Wild yeast is not the secret indispensable answer to making great wine. It’s one of the ways to develop complexity in wines, even if this added complexity is short-lived. The majority of winemakers feel these methods make their craft more interesting and challenging, assuring the use of wild yeast will continue to grow in the production of super premium wines.
There are groups of winemakers who continually look for techniques that will help them improve wine quality. The “indigenous yeast” trend became a buzz word popularized by influential wine critics of wines made with more natural, less interventionist techniques. Native yeast start the fermentation naturally in contrast to the common California, and in recent years European, practice of adding yeast to start the fermentation.
