Well, what a massively disappointing budget for the pub trade, brewers and pubgoers alike in the UK. George Osbourne upheld the excise duty escalator (as put in place by the former Labour government) which will have disastrous effects on the industry and actually bring in less revenue for the treasury! It is estimated 10,000 jobs will be lost across the industry from breweries to pubs, so that’s another 10,000 people on benefits too! If they all receive £10,000 in mixed benefits (jobseekers allowance, housing etc.) that is an extra £100 million a year out of the taxpayers’ pockets! Not to mention the loss of revenue from 10,000 people who were actually paying into the system with national insurance and PAYE!

There were parts of the budget which seemed quite good on the surface with some free thnking ideas, such as the reduction of corporation tax. To some this would appear to be giving big companies a tax break, but in reality most small businesses are also limited companies who pay corporation tax, so this is putting more money back into their business which they can hopefully use to invest in themselves.  Cutting taxes encourages people to work harder as they get to keep more of the rewards for themselves.

Increasing taxes such as excise duty – which also has VAT charged on top! – will only penalise already struggling businesses. Historically every time the treasury has increased excise duty they have actually received less money as people consume less. It is estimated this duty rise will reduce their income by £40 million in the coming year – plus another £8 million in VAT of course.  So by my reckoning that makes us £148 million worse off, with more people out of work and more UK manufacturing lost.

So why have they done it?

The supermarkets regularly sell alcohol way below cost, make a loss and claim VAT and tax relief on the loss. They don’t care what products they use as loss leaders as they can make the difference up on another product. After all they now sell food, booze, TVs, fridges, homeware, clothes, insurance, mobile phones, garden sheds…… the list is endless. Pubs on the other hand have one main product – alcohol, with some doing food or accomodation. Increasing excise duty will hammer the already suffering pubs who have no other income stream to switch to. 25 a week closed last year, and we can expect that to increase dramatically this year. The government had the chance to rebalance the regulated on-trade and the unregulated off-trade sale of alcohol with the recent proposed minimum pricing scheme. They buckled under pressure from the supermarkets and came up with a minimum pricing structure which is completely useless and ineffective. They could have simply brought in a new tax on the sale of alcohol for off premise consumption which would have brought in hundreds of millions of pounds for the treasury and protected the 10,000 pub related jobs that are now under threat. Not to mention cleaned up the anti social behaviour on our streets, and relieved the pressure on the NHS and police. Instead they have backed the duty escalator which will cost us another £148 million per year!

The supermarkets will be delighted by this duty increase – it will further damage the pub industry and give a greater market share to them. But what does the UK government get out of it? Perhaps they believe we have too many pubs. Close another 10,000 and with the new legislation to sidestep local planning for change of use on it’s way, they could be turned into affordable housing?

The current government contains some of the most intelligent ministers we’ve seen in 15 years. I can only presume they have some end goal in mind – or is it just one sector they’re not interested in, and they genuinely have scored a huge own goal? I sincerely hope not, but right now I’m not convinced. I welcome any comment from anybody who can shed some light on this financial suicide.

Well it has hit the headlines again today – the UK Government’s underhand headline grabber which will have absolutely no benefits on all the things they claim to be aiming to improve! 6 different Medical bodies have slammed the plans for a completely useless minimum pricing structure, and have withdrawn their support for the Government on the issue.  So what is the Government’s motivation behind this shady deal?

The Issue

Of course all of us resposible drinkers would love to be able to save a few pounds on a bottle of  our favourite wine, or a pack of beer - so why should we be in favour of a minimum pricing structure?

The issue is two pronged. Firstly the health implications (and the cost of, estimated to be £23 billion), and the late night trouble caused by excessive drinking.

Secondly the demise of the local Bristish pub, being forced out of business by a combination of inept, greedy pub companies, excessive taxation from the government and stealth tactics from the supermarkets who see the opportunity to completely dominate the drinks industry in the UK – including the wholesale supply to pubs, hotels and restaurants. Yes, that’s right – your friendly Tesco is aiming to dictate which wines you will be able to order in your local restaurant! Now, that’s a terrifying thought!

