Pioneer California Biodynamic Winemaking + 100 Adorable Sheep with Chris Benziger

Natalie MacLean
Jan15th

Click on the arrow to listen to this episode.

You can listen to the Unreserved Wine Talk Podcast on every podcast platform and app, including Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Android, Amazon and Pandora.

You can also subscribe for free so that you don't miss an episode. Click a button below to listen:

Introduction

What was it like to move to biodynamic wine farming at a time when hardly anyone was doing it? What crucial role do 100 adorable sheep play at the Benziger winery? How do biodynamic preparations that might seem a bit “woo” actually benefit the vineyard? What are the benefits of biodynamic farming practices for vine health and wine quality?

In this episode of the Unreserved Wine Talk podcast, I’m chatting with Chris Benziger, winemaker with the Benziger family wines in Sonoma, California.

You can find the wines we discussed here .

 

Giveaway

Three of you are going to win a bottle of one of his spectacular wines from California (open to Canadian residents only).

 

How to Win

To qualify, all you have to do is email me at  [email protected]  and let me know that you’ve posted a review of the podcast.

It takes less than 30 seconds: On your phone,  scroll to the bottom here , where the reviews are, and click on “Tap to Rate.”

After that, scroll down a tiny bit more and click on “Write a Review.” That’s it!

I’ll choose three people randomly from those who contact me.

Good luck!

 

Join me on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube Live Video

Join the live-stream video of this conversation on Wednesday at 7 pm eastern on Instagram Live Video , Facebook Live Video or YouTube Live Video .

I’ll be jumping into the comments as we watch it together so that I can answer your questions in real-time.

I want to hear from you! What’s your opinion of what we’re discussing? What takeaways or tips do you love most from this chat? What questions do you have that we didn’t answer?

Want to know when we go live?

Add this to your calendar:

 

 

 

Highlights

  • How did Chris’ grandfather transform his alcohol-importing business during Prohibition?
  • How did the Benziger Family Winery get started?
  • What does Chris love about the Benziger family property, and what fascinating history does it have?
  • How does the geology of the area influence Benziger wines?
  • What challenges did the Benziger family face during their first harvest at the new winery?
  • Why did the Benziger family decide to transition to biodynamic farming practices years ahead of mainstream sustainability trends?
  • What crucial role do Dorper sheep and Highland cattle play at the Benziger winery?
  • How do biodynamic preparations that might seem “woo-woo” actually benefit the vineyard?
  • What are the benefits of biodynamic farming practices for vine health and wine quality?

 

Key Takeaways

  • What was it like to move to biodynamic wine farming at a time when hardly anyone was doing it?
    • As Chris notes, the Benzigers were biodynamic pioneers in California. He quotes Gandhi: “First they ignored him, then they laughed at him, then they fought him, but then he won.” It was like that with their adoption of biodynamics. As he says, when people found we were ripping out vines to plant flowers and letting animals run amok in the vineyard, they thought we were crazy. Then we challenged them and said, “This is a better way to farm.” They countered saying, “Hey, we’ve been using chemicals longer than you’ve ever been out here. We get better scores than you. What are you talking about?” But fast forward today, in every single winery, particularly in Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino, Monterrey, and the counties that have very high prestige, every one of these wineries has some form of a sustainability program today.
  • What crucial role do 100 adorable sheep play at the Benziger winery?
    • Chris observes, we eventually figured out sheep are the answer to our challenges. We ended up getting a big flock of a special type of sheep called a Dorper. They’re smaller sheep, and they don’t have wool, they have hair. And they’re indestructible and lovely. They’ve got great personalities, and they’re relatively mellow. Their little cloven hoofs push debris down, like leaves, eliminating mildew pressure, so no mildecides. They eat the grasses underneath the vine, eliminating the need for herbicides like RoundUp. And they fertilize as they go which helps with that microbial growth. Rudolph Steiner, who is the father of biodynamics, said that animals add the personality to a farm. And boy, was he right.
  • How do biodynamic preparations that might seem a bit “woo” actually benefit the vineyard?
    • Chris says that even though it sounds odd to be putting cow dung in a horn and burying it in the ground, we’re making a plant probiotic. That manure attracts microorganisms in the soil, and they’re just small enough where they can fit through a cow horn. The horn is like a sieve of keratin, like your fingernails. They turn it into a beautiful humus. After six short months, it’s this beautiful, almost chocolate-covered humus. We put that in an earthen jar, and eventually put that into warm water and make a tea, and then drench the soil in the vineyard, and it feeds the roots so they can push deeper into the soil. Miracle Grow is blue goo, and they don’t think twice about putting that in their plants. But when something is all-natural, they challenge it, but this is unbelievably healthy for the plants.
  • What are the benefits of biodynamic farming practices for vine health and wine quality?
    • Chris explains that in conventional farming, you’re watering and feeding the plant from the top. The plant roots want to go down, but synthetic chemicals are like DoorDash food. You’re delivering everything at the surface so the roots stay at the surface. You end up getting a very shallow, anemic root system at the surface. Biodynamics tells the vine, Hey, you’ve got to earn a living. We don’t water or fertilize it. Now the roots do what they want to do, and go down into those different layers, find their own sources of moisture and nutrition, and that’s how we get a better, more terroir-driven wine.

 

Start The Conversation: Click Below to Share These Wine Tips

pic

The most important thing is obviously not the shiny tanks; it’s the family passion. - Chris Benziger Chris Benziger Click to tweet

pic

When they found we were ripping out vines to plant flowers and letting animals run amok in the vineyard, they thought we were crazy. - Chris Benziger Chris Benziger Click to tweet

pic

Even though it sounds nuts – putting cow poop in a horn and burying in the ground – what we’re basically making is a plant probiotic. - Chris Benziger Chris Benziger Click to tweet

 

About Chris Benziger

Still in high school when the Benziger family moved from White Plains, Chris finished his senior year in wine country. He went on to earn a degree in marketing from the University of San Francisco while spending summers, weekends and every spare moment working at the winery. He officially joined the Benziger Family Winery in 1993. Chris oversees the home ranch and is dedicated to the thriving Biodynamic ecosystem of the estate: shepherding the Benziger flock of sheep, tending to the estate vegetable and fruit trees, and producing Biodynamic preparations for our vineyards. Chris feels that the only way to communicate the quality of the wines he promotes is by having the soil from the vineyard in which he’s endorsing under his nails. Chris also travels to major markets and promoting Benziger wines around the country.

