organic ports

[D Lapassion]

Thank you Frederic, I didn't know you were in charge of the Quinta Quevedo. I tasted and enjoyed your wines at Vinexpo Paris 2020. Your answers make me think.
I come back to a statement of Andy's "to make a Port that tastes exactly the same as one not made by organic means" with which I do not agree. In reviewing my notes, Quevedo Ports offer a perfectly identifiable "salinity" and experience shows me that this salinity is very often found in organic wines and for me, it is a marker that allows me to identify organic wines.

[D Lapassion]

Thank you Frederic, I didn't know you were in charge of the Quinta Quevedo. I tasted and enjoyed your wines at Vinexpo Paris 2020. Your answers make me think.
I come back to a statement of Andy's "to make a Port that tastes exactly the same as one not made by organic means" with which I do not agree. In reviewing my notes, Quevedo Ports offer a perfectly identifiable "salinity" and experience shows me that this salinity is very often found in organic wines and that for me, it is a marker that allows me to identify organic wines.

[Glenn E.]

In this case I think they're unrelated. Salinity has been a marker of Quevedo Ports for many people since before they switched to all-organic production.

Also, I hear that term mentioned all the time at tastings even when there are no organic Ports present. Or at least not ones that are officially marked as organic. It's like I mentioned before - most Port could be sold as organic with very little change to the production process. They just don't bother because the certification process is too onerous (and expensive) for the value added. I.e. it isn't worth it.

[Frederick Blais]

Wine is a business, wine industry always created fashions. Now things are moving faster with social media and how trendy things are promoted.

We went to one extreme to another. From super intensive chemical production to highly ''natural'' production. Both have great and extremely bad exemples. I do believe the truth is in between. One thing is sure, we drink wine from grapes, not oak infusion filled with sulfur.

I am not in charge of Quevedo, I simply work there ... I don't think their Ports have salinity, they have a drier style, less alcoholic approach. But we all have our own perception.

[D Lapassion]

here you have an article in French on the characteristics of organic wines.
https://www.larvf.com/,vins-bio-agricul ... 023890.asp
I am translating some passages related to our discussion.

Antoine Gerbelle, one of the best French wine tasters, draws a complete picture of the organic phenomenon.
"The great organic red wines have an extra acidity that gives them a particular balance. Why? Because a vine that has never received potash has a better acidity than a plant saturated with chemical fertilizers to increase its productivity.....
.... Finally, great organic wines often have a slightly lower alcohol level than the average. This temperance, combined with higher acidity, results in better balance....
.... We are no longer talking about volume, fatness, alcohol, sugar, but about sapidity: two or three sips of this wine and there is something left on the palate, like an afterglow, a difference. Perhaps this is the beginning of the definition of the famous minerality of organic wines!
...most experts agree on one fact: when an organic wine is heated, the dry extracts, i.e. the solid residues still present when all the water has evaporated, are more numerous. I think that trace elements also play a role. When the plant works on a great terroir, without additives, it concentrates more trace elements. ....
...When the plant functions on a large untreated and cultivated terroir, it concentrates more dry matter, including minerals. This, I believe, is the secret of the rise in salinity in wines, especially organic ones. I have been feeling this saline touch more for the last five or seven years, especially in white wines. It is new, and yet I have been tasting for more than twenty years....

[Glenn E.]

Except that Port is not French Wine. You are trying to apply reasoning that works - or not, depending on your point of view - for French wine to a product that could hardly be more different. Logic that makes perfect sense for French wine does not make any sense for Port because it's a very different product.

Organic Port doesn't make commercial sense for most producers. That's why so few bother to make it.

[Eric Menchen]

Antoine Gerbelle may be a great wine taster, and maybe something was lost in translation, but I think most of the statements made don't really say anything about organic vs. non-organic wine.

The great organic red wines have an extra acidity that gives them a particular balance. Why? Because a vine that has never received potash has a better acidity than a plant saturated with chemical fertilizers to increase its productivity.....

Potash can definitely affect soil pH, and there are some suggestions that soil pH can affect the acidity level of the wine. But I've have more and less acidic wines from the same soil that suggest to me that weather, fermentation, and other factors can be more important. But most important of all for this discussion, the use of potash does not make a wine organic or not organic. Potash can be produced chemically in a way that it can not be used in organic farming. It also can be obtained from entirely natural organic processes and used in organic farming. And you can make a wine that isn't qualified as organic without using potash depending on the natural soil composition. Places that have been producing wine, like the Douro for Port, have been growing grapes for thousands of years because those places happened to be well suited for growing grapes before we developed modern fertilizers.
https://todayshomeowner.com/organic-sou ... or-garden/

[Eric Menchen]

.... Finally, great organic wines often have a slightly lower alcohol level than the average.

