Natural Wine Fair at Borough Market

A fair dedicated to natural wines.

I was lucky enough to be invited to attend this fair by a friend who at the time, used to ran a posh French restaurant at Sloan Square in Chelsea. That way, I avoided paying the £18-ticket, but still got my wine tasting glass and brochure. I have to say, next time I’ll be happy to pay for the admission fee because the event appeared to be super cool and the wines were delicious!

This fair was the brainchild of THAT CRAZY FRENCH WOMAN (aka Isabelle Legeron MW) and five natural wine importers who, between them, represented dozens of different natural wine producers in the UK. Natural wines are wines that have received little intervention by the winery and are produced without chemicals and additives, and are made with grapes grown in a natural environment without the use of chemical fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides.

There there 120 wine markers from around the world and 500 wines at our service. Some of them I’ve already met a year ago at a similar event, so I was on the hunt. I was mostly interested in sweet white wines and the most expensive ones of any color, I must say.

My top favorite biodynamic wine of all time is DOMAINE MILAN by Henry Milan. Try to get it somewhere if you can. It’s not too expensive.

Another top choice would be Corsican wines by DOMAINE COMTE ABBATUCCI. The family has a rich military history and you can admire some of their ancestors’ faces on the bottles. Be aware! Prices are around £150 per bottle. Speaking a little Spanish, I made friends with BODEGA BARRANCO OSCURO. Hopefully, I will visit them soon during the grand Spain tour I am planning at the moment. They are based near the city of Granada, so watch out for them!

I was surprised to meet a lot of very young wine makers, both French and Italian, because I always assumed wine was a business for the old. It’s a shame I didn’t get their names or the names of their domains, I was a little tipsy by then, as you could have been guessed.:)

Charter of quality for the beginners:
ALL grapes are, at a minimum, organic
ALL grapes are hand-harvested
NO added yeasts
NO added sugar
NO rectified acidity
Little or no sulphites are added during fermentation or at bottling

Borough Market,
Southwark St,
London, SE1 1TL

written by neja on 2011-08-14 #places #people #drinks #fair #drinking #wine #organic #natural #alcohol #sweet #location #italian #french #dry #london #spanish #urban-adventures #borough-market #natural-wine-fair #biodynamic #wine-makers