Brett and award-winning wines

GO DIRECTLY TO THE COMMENTS, ADDED 1 MARCH

GO DIRECTLY TO LATEST COMMENTS – 6 MARCH

In October last year, Angela Lloyd wrote an article regretting the way that wines affected with the spoilage yeast brettanomyces (or simply ' brett' were being awarded medals at competititions, most recently in the Veritas competition. (Click here for the article and the comments it received at the time.)

The following letter, addressing Angela Lloyd, was received from Paul Benadé CWM, former owner of Lievland.

From Paul Benadé:

Regarding this blatant and unsubstantiated attack on wine competitions and particularly the Veritas Shiraz panel’s decision to award certain double gold and gold medals cannot go unanswered.

You claimed that the panel lacked the ability to recognise ‘Brettanomyces’ (spoilage yeast) and that the presence of this contaminant was of no consequence to the final outcome. However, this damning statement can have significant financial implications for the 19 producers who were awarded these accolades as well as confusing the consumers.

To invent unfounded and untested drivel can be seriously damaging to the South African Wine Industry at large. With such accusations, I trust you have tasted these 19 wines, made notes, identified the ‘Brett’ infected samples or even bothered to have them analysed at an accredited laboratory.

Since our panel uses sensory evaluation to get to a score without the aid of a comprehensive accredited laboratory analysis, some debate did arise around the levels of ‘Brett’ funk in some of the wines. But, each and every wine was thoroughly evaluated and debated until we reached a consensus so as to give every entrant the benefit of any doubt.

Since you seem to have expert knowledge on the matter, we request you reveal the wines you are alluding to, what lead to the conclusions and a micro-biological analysis of these wines, to support your accusations.

By writing such a contemptuous article around vinous concepts that you perhaps cannot substantiate or fully grasp shows your lack of tasting evaluation and can only be damaging for a wine journalist such as yourself.

Just imagine a foreign buyer offering you a glass of Syrah at a restaurant. The buyer has just ordered 2000 cases of this wine. You advise him that the level of ‘Brett’ is unacceptable. He phones his supplier, cancels the order telling them he is doing it on your expert advice. Subsequent analysis proves that there is no detectable ‘Brett’ in the wine. The winery sues you for loss of income and damages.

Not possible? It has already happened. An ‘expert ‘ told an agent that a wine was seriously ‘Brett’ infected. After so called expert was proved wrong, the agent decided to go ahead with the order. Luckily for the ‘expert’, no steps were taken against him.

I also believe you have been a ‘Platter Wine Guide’ panellist for the past few years. Did you not forward wines for the 5-star accolade and when some of the wines did achieve this prestigious status, where later to be found ‘Brett’ contaminated? I've not heard or seen any response from you on this issue....

Perhaps there are other ‘Bretty’ skeletons lurking in your cupboard…or maybe you have discovered the magic wand that can guide the rest of us out of our ‘Bretty’ quagmire.

I look forward to sharing your knowledge and expertise on this topic. Please do not disappoint me

Mr Benadé also included a copy of a note he had written to Paul Walsh, the Australian who had served on the Veritas Shiraz panel, which included the following: 'Don’t know if you’ve read Angela’s article in ‘Grape’, so I sent it to you (this morning). This was my response to her. We had the wines analysed. Charl Theron was extremely happy with the results even though two wines showed levels of brett above the threshold. I would appreciate any comments if you would care do make any.

Angela Lloyd responds:

My purpose in writing this article was not the damnation of competitions but rather to suggest that it’s more important to get people to drink and enjoy wine than to award medals. Quite simply, if wine doesn’t taste nice, people won’t drink it. Brett affected wines can taste very nasty; some of the Veritas awarded wines, and please note I didn’t say this was either limited to or incorporated all the double gold or gold medal shiraz winners, did indeed taste unpleasant. I wasn’t the only person to express this opinion.

In support of this contention Paul admits that, ‘some debate did arise around the levels of “Brett” funk in some of the wines’ among the judges on the shiraz panel. Given individuals have different threshold levels of recognition, presumably the “Brett” funk’ was more evident to some judges than others, hence my statement that the majority of the SA judges `either didn’t recognise the brett or its presence didn’t trouble them.’ I never claimed they lacked the ability to recognise brett.

In his note to Brian Walsh, Paul mentions that `We had the wines analysed. Charl Theron was extremely happy with the results even though two wines showed levels of brett above the threshold.’ Although he doesn’t say when such analyses were carried out – directly after the Veritas judging, to verify or otherwise the panel’s acknowledgement that there was ‘“Brett” funk in some of the wines’, or after my article appeared – in either case, allowing wines with a quantified defect to retain their double gold or gold medals does Veritas and winelovers a disservice.

