Have You Tried Vegan Wine?

I know that some people hear the term "vegan wine" and start to wonder how there could be meat, cheese, or milk in wine. While wine and beer doesn't have any animal products in the actual ingredients, they are often processed with them.

The most common animal products in regular wines are casein, albumen, chitosan, egg whites, isinglass, gelatin, and dried blood powder.

The idea of dried blood powder grosses you out, doesn't it? Well, me too.

The purpose of these animal ingredients is often to help clarify, filter, refine, and generally produce wines and beers. The end result is a very small amount of animal products in regular wines, but strict vegans care about how food products are processed.

For strict vegetarians and vegans, the idea of using an animal in order to produce something for a human to eat or drink is ethically wrong. We don't think that one being is more important than any other, and when there are other options and ways around using animal products, there doesn't seem to be any reason not to use them.

Luckily, there are options for clarifying and refining wines that are totally vegan. Instead of the animal ingredients, vegan vinters use bentonite clay to refine their wines.

Vegan wines are no longer impossible to find, but they are still not well labeled. Because the refining ingredients aren't actually in the wine, it isn't required that they are listed on the bottle.

The best way to figure out how the wines are produced is to ask the wine maker. Now, the average person doesn't have access to wine makers, but many wine stores keep track of which wines are vegetarian-friendly.

Here's a great little pocket guide to vegan-friendly wines. This is especially helpful when you're in the wine store or out to dinner staring at a wine list and wondering what your animal-friendly wine options might be.

As an added note, a vegan-friendly wine that is not on the above list is Aum Cellars, which has both reds and whites.

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