What is wrong with the current system?

By far the biggest problem we have is the supermarkets and multiple retailers, who discount alcohol way below cost price to attract customers. This means that super cheap booze is widely available. In real terms alcoholic drinks have never been so affordable. As the supermarkets do not make a profit on these items they do not pay any VAT on these sales . The supermarkets also do not pay any corporation tax on these sales either, in fact they claim tax relief on the loss they make on these below cost drinks! So the Inland Revenue actaully loses out twofold by allowing this to happen. We all know the supermarkets already sidestep paying the taxes small businesses have to pay, by employing only part time staff so they do not need to pay employer’s national insurance contributions, and the employees themselves don’t earn enough to pay income tax or national insurance, and in fact get top up benefits paid for by us the taxpayer!

The drinking culture has changed in recent years, and the youth of today all “pre-load” – the new term for buying from the supermarket and getting tanked up at home before going out to the pub or club. Combined with the relaxation of the licensing hours, this has had a disastrous effect on the pub industry. Our daughter’s age group would happily booze the evening away getting ready and not even go out till nearly midnight, then expect a pub licensee to keep open all night while they spread the night out with the couple of drinks they could afford. If there’s any trouble it’s the licensee who gets the blame, although all the boozing has been done at home or in the park!

If the supermarkets (and other retailers) were forced to sell alcohol – a controlled drug – at reasonable prices similar to those in the pub, people would actually go out for a drink and enjoy the evening (hopefully fairly responsibly) rather than cram in loads of cheap booze first in private, then all spill onto the streets late at night already inebriated. Quite simply they would not be able to afford to drink so much so regularly and would benefit from a health perspective, the NHS and Police would benefit from less costs, and the streets would be a less unpleasant and hostile environment late at night.

What has the Government proposed?

The Government consulted all the major health bodies and “business” to find a solution. However in the end they completely ignored all the medical advice under pressure from the supermarkets. On the news they will tell you it was pressure from the drinks industry – it is not! The drinks industry will sell alcohol through the on-trade (pubs, clubs, restaurants) or off-trade (shops, internet etc) so either route to market will work for them. Quite simply the supermarkets are now so powerful they can tell the Government what to do!

It was recommended that a minimum unit price for alcohol of 50p be introduced. Instead the Government has said that retailers should not be able to sell alcohol below cost – defined as the “cost of VAT plus excise duty” which is bullshit. What about the cost of raw materials, production, packaging, labelling, transport, producer’s margin, retailer’s margin? It works out as low as 21 pence per unit, and will have absolutely no effect on sales whatsoever. The research company Assossia did some work on this and calculated how many deals would be affected. They studied 3667 alcohol price deals on offer in the supermarkets. How many do you think would be affected by these proposed new regulations? NONE! Not one single offer. So what is the point of paying the massive costs and wasting vast amounts of time and resources on research to bring in legislation which will never even be used?

As long as the supermarkets can dictate to industry and government we will have more of the same in the UK. More anti social behaviour on the streets, more stress on the police and NHS, more law abiding, tax paying pubs going to the wall, more mass produced bottles of chemicals labelled as wine sold to us through all routes.  And less – less VAT paid by the supermarkets, less tax paid by the supermarkets, less national insurance paid by the supermarkets, less real jobs which contribute to the economy, and more bullshit part time jobs which actually drain the economy. This Government isn’t stupid. So what is their motivation? I welcome any answers you may have!

And if you’re a part time worker in a supermarket, I’m not having a go at you. I’m having a rant at the supermarket itself. They should be giving you a full time job with full time pay and contributing to the UK economy like other businesses have to.

Not an easy headline to understand so here’s the explanation. Congratulations to Dave Lang of the Forge Brewery in Hartland, for his recent success at the Society for Independent Brewer’s 2011 UK Champion Beer Awards.