It may be of interest that a wine I was seriously considering submitting for a Platter five star rating last year, (incidentally my 20^th year tasting for the guide), I also believed to show elements of brett. Analysis revealed it had what the lab described as `relatively high levels’ of both 4-EP and 4-EG. The wine was not put up for five stars.

COMMENTS

From Dave Ingram:
Quoting Paul: 'We had the wines analysed. Charl Theron was extremely happy with the results even though two wines showed levels of brett above the threshold.'
My questions are
1. Was Charl happy with the quantity of brett?
2. The resultant flavour from the brett?

Good questions indeed. By the way, Charl Theron is listed by Veritas as 'Chairperson Quality Development Groups' . — Editor

From Clive Sindelman:
4-ep smells awful, but 4 -eg smells savoury and spicy and when in high concentrations masks the rank 4-ep odours. Hell if I were a wine-maker, I think I would add loads of that 4-eg that everybody loves so double gold, five star!

From Joel Goldberg:
This argument simply has no right or wrong, because one person's "too much brett" is another person's 'complexity'.

From winewriter J P Rossouw:
I disagree that this debate has 'no right or wrong', as brett is considered a fault and can be measured. It destroys a wine over a short time, and this is not something wine drinkers should want to tolerate. Let's test proposed award winners I say.

FURTHER CORRESPONDENCE WITH PAUL BENADE

We publish below a further letter from Paul Benadé addressed to Angela Lloyd. At Grape we believe strongly in open, uncensored discussion, which is why we publish it – although we feel the letter’s personally-directed virulence means that its value as a contribution to debate is sadly reduced.

Angela Lloyd herself declines to comment further on the issue, feeling she has nothing further to add under the circumstances. She never intended to accuse specific wines.

It is a pity that a potentially useful discussion about the (apparently increasing) presence of the brettanomyces taint in wine should be spoilt by the level of personal animosity shown by Mr Benadé.

As we understand it, his central point includes the perception that Angela Lloyd in her article exaggerated the presence of brett in Veritas medal winners, and that this was irresponsible. This, we agree, is a position that might be worth discussing and assessing in a rational manner. It is arguable that there are too many untested accusations being flung around in South Africa and elsewhere on this matter.

On the other hand, he quotes laboratory test results that indicate that certainly at least two Veritas gold medal winners had ‘perceptible’ levels of brett (we might point out out that levels of ‘perceptibility’ will vary among tasters). This is surely at least some vindication for Angela Lloyd’s original regret that brett-affected wines were awarded medals (not only by the shiraz panel), rather than being a valid excuse for Mr Benadé’s response.

The numerous people who have employed Angela Lloyd as a wine judge over the past few decades will take such note as they wish of Mr Benadé’s low opinion of her capabilities. We at Grape have little doubt that they will not agree with him any more than we do.

From Paul Benadé, addressed to Angela Lloyd:

I find your reply to my letter extremely disappointing, to say the least Not only do you refrain from naming a single wine out of the plentiful evidence of malodourous ‘brett’ that you found among the double gold and gold medallists, you also give us no insight into your apparent organoleptic skills and knowledge on the ‘brett’ issue.

Once again, your letter offers no positive feedback except to expose your lack of grasping the facts. You should read your own article again. There was nothing positive in it for any consumer. We are also aware that consumers are reliant on the outcome of the various competitions as a guide only. But it is also important for the producers to see how their wines fare.

You know that Brettanomyces yeast are unique in their ability to synthesize the volatile phenols 4-ethylphenol (4-EP) and 4-ethylguaiacol (4-EG). These compounds are an important part of the ‘brett’ character in wine and are important for monitoring ‘brett’. In fact, ‘brett’ is the only common organism in wine capable of producing 4-EP. Any reportable concentration of 4-EP indicates the presence of ‘brett’. This concentration is related the concentration of ‘brett’ and its activity, and increases in the 4-EP concentration is indicative of an active ‘brett’ population. 4-EP is mostly described as ‘medicinal’ and ‘band-aid’ and 4-EG as ‘smokey’ and ‘spicey or a ‘wet, burnt wood’ aroma. The sensory threshold for 4-EP is 140- and for 4-EG it is 620 microgram/litre.

Yes, the wines were analysed after I read your article. Elsabé Ferreira provided us with the extra samples of double gold and gold medal winners, that were supplied by the wineries for judging at Veritas. In conjunction with Duimpie Bayly and Bennie Howard (of Veritas), Charl Theron then aranged for the analysis of these wines for both the 4-EP as well as the 4-EG.

