Our Philosophy
Our Philosophy
A wine of terroir is a wine that requires a certain know-how, and therefore a certain technique. It has never been the product of pure empiricism... except in its very first instance, when man discovered, no doubt by chance, how to transform a berry into an intoxicating beverage! A vin de terroir is a wine that gives the place an essential place, going so far as to recognize its originality, its uniqueness, its characteristics, as the key to its taste and its permanence. From this perspective, the winemaker is comparable to a midwife. Wine is the fruit of a fertile mating between a carefully selected soil, sometimes several millennia old, and a winegrower trained in a centuries-old tradition!
With this philosophy of the wine it's the climate, name given to the place carefully delimited by man in Burgundy, region that pushed in its ultimate limit this choice, which guides the spirit and the hand of the winegrower. As Jean-Michel Deiss, an Alsatian winegrower, said loud and clear, The characters obtained, sometimes surprising, are assumed without the «Market» or the dominant taste being considered as a limit to its elaboration. The producer expresses, through the acceptance of these characters, his attachment to the place, to his deep identity and his faith in his product, even if sometimes the characters in question remain mostly misunderstood. The vintner remains in a supply economy.”
In any vineyard that claims to make terroir wines, local wines, the vineyard is increasingly worked in biodynamy, a method of cultivation based on natural products designed to allow the vine to be in good health to face the various and varied hazards of the wine year.
The wine that is born from it is a natural product, the fruit of a fermenting transformation of grapes into wine. In winemaking, only the minimal amount of sulphur is used. Some purists even go so far as to completely dispense with sulphur. However, most of today’s great terroir wines come from winemaking practices and sweet breeding, with a fair use of sulphur. We can speak here of real «Naturality».
Wine of grape variety, technological wine, industrial wine, food
type wine
A thechnological wine is a wine marked with the seal of modern know-how that has made demand, the guide of the production of today’s consumer goods. The human hand is guided by the different techniques developed by researchers to recognize the taste of each sociological, ethnic or cultural group. The various inputs created by industrial chemistry are used to produce food in general and wine in particular. The knowledge of industrialists and technicians in charge of the design of these new agri-food products guides the mind and the hand of farmers and winemakers who have become farmers. It is no longer the place and tradition that prevail, but the manufacturing, breeding and marketing processes that dominate… With this philosophy, we are no longer talking about winemakers, but about “winemakers” and “wine-growers”, engineers trained in universities and engineering schools who compete with audacity in the development and transmission of technical knowledge and chemicals.
In the vineyard, become widespred pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, fertilizers, etc. In the cellars the interventionist oenology replaces the indigenous yeasts by the industrial yeasts. Industrial enzymes and tannins coexist happily with tartaric acid or gum Arabic, supposed to enrich the raw material that is grapes… There are potentially 100 adjuvants available, and probably many more, as is the rule in the food industry in general.
Sulfites
Tout vin contient naturellement des sulfites. De petites quantités d’origine naturelle sont présentes naturellement dans tous les vins (ainsi que d’autres aliments).
Les sulfites synthétiques ajoutés au vin sont utilisés comme un antioxydant de conservation et comme stabilisateur. Les sulfites sont ajoutés au vin sous forme de sels de soufre, de gaz SO2 ou de solutions de dioxyde de soufre. Ils sont couramment utilisés à plusieurs étapes du processus de vinification. Ils peuvent être ajoutés au broyeur lorsque les fruits entrent dans le flux de production et après la fermentation alcoolique primaire, les niveaux finaux sont ajustés avant la mise en bouteille.
En raison de la nature réactive des sulfites libres, la plupart se joignent à d’autres substances dans le vin et deviennent des sulfites « combinés ». Une fois liés, les sulfites ne peuvent être goûtés ou sentis, sauf à des niveaux élevés. Tout sulfite ajouté qui ne réagit pas avec le vin reste « libre ». C’est cette partie « libre » qui fonctionne de protecteur du vin – la partie combiné est inactive.
Ce sont ces molécules libres et réactives qui peuvent être senties et goûtées et qui réagissent avec les tissus sinusaux pour provoquer une réaction aux sulfites.
| Teneur maximale en soufre (mg/L) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SUCRE RÉSIDUEL | Rouge < 2g/L | Rouge entre 2 et 5g/L | Rouge > 5g/L | Blanc et rosé < 2g/L | Blanc et rosé entre 2 et 5g/L | Blanc et rosé > 5g/L | Blanc et rosé > 35g/L | Liquoreux/vin doux naturel > 35g/L | Liquoreux/vin doux naturel > 35g/L | Effervescent < 10g/L | Effervescent > 10g/L |
 | 100 | 120 | 170 | 150 | 170 | 220 | 220 | 170 | 170 | 155 | 155 |
 | 70 | 70 | 130 | 90 | 90 | 130 | 200 | 80 | 80 | 70 | 100 |
| Teneur maximale en soufre (mg/L) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SUCRE RÉSIDUEL | | | |||||||||
| Rouge < 2g/L | 100 | 70 | |||||||||
| Rouge entre 2 et 5g/L | 120 | 70 | |||||||||
| Rouge > 5g/L | 170 | 130 | |||||||||
| Blanc et rosé < 2g/L | 150 | 90 | |||||||||
| Blanc et rosé entre 2 et 5g/L | 170 | 90 | |||||||||
| Blanc et rosé > 5g/L | 220 | 130 | |||||||||
| Blanc et rosé > 35g/L | 220 | 200 | |||||||||
| Liquoreux/vin doux naturel > 35g/L | 170 | 80 | |||||||||
| Liquoreux/vin doux naturel > 35g/L | 170 | 80 | |||||||||
| Effervescent < 10g/L | 155 | 70 | |||||||||
| Effervescent > 10g/L | 155 | 100 | |||||||||
Voici un bref aperçu des quantités maximales de sulfites autorisées dans les différentes catégories de vins. Les sulfites sont mesurés en parties par million, ou ppm.
Trois mythes courants sur les sulfites et le vin
MYTHE : Le vin biologique ne contient pas des sulfites ajoutés.
MYTHE : Les sulfites ajoutés au vin sont un ingrédient naturel.
FAIT : Les sulfites ajoutés sont un ingrédient industriel produit synthétiquement.
MYTHE : Les vins sulfités se conservent mieux que les vins non sulfités.
FAIT : Les vins rouges et blancs biologiques non sulfités peuvent se conserver aussi longtemps que les vins sulfités s’ils sont correctement élaborés.