The winners of the regional heats were all submitted in their relevant categories through to the national final. The Forge Brewery Lighthouse Ale won the gold medal in the Best Bitter 4.1 to 4.5% abv for the South West Region, plus Champion beer across all categories for the show. Quite incredible for a brewery built by Dave himself by hand 3 years ago in an old shed at the back of his house.

Well he had repeated success at the national finals with the Silver Medal in the same category – the 2nd best Best Bitter in the whole of the UK! Bowland Brewery from Clitheroe took the Gold Medal in this category with their Admiral Bitter, which also took the Silver Medal for overall champion, with the Gold Medal going to a mild from Cotswold Spring Brewery. Congratulations to both of them.

Why are we focussing on the Forge brewery rather than either of these two? Simply because the Forge is a one man operation, not an established company with staff and state of the art equipment. Dave even designed and built his own refrigeration system and cask washer equipment. He does everything himself by hand, working flat out seven days a week. This is just such a remarkable achievement from one man passionate about producing a quality product through sheer hard physical work and dedication – something we have always championed in the wine world. To go up against every other brewer in the UK  including multi million pound operations such as St Austell, J W Lees, Robinsons, Shepherd Neame…..(the list is endless) and win the silver medal, is just fantastic. Dave’s beers are all natural too. Unlike the big operators Dave doesn’t add artificial preservatives to his beer, so hangovers are also rare – I know, I drank 10 pints of Hartland Blonde in one sitting and awoke as fresh as a daisy!

The bad news though is his beer was very difficult to get hold of outside the North Devon area as he simply couldn’t keep up with demand. Now with this award, it’s going to be more in demand than ever. If you’re lucky enough to pass through the area this summer keep an eye out as his beers are in the majority of the best pubs in the area. The Lighthouse is well worth a try if you get chance (obviously) but so are his other beers, and he already has other medal winners too.

Check out his website for more details.

Carlo’s Restaurant - technically Italian cuisine – is undoubtedly the best seafood and steak restaurant in Llandudno, and probably all of North Wales. Carlo only buys the best produce – wild seabass (not farmed), Conwy mussels, Anglesey king scallops – not the little tiddly ones you will pay through the nose for in London! Their Gamberoni (king prawns) are simply stunning! He applies the same strict quality controls to his meats too and buys extra mature Welsh Black fillet direct from the abatoir when so may restaurants are downgrading to cheaper cuts like ribeye. This is why the restaurant is so busy and booking is essential on a weekend and recommended even on a Tuesday in February! Oh, I nearly forgot, their homemade garlic bread is just incredible – what a difference to the cheap ready made ones his competitors use! It’s these little touches that make all the difference.

Having holidayed in Capetown for the last three Januarys he was very impressed, and inspired by the restaurants out there. Firstly their fair pricing policies – wine in a restaurant is not much more expensive than in a bottle shop. In the UK we’re accustomed to the restaurant multiplying the cost of the wine by 4 then adding the VAT! Carlo doesn’t use multipliers, he just charges a fair price, and this makes his more expensive wines in particular great value. This way he sells two bottles where a more expensive restaurant may only sell one – he makes more money and the customer gets better value, if slightly more tipsy! So simple but why don’t other restaurants do it?

Secondly he was so impressed by the quality of the top end South African wines that he has added to his superb Italian range (including half a dozen Amarones)  by introducing some top end, boutique New World wines from South Africa, Argentina, Chile, New Zealand and even a couple from Australia.

He now stocks some of the very best wines from these countries including Zevenwacht, Jean Daneel, Cape Point and Jordan from South Africa – all heavily awarded by John Platter. Tapiz, Benegas Lynch, Susana Balbo and Eral Bravo from Argentina – Gold Medal winning wines as featured at the Gaucho Grill. Morton Estates from New Zealand including Decanter’s “Best Chardonnay in the World” two years running – their stunning Coniglio 2002, exceptionally rare!