 

Resources

 

Tag Me on Social

Tag me on social media if you enjoyed the episode:

 

Thirsty for more?

  • Sign up for my free online wine video class where I’ll walk you through The 5 Wine & Food Pairing Mistakes That Can Ruin Your Dinner (and how to fix them forever!)
  • You’ll find my books here, including Unquenchable: A Tipsy Quest for the World’s Best Bargain Wines and Red, White and Drunk All Over: A Wine-Soaked Journey from Grape to Glass.
  • The new audio edition of Red, White and Drunk All Over: A Wine-Soaked Journey from Grape to Glass is now available on Amazon.ca, Amazon.com and other country-specific Amazon sites; iTunes.ca, iTunes.com and other country-specific iTunes sites; Audible.ca and Audible.com.

 

Transcript

Natalie MacLean 00:00:00 What was it like to move from biodynamic wine farming at a time when hardly anyone else was doing it? What crucial role do 100 adorable sheep play at the Benziger winery? How do biodynamic preparations that might seem a bit woo actually benefit the vineyard? And what are the benefits of biodynamic farming practices for vine health and wine quality? In today’s episode, you’ll hear the stories and tips that answer those questions in our chat with Chris Benziger, winemaker with the Benziger Family Wines in Sonoma, California. By the end of our conversation, you’ll also discover how Chris’s grandfather transformed his alcohol importing business during prohibition. Did you hear my little quote fingers there? It’s a great story how the historic Benziger Family Winery got started. What Chris loves about the Benziger family property and its fascinating history. How the lasagna layer geology of the area influences Ben’s wines. The challenges the Benziger family faced during their first harvest at the new winery. That was just wild. I loved the details of that story.

Natalie MacLean 00:01:22 Do you have a thirst to learn about wine? Do you love stories about wonderfully obsessive people, hauntingly beautiful places, and amusingly awkward social situations? Well, that’s the blend here on the Unreserved Wine Talk podcast. I’m your host, Natalie MacLean, and each week I share with you unfiltered conversations with celebrities in the wine world, as well as confessions from my own tipsy journey as I write my third book on this subject. I’m so glad you’re here. Now pass me that bottle, please, and let’s get started.

Natalie MacLean 00:02:04 Welcome to episode 320. As I mentioned last week, I did a whirlwind tour of ten dryish January segments from coast to coast on the morning shows for CTV, Global, BNN Bloomberg, and City TV. I explained how low and no alcohol wines are made, so if you missed that, go back and take a listen. After you finish this episode, I’m sure you’ll find the process really surprising. I promised to share with you some of my favorite low and no alcohol wines, as well as some of those that are low in sugar. So here are the wines that I featured on the various television shows.

Natalie MacLean 00:02:38 Starting with Giesen from New Zealand. That’s Giesen. Let me spell it out for you. G-I-E-S-E-N, so it looks like you might want to say Giesen, but it’s actually pronounced Giesen, just as Riedel glasses spelled Riedel are pronounced Riedel, not Ridell. Anyway, I just note that in case you’re searching for them. This terrific winery has already won so many awards for its regular wines with alcohol, which are also worth trying, especially their Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir. So they recently launched a line of alcoholic wines made with zero alcohol, including fresh, crisp, vibrant white wines: Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Grigio, and Riesling. Plus a premium red blend and a sparkling wine. They’re all among my favourites when it comes to alcohol-free wines. You can order them from Amazon in Canada, the US, and other countries, as well as from the website Alcohol Free in Canada. I’ll include these links in the show notes.

Natalie MacLean 00:03:45 Next up are some terrific alcohol-free wines from St. Regis, France, including two new juicy wines, a Sauvignon Blanc and a Pinot Noir to complement the existing St. Regis lineup of Secco and Spritz, both lightly sparkling wines, as well as a Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Rosé. These wines are made by a traditional French winemaker and represent exceptional value given the wines or the still wines are just $13.95 and the sparkling are $14.95. You can also get these on Amazon.

Natalie MacLean 00:04:19 In the category of low-alcohol wines, I have a variety of choices that are available in liquor and grocery stores as well as online from the producers, though not from Amazon, given their alcohol content. First, we have Kim Crawford Illuminate Sauvignon Blanc with only 7% alcohol. It still has all those juicy citrus and tropical fruit flavors that you love in the classic Sauvignon Blanc. They wake up your taste buds and make them do a happy dance. The Illuminate Rosé is bursting with notes of watermelon and field berries that will bring back summer even on a cold January day. They’re so juicy, in fact, that they’d make even carrot sticks taste good, though I’d pair them with a delicate, pan seared, herb crusted halibut served with steamed asparagus tips and a light lemon caper sauce that enhances the wine’s crisp acidity. For red wine lovers, there’s Meiomi Bright, a new Pinot Noir that has just 8% alcohol and has the same rich, vibrant flavors of strawberry jam and toasty mocha, as does their classic Pinot Noir. I’d pair this one with a cedar planked wild salmon with a maple miso glaze, accompanied by roasted fingerling potatoes and grilled vegetables, all kissed with a touch of smoke.

Natalie MacLean 00:05:40  The light and lively XOXO Pinot Grigio Light brings fresh-picked peach (say that quickly, ten times!) and nectarine aromas to your glass. It has only 8% alcohol. And it’s so balanced, it could teach a yoga class. This would be divine with a Mediterranean grilled vegetable dish with quinoa topped with crumbled feta, fresh mint, and a light, lemony vinaigrette that makes every bite sing with flavour. The XOXO Pinot Grigio Light comes in a regular 750 mL bottle as well as a four-litre box for party night light, I guess. XOXO also has a blend of Pinot Grigio and Chardonnay, Rosé, Pinot Noir and Cabernet, a sparkling blend of Pinot Grigio and Chardonnay, as well as a Pinot Grigio sangria and a red sangria.

