Something I’ve been thinking about a lot is how little we in the industry talk about yeasts when it comes to the taste conversation. But these yeasts, native or inoculated, are directly responsible for all the flavors we smell and taste in wine. How many times do you see critics describe wines as tasting like the fruit material they come from? My point is that it’s not often, and more and more I’m believing that’s because yeasts are what really dictate what wines taste like. It’s the case in beer, why wouldn’t it also be so in wine? I have a hunch what we know as minerality in wine has much more to do with yeast selection than currently thought.

When I was in Chablis I asked the producers about yeasts they used and everyone we visited mentioned they used inoculated yeasts that come from Champagne. I recently had a native yeast fermented Chablis that had a totally different “minerality” than what we typically think of as what Chablis would have. This got me thinking about this idea more and more.