The Swiss Army Knife of Winemaking

Lees! (from the archives)

In the summer my glass turns to muscadet, the air conditioner in a bottle from the Atlantic coast of the Loire. That also means my thoughts turn to lees, the spent yeasts that turn the fruit juice into wine. I’ve been fascinated by how they are used in élevage, not only to build complexity in muscadet which has long been cited as the one technique after organic farming that adds to muscadet’s personality, but the way those dead yeast cells provide protection, especially in wines that use no or minimal sulfur. They seem almost mystical.