That is why wines of history, pedigree and consistency are the greatest and most exciting. Most often it take years of research and seeing the same fruiting body appear in the same location with consistent markings to make the decision to eat that mushroom. I taste what I trust and drink what I must. I am open to all wines and like the fungi I choose to eat or to ignore, I can’t be sickened by something I choose not to taste. I love great wine, well made wine, wine in balance. This is not a manifesto about natural wine, no far from it, but it is a confession. Vinifera success in Canadian vineyards is a recent phenomenon and there are plants more suited and native to our land but we should and will continue to pursue both realities.
I am a forager of wines as well, perhaps not in the same spiritual or personal way, but as I do with the forest I try my best to listen and become one with the vine, to imagine what it will beget, that being quality grapes and eventually honest wine.
Laetiporus Sulphureus, aka Chicken of the Woods