There are many restaurants struggling in the current economic slowdown. Perhaps they should take note of somebody thinking outside the box and introducing something different like the new world wines at Carlo’s, priced sensibly to give great value for money. If it works in sunny Llandudno on the Welsh Riviera, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t work across the rest of the country! We’re all watching our spending, but that doesn’t mean we’re not spending, we’re just selective where we spend it! Give us great food, great wine, throw in a good family atmosphere, friendly efficient service and top it off with great value prices and you’ve got the recipe for success - particularly in this economic climate as there are fewer customers to go round, and they will go to the better restaurants first!

Sulphite free wines and low sulphur wines have seen a sharp increase in demand globally over the last 12 months. As more and more people are educating themselves through the internet, they’re discovering that they are not alone in experiencing unpleasant symptoms when consuming various alcoholic drinks which are pumped full of chemicals - sulphur in particular. And as awareness of the problem is growing, they’re finding the solution is becoming more readily available with websites like www.goodwineonline.co.uk specialising in low sulphur and sulphite free wines.

Sulphur has been used for thousands of years as a preservative in wine. However in recent years with the advent of globalisation and factory production on a massive scale, it was perceived by the powers that be in these big companies that there was a need for a very effective preservative, an anti oxidant, to prevent products from spoiling before they could get to market. So sulphites were produced to be added to a vast array of foods from freshly caught prawns, to sausages, dried fruits, crisps, processed ready meals right through the spectrum to include mass produced alcoholic drinks, including wines.

In theory this seemed like a good idea. However as the supermarkets have consistently applied pressure on producers to reduce prices and forced them to use cheaper and cheaper ingredients, the addition of chemical preservatives has got higher and higher. Now cheap wine is more chemical solution than grape juice.

Unfortunately it is only in the last ten years that people have started to realise these sulphites can be potentially hazardous to their health. I’m not talking just about those of us who suffer from an allergy to sulphites which is potentially fatal, but the damage they’ve been causing to us all, over the years as they’re in most of the products we eat and drink on a regular basis.

Asthma rates in “developed” countries where these sulphites are used have soared to over 30% in children since the 1970s when they were at 2%. In “undeveloped” countries where they don’t use these artificial preservatives the asthma rate in children is still 2%. Throat and stomach cancers are hugely on the increase in developed countries too. These chemicals in our foods have been slowly poisoning us for years. I’ve heard from a lot people in their 30s who have sudenly started reacting to certain things like wine, which they have always been able to drink before. Give them a sulphite free wine and suddenly they are able to drink it without any adverse reaction! I believe our bodies can only tolerate a certain amount of toxins, and over time we get “full”. Our bodies then start telling us to stop imbibing these chemicals – in a variety of unpleasant ways!

The Centre for Scientific Research in the Public Interest recommended banning sulphites in the 1970s – but were suitably ignored of course. Last year (2010) the World Health Organisation recommended “phasing them out”. Phasing them out??? Why? If they’re not bad for you, why get rid of them? If they are admitting they are bad for you, gradually phasing them out isn’t the answer – stop poisoning people now!

So the lucky people who are aware of the problem can make an informed choice and search out natural products like sulphur free or very low sulphur wines, and foods of course. There’s a big increase in demand for organic foods and fresh produce rather than the processed rubbish we’ve been buying for years.

Certain winemakers are now reconsidering the sulphur they’ve been adding to preserve their wines. It seemed the perfect solution to ensuring their quality wines remained in good condition, but they are now being made aware that this sulphur is actually bad for us in large amounts. Most good winemakers use it in moderation. Unfortunately the cheap mass produced wines are pumped full of it as the base wine is such poor quality in the first place, so there isn’t likely to be any change here.

The UK has just seen the launch of the first dedicated low sulphur wine brand – SoLo S02 with their first wine “Navitas”. It’s a red blend from the Rhone Valley and is not just low in sulphur but technically sulphite free. It’s also a lovely wine in it’s own right, soft, fresh and smooth with good fruit and a very clean finish. If you want to cut out these artificial preservatives I suggest you treat yourself to a few bottles of this – not only is it delicious, you won’t get that nasty chemical hangover either!

