Funky Wines

What is a funky wine?

As you might have guessed, it’s not exactly a highly technical term. Other than highly divisive, funky wines are, broadly speaking, slightly off-piste - any that stray away from the ‘safe zone’, either stylistically (think skin contact Sauvignon Blanc) or flavour wise (like when a Chardonnay does NOT act like a Chardonnay). 

What does it taste like? 

Typically, a funky wine tasting profile would see a lot of brett (short for brettanomyces, a wild yeast which is often described as lending wines a barnyardy kind of smell - and often found in white Burgundy as a sought-after flavour), and yeasty aromas, and they’re quite often slightly cloudy/hazy. If you’re struggling to understand how these are good characteristics in a wine - you’re not alone! Funky flavours really are like marmite and, just as funky wines have their acolytes, there are also just as many people who will steer way, way clear. For many, ‘funky’ is the start of the slippery descent into ‘faulty’. 

But WHY? 

But why, exactly, are these wines funky? Well, funky wines tend to be unfiltered, which means a lot of the residual proteins left from the yeast haven’t been removed. In conventional winemaking, these elements, which are unstable, risk teetering into dissolution and introducing bacteria or fungi (like wild yeast), which could spoil a wine. Now, we’re talking about tiny, micro particles, so in order to remove them you need chemical agents, not just a fine mesh filter. 

But - while unstable, these tiny particles are also intricately interwoven into the wine’s flavour profile, so by removing them, you’ll also be losing part of the flavour, or colour in some instances. There are plenty of different fining agents available - some better suited to reds (they leave the tannins and colour intact), others better for aromatic wines (protect delicate flavours) etc, but it’s a toss up - they will all remove some part of the wine’s unique flavour and characteristic as well as those little proteins. 

And that’s where the funk comes in. In order to preserve the true characteristics of the wine, the liquid is often unfined. Consequently the wines are often described as more textured, with a depth and breadth of flavour that conventional wines don’t have. It also means these wines are, inevitably, more at risk of spoilage. To try and keep their wines as clean as possible, funky winemakers are meticulous about using only healthy grapes, and keeping every stage of the winemaking and bottling pristine to minimise the risk of introducing bacteria.

Here at GWGP, we are partial to a judicious splash of funk, but we’re also believers of keeping it clean, resulting in the best of both worlds. We’ve got some wines that smell like a farm but taste like a dream, bu we’ve also got plenty in the Safe Zone. Carefully handled wines made with the utmost respect for the liquid and the plants they came from, with as little intervention as can be managed to protect the wines and the flavour.

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