Natalie MacLean 00:06:33 The Peller Estates Pinot Grigio Lite has melon and pink grapefruit aromas that leap from the glass. Even though it’s just 8% alcohol, I’d pair it with a delicate lemon herb roasted chicken breast served on a bed of ancient grains with roasted butternut squash and sage, finished with a light white wine reduction sauce. I am getting very hungry and thirsty. Are you? Then the estate’s Cabernet Sauvignon offers an enticing bouquet of black cherry and plums. I’d pair this with a spice rubbed grilled portobello mushroom cap, topped with goat cheese and fresh herbs, served with a quinoa kale salad dressed in a light balsamic vinaigrette. Of course, you can also get the regular Peller Estate’s Pinot Grigio and Cabernet, along with a wide range of other wines and grapes.

Natalie MacLean 00:07:13  If you’re looking for low sugar options, try the Honest Lot Cabernet Sauvignon. It’s a revelation with zero grams of sugar per serving, but it’s still packed with dark fruit flavours. Any wine under five grams of sugar per litre is considered extra dry. More info on that is in the previous episode. So while the liquor store listing may say 2 or 3g/l, when it comes to a serving or a glass of wine, it can contain up to 0.49g of sugar per three-quarters cup or 188mL. That’s a serving. The sugar content is rounded down to zero grams per the Canadian Food Regulations. And everything, of course, is stated on the Nutritional Fact panel on the back label of the wines. I’d pair this wine with a seared steak crusted with pink peppercorns. Say that one 10 times too,  served alongside roasted rainbow carrots drizzled with honey and fresh thyme. The Honest Lot also has a lovely Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon Blanc, and Rosé. I’ll make some more recommendations with you next week.

Natalie MacLean 00:08:40 You can find all of my favourite low and no alcohol wines, spirits, beer, cocktails and mixed drinks at nataliemaclean.com/lowno. I’ll include this link in the show notes as well. I’ll also be posting reviews of these wines and others on Instagram at Natalie Maclean Wine. Connect with me there. I’d love to hear from you about your favourite low and no alcohol drinks. Speaking of delicious wines, three of you will win a bottle of the superb Benziger wines. This is open to Canadian residents because shipping alcohol across borders is still bound up with prehistoric laws that have no right to exist today. I also still have two copies of Chris Ruhland’s terrific book Press for Champagne: A Guide to Enjoying the World’s Greatest Sparkling Wine. This is open to everyone no matter where you live. All you have to do is email me and let me know you’d like to win. I’ll choose three wine winners and two book winners randomly from those who contact me at [email protected].

Natalie MacLean 00:09:41 In other bookish news, if you’re reading the paperback or e-book or listening to the audiobook of my memoir Wine Witch on Fire: Rising from the Ashes of Divorce, Defamation, and Drinking Too Much, I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. I’d be happy to send you personally signed book plates for the copies you buy or give as gifts. I’ll put a link in the show notes to all retailers worldwide at nataliemaclean.com/320.  The paperback usually arrives within a day or two of ordering, and the e-book and audiobook are instantly available. Okay, on with the show.

Natalie MacLean 00:10:28  Chris Benziger was still in high school when he and his family moved from White Plains, New York to California wine country. He’s going to tell us about that. He went on to earn a degree in marketing from the University of San Francisco while spending summers, weekends, and every spare moment working at the winery as a child labourer. He officially joined the Benziger Family Winery in 1993. Chris oversees the home ranch and is dedicated to the thriving biodynamic ecosystem of the estate, shepherding the flock of sheep, tending to the estate vegetables and fruit trees, and producing biodynamic preparations for his vineyards. Chris is hands on. He likes to keep the soil from the vineyard under his nails. We’ll get proof of that in a minute. Just kidding. Hey, Chris. Welcome. So great to have you here with us. You’re joining us from your home in Sonoma, if I understand correctly.

Chris Benziger 00:11:17 In Glen Ellen. Yes.

Natalie MacLean 00:11:18 Glen Ellen. There you go.

Chris Benziger 00:11:19 It’s Sonoma Valle. We’re like the Sonoma trifecta. We’re on Sonoma mountain in Sonoma Valley in Sonoma County.

Natalie MacLean 00:11:27 Oh wow. That’s one of those nesting doll things.

Chris Benziger 00:11:29 Like nesting dolls. Great to see you, Natalie.

Natalie MacLean 00:11:34 You too, Chris. And you have a marvellous story. Now, let’s talk about your grandfather first, because you have a long lineage of people in the booze business. He seemed like a real character. What did your grandfather do?

Chris Benziger 00:11:49 Okay, so yeah, I come from a long line of boozy folks. My grandfather Joseph, he was amazing. He had a small importing company prior to prohibition. And when prohibition hit, he was like, I’m not going out of business. I got a family to feed. So he did like a lot of people did, he kind of went underground and he actually had this souped up tugboat, which is amazing…

Natalie MacLean 00:12:11 That seems like an oxymoron, a souped up tugboat.

Chris Benziger 00:12:13 Yeah, I know, right. It’s kind of one of those things that didn’t draw attention, but it went fast. I have an old picture of it. It doesn’t look anything special, but supposedly it was it did the job. And he would go up into the Canadian Maritimes and load it up with whiskey. So our business depends on Canada.

Natalie MacLean 00:12:31 Excellent.

Chris Benziger 00:12:32 It puts it back down into the East River in New York City. Then they would put it onto the fishing scows and sneak it into the speakeasies. So he did that. But I think it was on his fourth or fifth voyage. The Coast Guard got wise because there was competition. And another Joe, Joe Kennedy, was a bootlegger, and he was putting all the other guys out of business. So he ratted on my dad. And that was the end of the booze cruise.

Natalie MacLean 00:13:00 Wow. Well, it could have been my relatives making that illegal whiskey for you. I’m from Nova Scotia, so I’m sure we’re connected at some point way back.

Chris Benziger 00:13:08 Wouldn’t that be cool?

Natalie MacLean 00:13:09 My ancestors were kicked off their lands in Scotland for sheep. And we’ll get to sheep in a moment. Another connection. Oh, yeah. They had their hand in the whiskey barrel for sure. That is great. Tell us about your family that you grew up in is quite large.