The sulphite free wine movement is gaining more and more momentum globally these days as the consumer is beginning to realise the health benefits of drinking well made healthy wines. There are up to 80 different chemicals permitted to be added to your wine, many of which can have negative effects on your health. Sulphites in particular have been linked to stomach and throat cancer, and are ‘hugely influential’ in the rapid increase in asthma. In “3rd world” countries where they don’t use sulphites asthma rates in children are around 2%. In “developed” countries where these sulphites are added to a vast array of foods and drinks, asthma rates in children have increased from 2% in the 1970s to nearly 40% these days. Well made good red wines contain natural anti oxidants (as opposed to massive doses of sulphites in cheap wines) which combat free radicals in the body actively reducing the risks of cancer. In fact according to renowned physician Dr Phillip Norrie, good red wine drunk in moderation is extremely beneficial to a person’s health, and people who regularly drink good red wine are less likely than those who don’t, to die of any cause. Crack a bottle now!

We’re delighted to have discovered a family owned winery in Chile just outside Santiago called Teillery who were Chile’s first certified organic winery. They’ve gone one step further this year with the first release of Chile’s only ‘no added sulphur’ wine. Chile is well known for giving us affordable mass produced wines which have traditionally been high in sulphites, although they do also produce a few world class wines too, particularly Cabernet Sauvignons and red blends. So we applaud Teillery for their bold move away from the norm toward producing pure wines.

Mr Teillery has been studying and researching production methods to make no added sulphur wines for the last 30 years plus. He owns several successful businesses including orchards and has now finally realised his dream buying the winery a few years ago and producing his own no added sulphur wine. There are several producers in Australia and South Africa who make no added sulphur wines, and while some of them are ok, many of them are terrible such as the Stellar Organics range from South Africa – I’m all for natural wines but the whole point of a wine is that it should  taste nice, something Stellar have clearly forgotten! I’ve tried all their reds and haven’t actually been able to drink any of them.

So what is the Teillery wine like? Originating from Chile, from organic vineyards, what will it taste like? Well, great news, I’ve tasted their no added sulphur Cabernet Sauvignon and it is fantastic, a great Cab Sauv in it’s own right, full flavoured, very smooth, supremely balanced with a really long finish too. It’s simply very good wine – then the bonus is there are no added chemicals, only natural beneficial anti oxidants.

Where can we buy it? Well as it has only just been released it isn’t in the UK yet but apparently Teillery have approached the UK’s market leader for sulphite free wine www.goodwineonline.co.uk who have confirmed they are looking at stocking it in the new year – it takes upto 7 weeks by boat from Chile so look out for it from February onward, it really is worth waiting for!

Our congratulations go out to Harold and Denise, and all the team at Zevenwacht as their limited production (6000 bottles), single vineyard Sauvignon Blanc 360 has just achieved John Platter’s highest award of 5 Stars in the latest edition of his world famous South African wine guide. This is a first for Zevenwacht although they’ve come tantalisingly close on many occassions with their fabulous limited production Z blends and their Z Gewurztraminer – all limited to only 1200 bottles per year.

Chief winemaker Jacques Viljoen did say the 09 Sauvignon was exceptional, and clearly he was correct.

If you’d like to buy Zevenwacht Sauvignon Blanc 360 2009 it is available in the UK from only one source www.goodwineonline.co.uk at a highly competitive £11.75 per bottle, a real bargain for a 5 Star wine. They’re also the only UK retailer to sell Zevenwacht’s other top wines too, so why not treat yourself to a Z blend as well? They’re great wines!

With the Chancellor’s spending review, we’re now left waiting to see how it will affect us in real terms. It’s difficult to digest and understand the longer term implications of billions of pounds in cuts, but there will be countless knock on effects for us all, some of which are already happening.  For example, although these cuts show the financial markets that the UK is serious about reducing the deficit (and therefore a good thing!) there will be hard times before things get better, and the mention by the press of industrial unrest and union action has actually weakened the pound in the short term.

