Wine Liberated

Over the last eighty years, wine has developed into a global monoculture—but an eclectic group of vintner rebels are redefining the culture and creation of wine.Just a few varieties of a single species of grape dominate the wine market: Millions of acres of Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and a few others grow across many countries on nearly every continent. When you think of wine, what you probably think of is a product of colonial capitalism and sustained by pesticides. What might wine become when we free ourselves from the belief that our current idea of wine is the highest and best version that it can be? Since 2019, Adam L. Huss, winemaker and host of the popular podcast Beyond Organic Wine, has been seeking out, interviewing, and learning from a revolutionary group of producers who are pushing wine beyond the boundaries of the industry’s hegemony. Wine Liberated explores the big questions about what wine is and what it can become when it’s ecologically minded, diverse, and even more delicious.“This extraordinary book turns every aspect of the modern wine world on its head. . . . Huss exposes centuries of prejudice, narrow-mindedness, and self-interest that shaped the way we think about wine today . . . [and] seeks out the iconoclasts and free thinkers who are moving the conversation forward.”—Simon J. Woolf, author of Amber Revolution“A provocative and inspiring look at wine beyond convention. Adam Huss challenges us to rethink the relationship between fermentation, ecology, and place, opening the door to a richer and more diverse vision of what wine can become.”—Pascal Baudar, author of The Wildcrafting Brewer

Adam Huss started learning and blogging about wine in 2004. He started making wine in 2007 and growing wine in 2012. Along the way, he took  introductory level tests with The Wine & Spirits Education Trust (WSET) and the Court of Master Sommeliers, but he found something missing in these widely revered institutions of formal wine training and didn’t pursue education with either. He chose instead to take the practical approach by working in and with wine and vines. Starting in 2012, Adam converted his Los Angeles yard into a permaculture-inspired wine-producing perennial polyculture, named Crenshaw Cru Winegarden. In 2019, Adam started Centralas, a commercial licensed winery headquartered in South Los Angeles. When he started Centralas, Adam also began recording and publishing the Organic Wine Podcast, which he later renamed the Beyond Organic Wine Podcast. He has interviewed over 180 wine professionals, scientists, authors, and wine farmers and producers from around the world. Recently, Adam and his wife moved from California to the Finger Lakes region of New York State, where he plans to develop an experimentation site for married vines, which are co-planted perennial polycultures made of vines growing on living trees supported by an understory of other beneficial plants.