Chris Benziger 00:13:26 So I’m the youngest of seven. I have 19 nieces and nephews. Nepotism run amok. And so after my grandfather, my father took over, bought back that importing company. So we were always had French wines on our table. Champagnes Maybe some cognacs. He was importing Scotch as well. And then it was my oldest brother, Mike, who was super passionate about wine. And he opened up a small wine shop in New York. And this is in the early 70s. And then the first California winemakers were coming across. And he was tasting he was like, God, this stuff is really good. And then he had this dream of like, why am I selling it? I want to make it. And he beat feet all the way out west. His compass was a little off. He ended up in Livermore and not Sonoma or Napa. But it didn’t deter him. He got it to a winery. He worked there and became a the winemaker in five quick years, which you could do back then because the business was in its infancy. And then what he did, he came back home to New York and he got us all sitting down at our Sunday dinner. Probably 13 of us sat around the dinner table at that point, and he goes, I want to start a family winery in California and I want you guys to run it with me. And we’re like. I’m thinking it’s like a Beach Boys movie or something. And my dad sitting there sipping his scotch and he goes, I like it. And we’re thinking, all right, pops is going to move out west in five, ten years. In six, six short months, my family is picking up from the metropolis of New York City and shooting 3000 miles to a very rustic Sonoma County. They were still grazing cows on the central green in town. It was like the Beverly Hillbillies in reverse.

Natalie MacLean 00:15:03 Yeah, absolutely.

Chris Benziger 00:15:04 It was so much fun. These knucklehead New Yorkers invading this quiet little, cow town that turned into the wine central.

Natalie MacLean 00:15:12 Oh my goodness. You were 14 or 15 at the time. What was that like? That must have been kind of a culture shock for you.

Chris Benziger 00:15:18 Yes, I didn’t want to move, of course. And, being a punk 14 year old, I ran away, and then nobody really noticed. So I’m like, going back sheepishly going…

Natalie MacLean 00:15:27 [laughter] Six other kids, who misplaced one

Chris Benziger 00:15:30 Did we miss him? Is he here? Anyway, I ended up out there and I was mad for about nine seconds and I saw how beautiful this place was. I instantly fell in love with it. And, as they say, the rest was history.

Natalie MacLean 00:15:45 Lovely. Wow. Now, describe the property or ranch that your family took over.

Chris Benziger 00:15:52 If you cup your hands, it’s exactly what the property looks like. It’s a little hanging valley on Sonoma Mountain. Sonoma Mountain is the major geological feature of southern Sonoma County. It’s a volcano. An extinct one, we hope. It just pops up out of the valley floor. So it drives the weather in that area, too. And we’re halfway up in this volcano, so we have a 360 degree exposure to the sun. And it’s just beautiful. The views on this property are just spectacular because you’re in this beautiful bowl and it’s very warm there. It’s a microclimate. It’s quite warm. So we grow very nice Bordeaux varieties on this place. But when you come down the driveway, it’s almost like a curtain is pulled back and the property just presents itself. And it’s got the best vibe to it. You always feel when you pull on that property that all your stress is gone and you just feel so in tune with nature.

Natalie MacLean 00:16:44 Sounds like a pastoral, idyllic scene.

Chris Benziger 00:16:48 It is. That is a perfect word for it. A perfect word. And I invite all your listeners to please come and visit because everyone finds this place miraculous.

Natalie MacLean 00:16:57 I’m already feeling more Zen talking about it.

Chris Benziger 00:17:01 [laughter] It may be the tasting of the wine earlier today for me.

Natalie MacLean 00:17:04 Oh, yeah [laughter]. Now, the actual ranch you took over had been closed since… Was it  a 1860s ranch. And it was closed during prohibition?

Chris Benziger 00:17:13 That’s another crazy story. This was a working ranch. settled in the 1860s. Was owned by this guy named Julius Wagner. He literally got it from the Spanish governor before California was a state. And he had a working ranch up there. People would come up there, but prohibition hit them too, and they literally locked the front gate. And it was a ghost town for 55 years. And then we actually bought it from a doctor who bought it a few years earlier. And this doctor could have had his own sitcom because he was a very smart doctor. But he believed in the medicinal uses of marijuana. So he grew Cabernet grapes and marijuana right next to each other and made it into a wine called Cannabis Sauvignon. I’m not making this up.

Natalie MacLean 00:17:56 So ahead of his time. Oh my God.

Chris Benziger 00:17:58 So ahead of this time. Let’s just call it Sonoma coma [laughter].

Natalie MacLean 00:18:00 [laughter] I love it.

Chris Benziger 00:18:04 It’s crazy when he left. I don’t know why. He had a temper tantrum or something, but he left dishes in the sink, food in the refrigerator, sheets on the bed, clothes in the closet. He just jumped in his car and took off, and we never saw him again.

Natalie MacLean 00:18:16 Wow. Wow. All sorts of antics. Oh my goodness. This could be a TV show.  Are you located? I’m not sure if this is the place or another area, but are you located right on the San Andreas fault?

Chris Benziger 00:18:29 We’re not technically this ranch on the San Andreas fault, but we have two other vineyards that are. We’re very, very close to it. We’re actually not what’s called the Rogers Creek Fault, which is an offshoot of that. But that is a major why, one of the reasons why, the geology in our place is so fantastic, because that subduction zone is doing all this and pushing up.

Natalie MacLean 00:18:50 What is it, a subduction, did you call it?

Chris Benziger 00:18:52 It’s called a subduction zone.

Natalie MacLean 00:18:55 What does it mean?

Chris Benziger 00:18:56 So you have one plate riding over the other. And that’s why you have that the ring of fire, the volcanoes from the Cascades and then Sonoma Mountain and all that. It does these rollers and what was on the bottom becomes up on the top and then rolls back. So you have these crazy geological blender, if you will. And the soils make it amazing, like on our ranch, because it’s a series of eruption. The basement is basalt. Then you have this beautiful red aggregate. Then you have this stuff called welded tufa, which is white as ash, and then breccia, which is that lava clinker rock you see in Hawaii, bits of obsidian, and then it repeats itself. So when we dig pits, it looks like geological lasagna. The browns, the reds, the whites. It’s just amazing. That was another one of the reasons why we wanted to get deeper roots, because every time the the roots grow down and those different layers of minerals they send out a ot of root hairs and those minerals go up into the grapes and give it that fingerprint of where it is, that magical word terroir. And it brings authenticity to the grapes and eventually to the wine.