It’s now back at 1.10 Euro which is the same rate as 12 months ago when wine importers were throwing themselves off Tower Bridge! I’ve been to France three times in the last three months and was horrified by the prices. A light lunch for two was 50 Euros, a McDonalds for two was 20 Euros. At these prices an exchange rate of 1.70 Euros to the pound (where the pound was originally when the Euro was launched) is about right. The current rate makes everything purchased in Europe approximately 50 % more than it should be.

It’s going to take a long long time for the pound to recover, several years of very slow increase. Which means that European wines will remain expensive, and so will those from other countries as the pound is weak everywhere at present. It’s now below AUS$1.59 where it should be AUS$2.50! And US$1.57 where it was over US$2 not so long ago. The only hope of any recovery for the pound is for our European cousins, the Germans, to pull out of the Euro and let it fall to a realistic exchange rate, as the rest of the Eurozone is basically skint. This is also the only hope for getting countries like Greece, Spain and Portugal out of recession too, as the strong Euro means they can’t export anything and get their economies moving again.

In the UK, with the VAT increasing to 20% in January, and people being generally a lot worse off due to higher taxes and higher prices on virtually everything they buy, we will see a change in the way we buy things. It won’t be a sudden stop to purchasing, but it will mean people will choose carefully what to spend their money on. For example many will cut down the night out to the restaurant and opt for a night in with a decent bottle of wine instead. Others will cut out going to the pub – a decent night out costs £50 these days. Add in babysitters, taxis and a kebab, and it becomes a major expense. For the same money you could entertain four friends on fine food and wine, then have them entertain you the following week for free!

People will look for the best deal before they purchase. There are many competitive businesses out there who offer keen prices who will benefit from this metaphorical belt tightening, but there are many dinosaurs who will bury their heads in the sand and continue to operate as they have always done who will lose out. Then there are the unscrupulous businesses like supermarkets who will recognise the extra pull a 50% off sticker will have, who will be advertising dozens of wines at artificially high prices for the mandatory two weeks on a top shelf in the Aberdeen branch,  so that the following week they can blitz it in every branch across the UK as a legitimate half price deal! Remember you get what you pay for, even in this economic climate. I advise stay in one extra night a week and use the money you’ve saved to buy some good wine online, then you’ve saved on the petrol to the supermarket too.

With the myriad of price increases we’ve all experienced since the beginning of the recession, one increase which  has been hard to get to grips with, is the price of wine. This is because the industry has been hit from all sides at once.

Obviously there is the string of excise duty increases put into place by the former labour government which has increased a bottle of wine by 36 pence, plus vat of course, making it 42 pence per bottle. Thanks to their legacy, it’s set to increase again in 2011 by 2% over inflation which is currently 5%, so 7% in total, with the vat adding another 1.2%. On it’s own this would be no problem, we accept we have to pay a bit more. The biggest increase has come from the extremely weak pound. As (virtually) all wine is imported, we’ve seen increases in the basic cost of the wine by as much as 40%. Add back on the excise duty increases and you can see why the price on our shelves has increased so much. In January we have VAT increasing to 20%!

So how have the supermarkets coped?

We all remember ’3 for £10′ and although this wine was frankly all crap, it was still affordable. 85% of all retail wine in the UK is sold through the supermarkets and they’ve dominated the market for years, forcing producers to repeatedly cut costs till many went out of business, so they could maintain their price points. Many brands have to pay the supermarkets to have a presence on the shelf! Have the supermarkets cut their margins while the rest of us struggle? No! They still make around 30 to 35%! You may have noticed prices creeping up on the shelves as there is simply no room left for the producers to manouvre. Asda has moved to 3 bottles for £12 presumably to acclimatise consumers before the vat increase. According to inside sources supermarket buyers are instructed to source wines at no more than 34 cents a bottle – about 22 pence. This makes sense on a bottle of wine at £4, as it leaves £1.75 for duty and customs tax, 60 pence vat, 22 pence for the producer (including the bottle, cork and labelling, leaving only 5 pence for the wine!), 20 pence shipping, and a nice 30% (£1.00) for the supermarket.

