Interesting article in the WS on France's struggle to define "natural" wine:
WS:NaturalWine
Apparently the organic wine folks feel threatened that the advent of "natural" wine will fragment & diminish their market and are pushing the AOC bureaucrats to define what "natural" wine means. Yet the producers of "natural" wine can't agree amongst themselves what "natural" means.
I think the definition of "natural" wine is simple. If SweetAlice says the wine is "natural", then, by dammies, it is "natural".
I say don't try to define "natural" wine...it's impossible. Let chaos reign in the marketplace. It's well known that we wine consumers are easily mislead and, for the most part, clueless. Besides, I don't see any winemakers who are in a rush to put "natural" on their label. Most "natural" winemakers readily share the details of how they made their wine.
"Natural" wines are easy to identify anyway. If the wine smells like a Kansas outhouse on a hot/Summer day...than $$'s to donuts it's a "natural" wine..the way a wine is supposed to smell.
Tom