NONE of the wines tested positive for any perceptible 4-EG. NONE of the double gold winners tested positive for any perceptible 4-EP. Two of the gold medal winners did test positive for 4-EP levels above the sensory threshold.

‘Brett’ was debated, yes. But so were alcohols, acids, tannin, v.a, cork, etc. And judging 224 wines, just about everything possible would receive attention. It happens at every tasting, you should know!

‘Brett’ is not always easy detectable organolepticaly because of the complex composition and myriad of aromas, textures and tastes and style of each wine. That is why some winemakers feel that a little ‘brett’ is not the worst thing that can happen to a wine. There are some basic methods for the prevention of ‘brett’ growth’ in wine, but most have detrimental effects on wine quality. Decreasing pH, increasing SO2, decreasing aging temperature, avoiding barrels, and sterile filtration are all going to be effective at controlling ‘brett’, to some degree. Yet some of these techniques may render the wine lifeless, boring and without personality. Many great wines of the word live with small amounts of ‘brett’. Chateau Pichon Longueville Comtess de Lalande 1989 was rated 92 by the Wine Spectator. Tests showed that the wine had 15 800 ng/ml of 4-EP!

I agree with you that you, nor anybody else, will always recognise that ‘brett’ is present. But to claim to find ‘brett’ when it is not present and to act upon it, is malicious, criminal and inexcusable, to the judges involved and also the producers (wines) who were awarded medals. To say that you were not the only person to find the wines tasting unpleasant is passing the buck and hiding behind nonetities. You wrote the article! And you are the one that is shouting ‘brett’. I think the entire country is waiting for you to identify those wines you included in ‘the number of badly brett-infected wines being highly awarded on competitions’. Or was your article just a sensation-seeking hoax. There is only one way to redeem yourself : name the wines and prove that they are so malodorously brett infected.

The wine analysis results and your response to me letter has proved that as far as I am concerned, you have written one of the most ill-judged and damaging articles on wine that South Africa has ever seen. It also proves that you have NO idea of the taste, smell and identification of ‘brett’, seeing that you have failed to enlighten us and that you are a danger to the South African Wine Industry on this subject.

FURTHER COMMENT

From Vinfundi:
There is a nasty fungus-induced chemical compund out there that makes all wines taste the same.  It reduces the fruit characters in all wines and basically makes shiraz indiscernable from merlot, from Cabernet (either Franc or Sauvignon). It is detectable by trained judges, or so we think. Yet, obviously, there are those who cannot identify it. Most (if not all - I do know people who would quite contentedly drink a bottle of this vile stuff) of us would shy away from an infected wine. Cork taint is a real bitch! I use this term as it so aptly describes the emotions behind this "brett" debate.  Come on guys, with the Soccer World Cup to be played here in 2010 shouldn't we all learn to play the ball and not the man?

From Cassuis:

The debate, if you can call it that will never end. Firstly, sorry JP, journo or no journo, nothing in wine is as clear cut as you want to put it. Wine is a luxury commodity and thus, slight differences and nuances is what makes it what it is. Same argument and old school thought was held 15 years ago about VAs [levels of volatile acidity – essentially vinegar!] that need to be under 0,55mg or it's detrimental; surprise surprise, a slightly higher VA has proven king! As for Brett, who exactly ‘decided’ it's a spoilage yeast? Jancis in the Oxford companion?

But I'm sure you will be the first to tell the Chateau de Beaucastel boys their wine is spoiled and rubbish, seeing that South Africa has such a strong tradition and untouchable market strength.
By the by, Brettanomyces the yeast gets transferred from your grapes to your cellar. True bad cellar management will lead to a build up of the yeast spore, Dekkera, in your cellar and lead to out of control brett.

But the fact that it occurs naturally in your vineyards, reminds me of another journo word ... terroir?? But innoculating with a cultured yeast that comes from France is much more true to the real expression of the fruit I guess.

I do admit, there are many wines that are vitally flawed with Brett, but so are others with VA, wood, malolactics, acid adjustment and cork taint. Again, this is not a Coca Cola industry; if eveybody jumped to the snap of the journo whip of whistle-clean fruit for the enjoyment of Joe Public, things would look bleak! But then I do recall reading a article of yours [ie JP Rossouw’s] where you refer to being tired of hearing about all the ‘passion’ that the winemakers put into their wines? There are very few industries where people will pack the hours and physical work if it wasn't for passion, you should know, your other half is also in a wine family? [Here Cassuis refers to the fact that JP Rossouw recently married into the Beaumont family, owners of the Overberg winery of the same name].