So next time you see a wine on the shelf in a supermarket at an affordable £4, stop and think what is actually in the bottle – a product that is actually worth about 5 pence! Would you buy orange juice at that price, or milk, or even a piece of fish? No way, at that price you would expect it to be crap! So why are we still surprised when we get the wine home, open it and attempt to drink it? Yes, it is crap! But on the shelf it said ‘Half price, reduced from £8 to £4 so I thought it might be good……’ People are being routinely disappointed time after time in the supermarket, while the supermarkets make literally billions of pounds per year from us. Thankfully many people are beginning to wisen up and look elsewhere for their wines, accepting that due to the weak pound and punitive duty rates, good wine now costs at least £8 per bottle. But those of us on a tight budget, and let’s face it that’s most of us at the moment, will continue our regular bout of weekly disappointment, but at least by the following morning we can’t really remember how bad the wine tasted, because we’re struggling with a horrendous hangover from the 80 different chemicals that were added to it to keep the price down!

Sulphite free wine, which is also organic and biodynamic, is now available in the UK through the UK’s leading specialist low sulphite wine merchant, www.goodwineonline.co.uk.

Firstly, just to explain the technical definitions, ‘sulphite free wine’ is a layman’s term, which should be more accurately called ‘no added sulphur wine’ or ‘no added preservative wine’, purely because tiny amounts of bound sulphur are a natural biproduct of the fermentation process, so there is no such thing as a sulphite free wine. These tiny amounts of bound sulphur are harmless, it’s the added free sulphur which can cause allergic reactions in sulphite intolerant people, so these wines can safely be regarded as ‘sulphite free’.

www.goodwineonline.co.uk have specialised in low sulphite wines for a couple of years, but are very excited by these latest additions to their portfolio, as good quality sulphite free wine is as rare as hen’s teeth. There are a handful of wineries around the world who produce wines with no added sulphur, but most of these wines are pretty poor quality. Goodwineonline have always specialised in top quality, award winning boutique wines, which by their nature are hand made with pride, and a minimal amount of additives.  Now they’ve partnered up with a unique winery called Domaine Viret in the northern Rhone Valley.

Domaine Viret, owned by father and son - Alain and Philippe Viret, is a unique concept in wine making. They have developed their own system called ‘cosmoculture’ which is a combination of advanced biodynamic principles with traditonal respect for the land, nature and natural energy. They use the earth’s natural magnetic field and the cell structure of water to transfer this energy to their vines – it’s a highly complex approach which some traditional winemakers may consider a little eccentric, but it has amazing results. Oz Clarke described their wines as ‘cosmic nectar’.

On the biodynamic side of cosmoculture, they produce their own ‘plant food’ for the vines from 14 different plants on the estate. Each plant lends a different property to the mix, so with 14 different plants it takes some expertise to get it right. Lavendar for example, has been used for milennia as an antiseptic, and so forth with all the other ingredients. They’ve studied plant microbiology and adopted trusted philosophies from tradional oriental herbal medicine, the Aborigines and even the Red Indians.

Their wines are quite simply amazing. Philippe’s approach isn’t just about making a wine with no added sulphur, nor is it about just making a wine with great flavour. It’s about making a wine which is complete - it tastes great, has good balance and is actively good for you. They all have a real purity, an absence of chemicals, that you really notice and which may make it difficult for you to revert to drinking normal wines again! The acidity is beautifully balanced as Philippe explains it’s not just about the flavour, but the whole experience of drinking the wine – it should be agreeable to your whole body not just your taste buds.

This labour intensive method of hand production restricts Domaine Viret to only making a limited amount of wine, around 10 000 cases per year. As these are distributed globally there isn’t much to go round, so Goodwineonline consider themselves very fortunate to have secured regular supply.

Checkout Domaine Viret’s website for more details on Cosmoculture.