I find this one particularly amusing. I decry the increase in alcohol levels in most wines, which is a phenomena of what, the last 40 years or so? But I'm not sure this is really related to organic vs. non-organic production. Here's a interesting quote from the Organic Wine Company:

Most of our wines contain 12.5% alcohol which is kind of ideal. The difference is not due to organic growing but to the climate/soil combination between Europe and most of the US. Domestic wines and particularly Californian easily reach 14% if not 15%, which is not necessary nor desirable for the wine nor the drinker!

https://www.theorganicwinecompany.com/h ... anic-wine/

And this part about alcohol content really ties in to what Glenn said. We are talking about Port, and guess what, it all has the same level of alcohol, ~20%, organic or otherwise.

And the rest of the stuff about dry extracts, trace elements, etc. also don't really apply to Port, grown in a very specific demarcated region and produced by specific methods. There are lots of solids in Port. Open a bottle of 1970 Taylor and there will be plenty of that. It isn't there because of organic production or not. It is there from foot treading of the wine with the skins and lack of filtration. Trace elements, untreated terroir? Port is required to come from schist soil. You generally aren't even allowed to irrigate. There is a lot of regulation of Port that will produce the the features desired here. Sure, if you want to make wine in northern China (which they are doing, see Red Obsession) you will likely have to resort to inorganic means, and the product may be inferior. But the Douro is far from there.

[Frederick Blais]

here you have an article in French on the characteristics of organic wines.
https://www.larvf.com/,vins-bio-agricul ... 023890.asp
I am translating some passages related to our discussion.

Antoine Gerbelle, one of the best French wine tasters, draws a complete picture of the organic phenomenon.
"The great organic red wines have an extra acidity that gives them a particular balance. Why? Because a vine that has never received potash has a better acidity than a plant saturated with chemical fertilizers to increase its productivity.....
.... Finally, great organic wines often have a slightly lower alcohol level than the average. This temperance, combined with higher acidity, results in better balance....
.... We are no longer talking about volume, fatness, alcohol, sugar, but about sapidity: two or three sips of this wine and there is something left on the palate, like an afterglow, a difference. Perhaps this is the beginning of the definition of the famous minerality of organic wines!
...most experts agree on one fact: when an organic wine is heated, the dry extracts, i.e. the solid residues still present when all the water has evaporated, are more numerous. I think that trace elements also play a role. When the plant works on a great terroir, without additives, it concentrates more trace elements. ....
...When the plant functions on a large untreated and cultivated terroir, it concentrates more dry matter, including minerals. This, I believe, is the secret of the rise in salinity in wines, especially organic ones. I have been feeling this saline touch more for the last five or seven years, especially in white wines. It is new, and yet I have been tasting for more than twenty years....

As much as I am in favor of porper organic farming, I think these arguments are simply fabricated for marketing purposes. I think those who aim for natural easier drinking wine might in general harvest earlier... which ends up with less sugar, less alcohol and automatically more acidity.

Natural wines don't exists withouht any flaws. Too many have the ''dead mouse''character that is unsupportable. Especially in the hot south regions when they do not correct acidity and add a touch of sulfur.

[Glenn E.]

fabricated for marketing purposes

This. "Organic" is primarily a marketing gimmick.

[Eric Ifune]

I think organic viticulture is a positive thing. Not sure, however, if the wines are necessarily better. One can follow organic precepts but not be certified. To me, certification is a marketing thing. Biodynamics is a different thing. Some of my favorite producers are biodynamic, but in their cases, I think it superfluous. High biodiversity in the vineyards is more important for me. This maintains a good soil biome. Monoculture, which occurs in most vineyard areas, does not lend itself to high diversity and the resulting ecosystem is limited, especially with regard to the soil biome. We are finding out more and more that a healthy biome is important.

[Frederick Blais]

Very true Eric, soil has been left aside for so many years as we focused only on the canopy.

As you guys say, the proof is in the pudding. Organic or biodynamic does not automatically yields great wines. Treating well the nature and giving back to it is very important.

[Bert VD]

fabricated for marketing purposes

This. "Organic" is primarily a marketing gimmick.

every country seems to have different rules connected to different terms. apart from the discussions about taste, structure... that in my opinion are not so much related to bio/organic/regular... this is for me a clear example of the difference in (french) official wine categories. it just shows what is allowed in the production of the wines without marketing statements. (you could argue the image itself is a marketing statement and that's probably true )


this can make a difference in environmental impact and also for certain people how their body reacts to the presence or abscence of certain chemicals in the wines.

[Lindsay E.]

Bert,

Where did you find that picture/illustration?