Angela, I'm not going to say much. Take the Veritas awards winners, both double gold and gold. Take your new Platter guide and compare. Enough said. Excluding three wines that were awarded at Veritas, all are rated in the Platters guide 2006. Out of the 32 ( I took the majority of the reds getting Double Gold, just Shiraz getting Gold) only 7 of them scored three and a half stars in Platter - all the others got four stars and five got four and half stars. Now in my world, math tells me that the lowest scoring wine got 70 %, the majority got 80%, and the rest 90% – those are pretty convincing scores.
Why is it then that these flawed Brett wines that got rewarded at the shows, actually got rewarded in the Platter guide, for which you have been a taster for 20 years now?
Veritas award results are all but forgotten in two months time and have no international recognition, but the Platter guide will be in use for up to two years, especially by foreign visitors, who want an informed opinion. I think the damage is on a much grander scale on your side, don't you?

From the Editor: I think we must declare the debate closed as far as Mr Benadé's vituperations go. OK, Paul - we've taken your point, I promise, and are getting a bit bored.

From Dave Ingram:
If Brett is not a problem why do wineries try and get rid of it? One I know of recently had a severe fall-off in quality, related to brett according to the winemaker, and winery. They cleaned  out and now their wines are top of the pile again. Maybe their winery was severely affected, or maybe their clean-out got rid of something else?

From Clive Sindelman:
I have read all the debate and it seems to me that there may be a lot of SA wine that smells and tastes offensive to some, not always on account of Brett. If it's not always Brett, what could it be? Storage quality? I drink a glass of good red SA for lunch everyday and the degree of bottle variability is ridiculous! One day wine X is great and the next day, new bottle, the mustiness and flavour imbalance is terrible.

A dipstick chemical analysis for wine is desperately needed. Come on clever inventor, give us one and then we can settle these questions straight away.

FURTHER COMMENTS (Added 1 March 2006)

From Carl Schultz, winemaker at Hartenberg Estate

Perhaps the following needs to be said about the Brett debate.On the evening of the Veritas public tasting in Cape Town last year I spent the evening tasting the categories of Pinotage, Shiraz and Chardonnay. I was very surprised to find a Shiraz with very clear traits of Brett (in the interest of the producer I choose not to reveal the identity).

Reading the debate it becomes clear that personal detection levels and liking of some of these wines differs greatly, especially at lower levels, but this wine was stripped of both its fruit and varietal identity. It reminded me of what we thought good SA Shiraz was supposed to be a couple of years ago – sweaty saddle, farmyard and leathery characters perhaps (characteristics, I might add, giving the reason why many people would not drink old style Shiraz).

I found a second Shiraz with lighter taint,but the first was full-blown to the point that I thought that there had to have been an oversight. For this reason I showed the wine to the Shiraz panel chairman, who also was present that evening. He immediately recognised the problem in the wine and said there were many examples judged which also showed this taint, that they had discussed the taint, but that he felt that it represented a certain style and that they had only penalised ‘wyne met kwaai Brett’ [wines with bad Brett]. The Chairman felt they represented the Old World (which, having tasted many beautiful examples with pure fruit, unshackled by this taint, I find a highly debatable and very general comment). There can then be no argument by one of the judges that Gold medals were in fact awarded to some wines showing Brett taint.

I divulge the above because as a long-time supporter and entrant to Veritas I was hoping that fellow Shiraz panelists would give their own civil, balanced views and because I hope that Mr Duimpie Bayly [chair of the SA National Wine Show exec] and Veritas do not condone the manner in which one of its judges has chosen to wage this debate on a public platform. I have met Brian Walsh [the Australian Veritas panelist] on several occasions, and he is the perfect gentleman and most certainly would not accede to Paul Benadé’s tirade.

Paul, your manner is unbecoming of both a Veritas judge and a Cape WIne Master: don’t shoot the messenger if you do not like the message. Perhaps you should consider offering Angela Lloyd an apology and reconsider judging at Veritas in future.

The fact of the matter is, awarding clearly tainted Brett wines sends the wrong message to both winemaker and consumer. Shiraz quality in South Africa is at an all-time high, and I often quietly applaud some of the wines I get to taste or which do well at local or international shows.
I close my case and am not interested in a back and forth verbal battle, Paul – the facts are plain to see.

PS Cassuis: There is no published, documented research in the last 20 years able to prove the migration of Brett from grapes to cellar, nor has there ever been to my knowledge.

