La Cabane a Vin: Hong Kong's wine non-interventionists
This tiny new wine shop on Hollywood Road sells organic, biodynamic and "natural" wines
La Cabane a Vin also has lounge space where customers linger for hours tasting different bottles.
La Cabane á Vin has launched under a staircase on Hollywood Road in Hong Kong.
The city’s first natural wine shop, La Cabane á Vin opened its doors two months ago. Rebelling against mass-produced wine, the shop stocks only "natural" and bio-dynamic wines from small-scale winemakers in France, Spain and Greece. Every bottle they carry is made from organically grown grapes with little to no additives.
La Cabane was founded by Algerian-born Karim Hadjadj and a group of French wine lovers. A pilot by profession, Hadjadj first learned of "natural" wine in 2000 while visiting a friend in the Côtes du Rhône region in Southern France. Ever since, he has become a convert who finds it difficult to drink conventional wine. His newfound mantra is, “There are no bad grapes, only bad wine makers.”
More than organic
Hadjadj fondly describes natural winemakers as “the non-interventionists.” In contrast to conventional winemakers, they refuse to alter wine with manufactured yeasts, sugars or other additives. Instead they handpick grapes and produce wine in small quantities not unlike how it was made hundreds of years ago. The only unnatural product they use is a bare amount of sulphites for preservation while some natural winemakers reject sulphites all together.
Meanwhile, biodynamic winemakers go one step further. Taking a holistic approach, they also consider the cycles of the moon and the theory of anthroposophy when farming grapes.
According to Hadja, natural wine is uncommon in Hong Kong. So far, he has only encountered a few expensive bottles like the famed Romanée-Conti which has been produced naturally since the 1980s.
For most countries outside of Europe, natural wine is still a relatively new concept. Two exceptions are Japan, which has been importing natural wine since the mid-1990s and the United States where it has been sold for more than a decade.
To date, there are no consistent certifications for natural wines. “Natural winemakers are seen as anarchists of sorts,” Hadjadj explains.
"Natural" wine: environmentally and olfactorally friendly.
Hadjadj explains, “Even though some winemakers are organic in the vineyard, it doesn’t mean they are organic during the vinification process, they can still use chemical additives and sulphites.”
Often a bottle will list “organically grown grapes” on its label which may mean that no pesticides were used but the wine still could have been chemically altered further down the line.
La Cabane á Vin opened with the promise of bringing something more than organic into Hong Kong. Holding small gatherings and spreading the natural message is their mission. As for the bottom line, Hadjadj makes profit sound like an afterthought.
“Natural wine is sold at an honest price to reflect the work of the winemaker. Meanwhile, the price of conventional wine corresponds to the market. Instead of making wine they want to make money,” he says. “We just wanted to open a place where people feel good and can talk about wine.”
La Cabane á Vin, basement Floor, 97 Hollywood Road (entrance on Shin Hing Street), Central, tel +852 2517 0186, www.au-naturel-wine.com
