Soil Health & Blind Tasting

The following is part-three of a three-part discourse that first looked at trends within the food industry, and the associated diet led health epidemic in America. Part-two assessed biodynamic wines as small yet potential elements of a solution. This final part will is deeper look at biodynamics, and a comparative tasting between conventional and biodynamic wines.

Science & Soil
Coverage of biodynamic winemaking tends to sensationalize its oddities (such as last week’s column). Manure filled cow horns and lunar-based “energies” are attention grabbing—perhaps like a train wreck is attention grabbing. But if one cares to dig deeper, there is a growing body of evidence—extending beyond sensationalism—that points to biodynamic’s efficacy in the production of high quality wines via advances in soil health.


Soil health is directly related to the presence of organic matter which is synonymous with the presence of humic substances, which are the major organic components of soil. Humic is produced by biodegradation of organic matter. Thus, biodynamic practices of introducing degraded matter (e.g, manure from the filled cow horn) into soil appears less lunacy and more feasible. These distinctions can also be seen at a more concrete level—in the vineyard.
When vintners choose to shift to biodynamic practices, often they document changes in key soil compounds over initial years. One such vintner from France’s Mâconnais region, Delphine and Sebastien Boisseau, began a fourteen year step-by-step process toward biodynamic practices. In 2000 they discontinued chemical weeding. In 2002 they halted the use of chemicals altogether, shifting to organic practices the following year, and finally achieving organic certification in 2006. Eight years later, the Boisseaus decided to fully embrace biodynamic principles, applying the first treatments of biodegraded organic matter in April of 2014. Less than one year later, measurable increases in the soil’s key elements—namely carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, calcium and magnesium—demonstrated an increase in the soil’s organic matter by an average of 50 percent.

This particular case study offers strong evidence that biodynamic practices outperformed mere organic practices in the production of healthier soil—the fundamental goal of biodynamics, and what should be the target of any agriculture system. Nutrient rich soil produces nutrient rich food.
While it’s reassuring to know that measurable variables point to an improvement in the soil’s health, ultimate proof depends upon the final outcome of the produce. However, wine is difficult; it is here where the subjectivity of taste, and the opaqueness of wine production, tangle and trip. Only you can judge what tastes good to you; and often a wine can mislead with its engineered additives (see OTT’s “Fake Wine” April 5, 2017). Regardless, go taste!

The Tastings
While more time is required to make authoritative judgements there have already been scrupulous tasting panels that have determined biodynamic’s superiority, namely Fortune Magazine’s 2004 blind tasting of twenty samples. In which it was reported that “[o]ut of ten pairs of wines, only one of the conventionally made wines was judged superior to its biodynamic counterpart.” Summing up the tasting, Master of Wine and Master Sommelier Doug Frost noted: “The biodynamic movement seems like latent '60s acid-trip-inspired lunacy—until you taste the wines.”

On The Table’s panel compared two Rhône red wines, one a conventionally produced, and the other a Demeter certified biodynamic. Vintages were identical (2015), prices were within a few dollars of each other, and tasters were blind.

The notes concluded that the conventionally produced specimen was “bigger,” “jammy,” “almost New Word in approachability,” i.e., it was almost easy to drink without food. These attributes surprised as they approximated those of Californian or Australian wine that can stand alone; while Old World wine traditionally is produced to accompany food. The biodynamic wine garnered praise for being “gentler” with more “minerality” while it required food and “took longer to open up,” meaning over an hour was required before the full complexity of the wine was apparent.

The conclusion: purported soil science evidences a nutritionally superior wine, while the tastings demonstrate that biodynamic wine holds its own. Thus, the consumer can only win.

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