Natalie MacLean 00:20:00 Oh, I love that. All the layers and the root hairs on each layer. I can visualize that. So what happened during your first harvest there?

Chris Benziger 00:20:10  So this is a classic, almost Tom Sawyer-esque story here because we had tons of passion, we didn’t know what we were doing, our first employee was a contractor so he could help us build a building. And then all my brothers and cousins, sisters, wives, we get up every morning and my dad, being an ex-Marine, he’d go, all right, you guys, you’re building the winery; you guys, you’re planting grapes; or you guys are doing this. And then we go in and attack what we were going to do. We thought we could build the winery in the summer and then crush grapes in the fall, and we were sorely mistaken on the timing. So when our first harvest happened, the winery wasn’t fully built. It didn’t even have a roof. We bought every extension cord we could because the electrical wasn’t finished yet. We used car headlights to see at night. And the funniest part was we had ordered our stainless steel tanks, but they weren’t delivered yet and we didn’t have a pad to put them on.

Natalie MacLean 00:21:07 No tanks. That could be an issue.

Chris Benziger 00:21:09 That’s an issue big time. So my dad used to work with this junkyard guy across the valley, and this dude was a character, too. He was right out of central casting for motorcycle badass. He should have been on that show Sons of Anarchy. He was huge, like six foot five. Had this big, wild, bushy black hair that he tied into a ponytail. He had the big beard. He wore the vest. He was a Hells Angel. The denim. The boots. He was one tough hombre. But his name. I just love his name. His name was Barry Gold.

Natalie MacLean 00:21:40 It had to be. Barry Gold. Barry Gold, the motorcycle guy. Don’t mess with Barry [laughter].

Chris Benziger 00:21:47 Don’t mess with Barry. Right. And so, my dad calls, he goes like, hey, Barry, my kids screwed up. And, we’re not getting a stainless steel in time. You got stainless steel in that junkyard? And Barry’s like, sure Bruno, what do you need? He goes, I need 2000 gallon tanks. But here’s the kicker. We need it, like, right away. The grapes are coming in and we’re in a panic. And Barry goes, yeah  I’ll get it there first thing tomorrow morning. He hangs up the phone. We’re like, jeez, Barry’s got everything up in that junkyard of his. The next morning, our driveway is a long drive. It is just shy of a quarter mile. And it’s super dusty. Back then, we had not paved it. We didn’t have the money. And these two tow trucks come rumbling down the driveway. Billowing dust. And we’re like, God, what has Barry got? And as they pull in front of the construction site, the dust settles and I see the gleam of stainless steel. But then I see, like a Flashdance model leaning back in a chair with milk splashing on her. And the early Got Milk campaign was just getting started. We’re like, what? And Barry climbs out. The milk is dripping from the drain plug. He had supposedly went to a dairy guy that owed him money and said, I’m taking that tanker truck. I’m taking that tanker truck, and hooked them up and drove him up. So our first wine tanks were stolen milk trucks.

Natalie MacLean 00:23:00 And just drained all the milk.

Chris Benziger 00:23:01 We didn’t know at the time, but beggars can’t be choosy.

Natalie MacLean 00:23:04 Sure. Absolutely. So that’s obviously, I’m sure you’ve heard this before, but that’s why your Chardonnays are so creamy and rich.

Chris Benziger 00:23:13 So the other crazy part is there was no Marvin Shanken with the Wine Spectator. There’s no Robert Parker. There was none of that wine press that there is today. Back then you entered it into the county fair, right? Very Americana, very hokey. But it was legitimate because it was winemakers judging wine. So after, like the apple pies and the pig and cow judging, they had this fantastic wine judging. And we entered our wine. Three of them at the time. We won the top honours. We won the sweepstakes and it was the best PR ever. These knucklehead New Yorkers with a stolen milk truck makes this award winning wine.

Natalie MacLean 00:23:52 [laughter] And you come out on top in the local county fair. Oh my goodness.

Chris Benziger 00:23:56 It did teach us a valuable lesson, that the most important thing is obviously not the shiny tanks, but it’s the family passion. And what’s cool about that is we still have that same passion, but a whole other generation.

Natalie MacLean 00:24:08 Sure. And new tanks to boot. And real tanks to boot [laughter].

Chris Benziger 00:24:13 And real tanks, too. They don’t have wheels on them.

Natalie MacLean 00:24:14 So you made a move to biodynamics? I believe in the 80s or 90s when there was no textbook, sort of no one really doing it or not many people doing it in California. Is that correct?

Chris Benziger 00:24:28 Yes, we were very much pioneers in this one. There’s this great quote from Gandhi. He said first they ignored him, then they laughed at him, then they fought him, but then he won. And there was a little bit of our same arc with biodynamics. People were ignoring us, but also when they found we were ripping out vines to plant flowers and letting animals run amok in the vineyard, they thought we were crazy. Then, when we challenged them and say this is a better way to farm, they attacked us back saying, hey  we’ve been using chemicals longer than you’ve ever been out here. We get better scores than you. What are you talking about? Fast forward to today and every single winery, particularly in Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino, Monterey –  the counties that have very high prestige –  every one of these wineries has some form of a sustainability program today. So not that we’ve won, but definitely the current is more in our favour.

Natalie MacLean 00:25:21 That was very visionary of your father and your brother. Was it because you had all those little kids running around they just didn’t want that many chemicals?

Chris Benziger 00:25:28 That’s actually a big part of it, because we had a very shallow well that was showing contamination. And then personally, for me, and this was one of those epiphanies if you will, when we got to the property –  remember it had been left vacant for 55 years –  it was a primordial garden. It was beautiful, but it wasn’t a farm yet. And we got there, you know, we have to survive. So we put a big deer fence. And the conventional wisdom back then was to use chemicals, right, And the Monsanto guy would show up with his big bag of methyl ethyl bad stuff. And you go nuke your vineyards and in very short order I remember first the big critters would disappear. You know, the foxes, wild turkeys, bobcats. No more those guys on your property. Then the next year spraying. No more birds. The following year or two, no more insects. Four years down the road, you’re walking through the vineyard and you don’t hear anything. Just wind. And then by the fifth year, the soil changed colour. And I just remember as a kid living there, watching all this happen. Then we had erosion issues. We had phylloxera. And worst of all, as the vines matured, they should get better. And they weren’t.