More from Cassuis:
Personally I think the Brett thing has taken on a life of it's own by now, same as the sauvignon blanc scandal did two years ago, just for more serious and substantiated reasons. We need more reporting down to the man, call a spade a spade, and write down the names of wines or producers who are slack for whatever reason. Journos have a massive responsibility, and none of our critics are taken seriously in the international context, because they won't say X, Y and Z is faulty for whatever reason. Do they doubt their tasting abilities so much that making a broad comment is safety in numbers?

A response to Cassuis from Tim James:
Yes, I agree that journalists do have primary responsibility to the consumer, and I agree that this is not all that often carried out, and that many of them feel more commitment to 'the industry' (whatever that might be), or to the whole business of 'sunshine journalism', or to keeping producers from being nasty to them when they deliver some truths. I think this all applies internationally as well as locally, though it is worse here partly because journalists have to continually interact with wine producers, and understand their problems. (But – defensively – I think you're demonstrably wrong to say that 'none of our critics are taken seriously in the international context'!)

Personally: I seem to have heard 'experts' (highly trained winemakers as well as confident journalists), at some stage, name just about every single local wine as having Brett. They frequently disagree with each other. I have stopped believing most of them until it's backed up by analysis. Incidentally, I wrote in once to Jancis Robinson's website when she quoted a Swiss sommelier and a fancy Australian wine judge as having found Brett in, respectively, two eminent Cape Shirazes that I knew did not have the taint.

Knowing my own inadequacies, and my own unresolved questions about when and to what extent Brett is acceptable, I seldom publicly make accusations about Brett. In the current Platter Guide, though, I wrote about a few wines that I knew to be offensively Bretty and spoke of 'animal aromas', etc, and lowered their ratings. This is very rare in Platter, unfortunately (after all, the wine that Angela Lloyd referred to as not going forward for the five-star tasting because of Brett did end up getting four and a half stars! - maybe it deserved them, but the rating was given despite proven taint). I felt very worried about writing these elliptical comments, as it is a nice, modest winery – and I would prefer them to clean up their act than to be drummed out of business; but consumers should be warned of problems by us, if we take our job seriously.

But I believe, frankly, having seen plenty of inconsistency, that most of us winewriters (as with foreign ones too) are simply not competent to make specific and untested pronouncements about Brett (I certainly am not) – certainly not enough so to risk doing possibly unjustified damage to a winery. I'd be willing to bet against anyone I know getting it absolutely right with a mixed case of infected and non-infected wines. Unfortunately, testing for Brett is not easy or cheap to back up suspicions. Platter, for example, could not, I think, afford to test a large number of wines – and could not risk libel claims without such tests.

The Brett police have justice on their side, and often get it right, but they also make too many mistakes. At this stage, I personally think it is better to not have too many specific accusations of Brett being flung about. But I do think that it is important to make generalisations about the problem, and to seek to inform winelovers, and only where there is certainty to make specific accusations.

From Kent Scheermeyer [sommelier at Bosman’s restaurant at the Grande Roche in Paarl]:

I would like to comment on the responsibility of a judge/wine writer etc. to point out producers which have a problem with their hygiene in their cellars.

The disadvantage of generalising a problem is that one would always find producers (sometimes more – sometimes less) who will not sort out the problem until they are forced to do so. This can only happen with informing the puplic openly. Let’s be honest, a producer will not take any action unless he or she struggles to sell the product. It is also very worrying that some producers hide their hygiene problem behind a style which they pretend to produce.

As a wine buyer, I would like to see the content of 4 EP and 4 EG displayed on analysis sheets as is done with ph, TA, alc, sugar etc, as it is very difficult to detect Brett in very young wines – it becomes more obvious with age (referring to my tasting skills!).

Why has the Wine & Spirit Board not tackled this problem? As the approval authority in South Africa they should not support wines of this nature without investigating the questions surrounding it. Have they detected and/or adressed the problem in some manner, or will it come down to a journalist or a judge to address this matter?

A brief response from Tim James:
A very interesting idea that all wines should be analysed for Brett before being submitted for certification. And any wine found guilty to be denied it? I suspect that there would first have to be legislation to declare the legal threshholds (as is already done with volatile acidity - but as far as I know that is the only 'fault' that producers have to declare, both here and elsewhere in the world.) I suspect there is not enough agreement on the 'faulty' nature of Brett for this to be an easy matter.

And given the indisputable fact that some of the wines that are or have been widely regarded around the world as great are affected by Brett, things become difficult. I know that I have had some Bretty wines which are awful, and some which are lovely. Perhaps the lovely ones would have been better without (I don't know), but it would have been absurd to have had them legislated out of existence.