egg albumin, casein, chitin, gelatin and isinglass can be used for this purpose but in EcoWines Vegan labelled tipples these are eschewed, in favour of mineral clays and the like. Check out their cellars at :: EcoWine [by WM]