Chris Benziger 00:26:35 So we were really concerned and we had our little children running around. We went up and visited a vineyard up in Mendocino, the Sego vineyard that Paul Dolan was working. And, we saw biodynamic as they were in transition. And we said, this is it. And so we tried to emulate what they were doing up there. There was no textbook. It was just figure it out. And we did. And most of it was pretty easy. Composting has been around forever. Integrated pest management is pretty well established. The hardest part for us was weed abatement. Getting rid of the weeds. Because as you so well put Roundup is diabolically efficient right. One spray, you burn the plants, kill the chloroplast, and you’re done. And it’s not that expensive. But the long term effects, which they claim there were none of course, were terrible.

Natalie MacLean 00:27:29 What’s in Round up? What is the…

Chris Benziger 00:27:28 It’s called glyphosate.

Natalie MacLean 00:27:29 Glyphosate.

Chris Benziger 00:27:32 It’s a herbicide. They said it doesn’t go in the ground. It affects the chloroplast. Killing that, the plant can’t make food and boom it’s dead. But the people that apply it are the first ones to be poisoned. And then the use over years, it stays in the soil. And it’s no bueno. It’s bad stuff.  Just like DDT was supposed to be this miracle, right.

Natalie MacLean 00:27:57 Silent spring. And all I hear is the wind. Absolutely.

Chris Benziger 00:28:03 It took us a while, but we eventually figured out sheep are the answer to our prayers. So we ended up getting a big flock of a special type of sheep called a dorper.

Natalie MacLean 00:28:12 What do they look like?

Chris Benziger 00:28:14 They’re smaller sheep and they don’t have wool. They have hair. They’re indestructible. They’re lovely. They got great personalities. They’re relatively mellow. So, I was born in New York City. The last thing I thought I’d be doing is being a shepherd.

Natalie MacLean 00:28:34 A shepherd. That sounds fairly pastoral. It sounds like you were herding a bunch of wigs around them.

Chris Benziger 00:28:40 Yes, hairy wigs. It ended up being one of my most favourite jobs to do.And right now, we’re in lambing season. So right now I have maybe even more. I haven’t checked them this morning, but we had as of last night, I had 12 lambs and I’m expecting another 50.

Natalie MacLean 00:28:56 Oh, I bet you they’re cute, cute, cute.

Chris Benziger 00:28:59 Adorable.

Natalie MacLean 00:29:00 Do kids come by and visit the lambs all the time?

Chris Benziger 00:29:03 All the time. And, what we try to do, too, is a schedule. We call it the running of the lambs. We take the lambs out into the vineyards to eat and then as we put them back in at night we have a barn dubbed the Sheep Chateau. We got to stay on theme, right. Unfortunately, we have a very active mountain lion population, so…

Natalie MacLean 00:29:23 They like to snack on them?

Chris Benziger 00:29:25 They do, they do unfortunately. So anytime we’ve left them out overnight for a longer period of time, we’re going to lose a few. So we put them into the Sheep Chateau and they’re nice and safe, and then we let them out in the morning.When they’re going out and they’re coming back, we run by the tasting room so people can see it.

Natalie MacLean 00:29:41 Cue the lambs.

Chris Benziger 00:29:43 Cue the lambs exactly.

Natalie MacLean 00:29:45 Everyone looking cute now! So these little wooly eaters or lamb mowers are eating the weeds for you instead of having to use RoundUp.?

Chris Benziger 00:29:57 So amazing. Their little cloven hosts are pushing debris down like leaves, eliminating mildew pressure. So no mildicides. They’re eating the grasses right underneath the vine, eliminating herbicides like RoundUp. And they’re fertilizing as they go. They’re pooping out their back ends, helping fertilize the ground, helping with that mycorrhizal growth and all that good stuff. So Rudolf Steiner, who was the father of biodynamics, he said that animals had the personality to a farm and boy was he right.

Natalie MacLean 00:30:26 If I understand correctly, they don’t like the unripe grapes. They’re not interested in them, so you don’t have to worry about that.

Chris Benziger 00:30:33 No. They do love the leaves, though.

Natalie MacLean 00:30:35 Okay.

Chris Benziger 00:30:35 And they’re not goats. Goats eat up. Sheep eat down. But they will jump on the back of a fellow sheep to get up to plants. And the most dangerous time is bud break. So we got to get them out of the vineyard at bud break because they love those little buds there.

Natalie MacLean 00:30:54 Yeah. They’re tender.

Chris Benziger 00:30:55 It’s like eating jelly beans for them or something. So we got to, we got to watch them. So they’re in the vineyards for about five months, and then we move them to paddocks around the area so they don’t do too much damage in the vineyard.

Natalie MacLean 00:31:10 And they must get moved out because you’re getting 50 or 60 new lambs. It must be sort of like the circle of life.

Chris Benziger 00:31:17 It is. It’s a farm. We have to pull out the males. We keep the females. And then, it’s the constant thing. You move some young females in, some of the older females get retired, and the cycle of life goes on.

Natalie MacLean 00:31:31 I guess you don’t name them in that case.

Chris Benziger 00:31:34 They’re all named Snowball, the lambs.

Natalie MacLean 00:31:37  I love it.

Chris Benziger 00:31:37 So if one snowball goes missing, there’s another snowball right around the corner.

Natalie MacLean 00:31:41 Oh, that’s so cute. And what are you doing with the Scottish Highlands cattle?

Chris Benziger 00:31:47 Those guys are my favourites. The hairy cows. So here’s the funny thing, Natalie. We got those guys first to do the grazing. And, you know, biodynamics is big into cow horns. And how cool would have a herd of Scottish Highlanders. So we did. We got big herd of 12 Scottish Highlanders with a bull named Chewie, who was one ton of fun. And in short order, they almost destroyed the vineyard. We put them in because they’re gigantic and they would scratch up against the fence posts to break those. Chewie, literally like a forklift, got under a vine to eat and then picked his head up and the vine just popped out of the ground. We’re like, oh my God. And he didn’t care. They would trample the fence down. And twice I had to cowboy him up from the town. I got a call from a sheriff at 3:00 in the morning once, hey come get your cows, Chris. The neighbours got a lot of entertainment out of it.

Natalie MacLean 00:32:45 Yeah, I’m sure. They didn’t have to take care of Chewie.

Chris Benziger 00:32:50 They’re used for their manure.

Natalie MacLean 00:32:52 Okay, so you graze them somewhere else and then use the manure.

Chris Benziger 00:32:56 Yeah. And we use the manure. One for composting and two for the horns.

Natalie MacLean 00:33:01 Okay. For the biodynamic preparation. And just a moment on those, some people think it might be a bit woo but…

Chris Benziger 00:33:10 It is a  little woo woo in the vineyard. Sure,  I can see how people would think that.

Natalie MacLean 00:33:13 But you are having to pay closer attention to the vineyard, which I think has to be a good thing whether you believe in moon cycles or not. It is just more attention.

Chris Benziger 00:33:23 Your hands on everything. And even though it sounds nuts, what you’re putting cow poop in a horn and burying the ground. What? What we’re basically making is a plant probiotic. So that manure is attractive to these microorganisms in the soil. And they’re just small enough where they can fit through a cow horn is like a sieve of I guess it’s carotene, the stuff that your fingernails is made out of. And we get a cow. So it’s stretched so these little organisms can slip through this fibrous cow horn and they eat that green gloppy cow poop and they turn it into a beautiful hummus. So after six short months, we take it out and it’s this beautiful, almost chocolate covered hummus. Now we put that in an earthen jar, and then we’ll eventually put that into warm water and make a tea and then we’ll take that tea – usually doing root flush has happened about about a month ago – and then we drenched the soil in the vineyard and it goes down and kind of feeds the roots at the last minute. So they could push deeper into the soil and maybe get to another layer of that lasagna.

Natalie MacLean 00:34:36 Fascinating.

Chris Benziger 00:34:37 So when you say it like that, then it kind of sounds right. But people get Miracle-Gro this blue goo and they don’t think twice about putting that in their plants. And when something that’s all natural, they’re like, what’s this? But this stuff is unbelievably healthy for the plants.

Natalie MacLean 00:34:54 And it totally makes sense. We’re told as people get your fermented foods. That’s the natural probiotic, whether it’s kimchi, kombucha, yogurt, whatever. Totally makes sense.

Chris Benziger 00:35:03 Yeah, Michael Pollan has that great book Cooked, where the biodynamics we talk about  earth, water, and fire, he breaks his whole book up into those four chapters. It is amazing.

Natalie MacLean 00:35:16 You equate the four elements with the four fingerprints or influences of the vineyard.

Chris Benziger 00:35:22 Exactly.

Natalie MacLean 00:35:23 What are the four influences and how do they line up with those four elements?

Chris Benziger 00:35:26 You have fire, water, earth and air. Then each one of them. The fire is the sun; the earth is the vineyard; air is the seasons; water is the plant.

Natalie MacLean 00:35:40 Is there a fifth element?

Chris Benziger 00:35:43 That’s the omega. When everything comes together. And that’ll be the one.

Natalie MacLean 00:35:47 Holy synthesis. That’s great. Let’s talk about insects while we’re still in our little menagerie here. You cultivate gardens to attract good bugs to eat the bad bugs. Is that what you’re doing?

Chris Benziger 00:36:01 So imagine we have this monoculture of just grapevines. We’ve put this chemical bubble over our vineyard. And unfortunately, that’s how most agriculture is done today.  You just kill everything and then just farm that monoculture. And that’s whether it’s grapevines or lettuce or whatever. So what we did is pop that bubble. Instead of pushing nature out, we allow nature in. That’s why my wine is called Running Wild, because that’s what we do. We let nature run wild and the first thing we do is we grow these big, we call them insectaries. They’re almost an acre, acre and a half garden situated strategically in the vineyard. And then we connect these gardens, what we call habitat highways. So we’re putting a web of biodiversity over the monoculture vineyard. So now when the plants are flying, the insects are flying through, they see these gardens and they’re like, whoa! They think this is like they’re going to the Mardi Gras and Tinder at the same time.

Natalie MacLean 00:36:59 That’s great.

Chris Benziger 00:37:00 And so what they do is they eat and propagate, and then they fly out and eat other insects out there. I’m sorry. My dog is barking.

Natalie MacLean 00:37:08 Oh no worries. It’s all part of the animal life that you’ve got going on there.

Chris Benziger 00:37:14 Yeah, she’s a good guard dog. A little obnoxious right now. Just doing her job. But anyway, this web of life. So these insects go out there instead of eating the plant, they eat each other.

Natalie MacLean 00:37:26 And how do you get them to travel along the habitat highway? Are you just? They’ll smell something else?

Chris Benziger 00:37:32 They do it themselves. But that’s why it takes a long time to do it. It took us almost seven years to get established. So it’s a slow process. And it’s not just insects, it’s birds too, and other critters. You want to get that diversity back in. So now you can start to heal the property. You get rid of the insects…. here’s what’s happening in conventional farming. You’re watering and feeding the plant from the top.  So the plant wants to go down, but it’s like, wait a minute. It’s like DoorDash. You’re delivering everything right there. So it stays at the surface. So you end up getting this very shallow and anemic root system at the surface because it’s being fed. So what we got to do. It’s like, hey you got to go earn a living. So we cut that off. We don’t water it. We don’t fertilize it. And now the roots do what they want to do and go down into those different layers and find their own sources of moisture and nutrition. And that’s how we get a better, more terroir driven wine.

Natalie MacLean 00:38:29 Absolutely. Almost like they were heroin addicts or something. You had to get them off the drugs.

Chris Benziger 00:38:34 It’s like eating a Red bull in a Hershey bar every day. It is not healthy at all. And we did this. They’ve done these root studies at the University of Washington. This guy, a professor John Regional, has an organic vineyard and a conventional one. And the root structures it is amazing how different one is shallow and very anemic, and the other one is dense, deep, full of vigour. But the crazy part, when you look at the top, they look the same.

Natalie MacLean 00:39:08 Oh, wow. Fascinating.

Chris Benziger 00:39:11 But when you taste them, the conventional one, which is grown in water balloons, may be sweet, but that’s about it. The ones that are farmed with terroir in mind, organically, they have much more character. They’re much smaller berries, too.

Natalie MacLean 00:39:24 That’s fascinating.

Natalie MacLean 00:39:28 Well, there you have it. I hope you enjoyed our chat with Chris. Here are my takeaways. Number one. What was it like to move to biodynamic wine farming at a time when hardly anyone else was doing it? As Chris notes, the Benzigers were biodynamic pioneers in California. He quotes Gandhi, which I love, first they ignored him, then they laughed at him, then they fought him, and then he won. And it was like that with their adoption of biodynamics. As Chris says, when people found out they were ripping out vines to plant flowers and letting animals run amok in the vineyard, they thought we were crazy. Then, we challenged them and said, this is a better way to farm. They countered, saying hey we’ve been using chemicals longer than you’ve been out there. We get better scores than you do. What are you talking about? But fast forward to today and every single winery, particularly in Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino, Monterey and other counties that have very high prestige when it comes to wine. Every one of the wineries has some sort of sustainability program today.

Natalie MacLean 00:40:25 Number two, what crucial role do 100 adorable sheep play at the Benziger winery? Chris observes, we eventually figured out that sheep were the answer to our challenges. We ended up getting a big flock of a special type of sheep called dorper. They’re smaller and they don’t have wool. They have hair. I just love that image of little pigs running around the vineyard. They’re indestructible and lovely. They’ve got great personalities. They’re relatively mellow. Their little cloven hooves push debris like leaves down into the soil, eliminating mildew pressure so they don’t have to use pesticides. They eat the grasses underneath the vine, eliminating the need for herbicides like Roundup, the diabolical Roundup. Then they fertilize as they go, which helps with microbial growth. Rudolf Steiner, who is the father of biodynamics, says that animals add personality to a farm. I couldn’t agree more. Those little lamb mowers, they’re so adorable. I love them.

Natalie MacLean 00:41:33 Number three how do biodynamic preparations that seem a bit woo actually benefit the vineyard? Chris says that even though it sounds odd to be putting cow dung in a horn and burying it in the ground. They’re actually making a plant probiotic. That manure attracts microorganisms in the soil, and they’re just small enough that they can fit through the cow horn, because it’s like a sieve of carotene Like your fingernails. They turn it into a beautiful hummus. After six months, it’s like a chocolate covered hummus, and they put it in an earthen jar and eventually put that into warm water, make tea, then drench the soil. And it feeds the roots so they can push deeper down into the soil. Miracle Gro is blue goo, says Chris, but a lot of people don’t think twice about putting that on their plants. But when something is all natural, he says, a lot of people are skeptical and challenge it. But this preparation is unbelievably healthy for the plants.

Natalie MacLean 00:42:36 And number four. What are the benefits of biodynamic farming practices for vine health and wine quality? As Chris explains, in conventional farming, you’re watering and feeding the plant from the top. The plant roots want to go down but synthetic chemicals are like DoorDash food. You’re delivering everything right at the surface, so the roots stay there. You end up getting a very shallow, anemic root system at the surface. Biodynamics, however, tells the vine, hey you got to work to earn a living. They don’t water or fertilize the vine. Now the roots do what they want to do, which is go down in through the different layers, find their own sources of moisture and nutrition. And that’s how you get better, more terroir driven wine. Wine that tastes of the place where it’s made.

Natalie MacLean 00:43:24 In the show notes, you’ll find a full transcript of my conversation with Chris links to his winery and wines, the video versions of these conversations on Facebook and YouTube live, and where you can order my book online now no matter where you live.  If you missed episode 215, go back and take a listen. I chat with Chuck Cramer, host of the podcast Mr. K Wine about California wines. I’ll share a short clip with you now to whet your appetite.

Chuck Cramer 00:43:51 You have Napa Sonoma just north of San Francisco, about an hour and a half drive. And then you have Paso Robles, which is Central Coast, which sits halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. And then you have Temecula, which is inland from San Diego and Los Angeles. So, you know, South Coast, Southern California. Napa only produces 4% of the wines coming out of California. Lodi is a workhorse, 22%. Paso Robles. They keep talking about how Paso Robles is emerging. Well, I think Paso Robles is here. They make great wine.

Natalie MacLean 00:44:30 You won’t want to miss next week when we continue our chat with Chris Benziger. If you liked this episode or learned even one thing from it, please email or tell a friend about the podcast this week, especially someone you know who would be interested in learning more about California wines, particularly those from the cool climate of Sonoma like Benziger. It’s easy to find my podcast. Just tell them to search for Natalie MacLean Wine on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, their favourite podcast app, or they can listen to the show on my website at nataliemaclean.com/podcast.

Natalie MacLean 00:45:12 Email me if you have a sip, tip question, or if you’d like to win one of three bottles of Benziger wine, one of two copies of Chris’s book, or if you’ve read my book or listening to it. I’d love to hear your thoughts about this episode. Were you surprised about what it takes to farm biodynamic? Have you tried biodynamic wines? Email me at [email protected]. In the show notes, you’ll also find a link to take a free online food and wine pairing class with me called The Five Wine and Food Pairing Mistakes That Can Ruin Your Dinner and How to Fix Them Forever at nataliemaclean.com/class. And that, my friend, is all in the show notes at nataliemaclean.com/320.

Natalie MacLean 00:45:49 Thank you for taking the time to join me here. I hope something great is in your glass this week, perhaps a delicious Benziger Chardonnay or Cabernet. You don’t want to miss one juicy episode of this podcast, especially the secret full bodied bonus episodes that I don’t announce on social media. So subscribe for free now at nataliemaclean.com/subscribe. Meet me here next week. Cheers.

Books and Wine, Books: Wine, Boxed Wine, Food & Wine Pairing, Podcasts, Serving Wine, Taste Wine, Wine Question, Wine Style, Wine Tasting, Wine Tasting Notes, Wine Trends, Wine Writing, Women and Wine