FEATURES
Spirits on the Red Rocks
By Lindsay DeChacco
It occurs shortly after the onset of a ride on the Verde Canyon Railroad; as
ribbons of 
verdant river valley spool beyond your windows, you’re gripped in
a stalemate of dissenting desires.
Your first instinct consists of hunkering into the deepest part of the sinking
sofa that constitutes a first-class seat and succumbing to the train’s lethargic
sway teamed to the tryptophanic properties of railroad hors d’oeuvres.
Yet a pressing sentiment — roused by the perfect pitch of excitement and urgency
laced in the cabin attendant’s tone — prods you like cattle to the observation
car.
Here you peel your eyes like a bird of prey on the panoramic tableau in hopes
of zeroing in on the promised singular glimpse of nature — like an eagle pocketed
in the canyon or a rock shaped like the Budweiser frogs.
The thrill of spotting the latter can only be compounded during Verde Canyon’s
October Ales on Rails tours, which introduce beer into the equation — one has
to wonder if it wasn’t somehow at play during the original sighting.
A few years ago, perhaps during a similarly languorous and scenic rail journey,
someone must have noted the fertile Verde Valley’s startling resemblance to California
wine country and hypothesized that it could likewise sustain a vineyard.
Within the last five years, the Arizona wine market has begun to thrive, due
in part to the burgeoning trend toward locally grown produce. During the summer,
the railroad defers, devoting at least one day of their starlight wine tours,
the Grape Train Escapes, exclusively to Verde Valley vintners.
Local wines have begun to cross-pollinate other area commerce as well, turning
up in Sedona restaurants and markets.
Geographic locality holds particular emphasis in viticulture. Terroir, a term
used in tasting, solely concerns a wine’s ability to reflect its origin through
its flavor, like a native son carries over regional colloquialisms in his manner.
In general, wine tasting — where descriptions of complex vintages are as verbose
as they are sometimes incomprehensible — feels conducive to Sedona’s appetite
for the abstract.
And given its affinity for the metaphysical, I assumed it would be the perfect
enclave to seek out organic and biodynamic wineries, which combine ethical and
spiritual considerations to the ecological and holistic approach of modern organic
farming.
Biodynamic farming is based upon the theory of turn-of-the-century Austrian philosopher,
Rudolph Steiner, whose methodologies parallel organic practices insomuch as they
eschew the use of synthesized products in the farming and vinification processes
(ie, chemical fertilizers, pesticides and sulfites).
Deliberations are heightened in biodynamics to further stay disruptions to nature’s
balance and create a self-sustaining ecology. One such principle is to keep an
ear to the biological rhythms of the environment.
Toward this end, a common tenet is to cue cultivation cycles to the astrological
calendar. Another involves packing a cow’s horn with manure and burying it in
the vineyard at full moon.
I read about one farmer who exhumes the same manure every spring, dilutes it
into obscurity, and applies the resulting elixir to his crops. He explains that
the fertilizer becomes imprinted on the water.
It struck me as something like synthesizing a homeopathic remedy, where natural
substances — poisons even — are diluted until no trace of the original material
remains. They are then used to treat symptoms that the unadulterated substance
is credited with inflicting.
I was pretty pleased with my analogy, particularly considering Steiner’s subsequent
tenet — to gird up the crops through herbal supplementation. Steiner’s preferred
method of application is feeding the vines tasty medicinal teas, steeped from
herbs like dandelion root and chamomile.
Suffice it to say, even in Sedona, critics of the techniques abound. Among them,
a symbiotic arm of wineries clustered in the dusty yellow district of Cornville,
a community that lies well within the orbit of Sedona’s red rocks.
Boutique wineries still rely heavily on agritourism, drawing visitors to their
fledgling farms through tastings and tours. Each of the tasting rooms in this
particular wine-making artery harbors a distinct charisma; Page Spring Cellars
teems with the activity of a wildly popular restaurant, while Oak Creek Vineyards
resembles a country gift shop where tasting flights are doled out at the till.
A fitting postlude, Javelina Leap proffers a masculine tasting room — a dim borough
whose moss green walls and ornate tin ceiling befit a deco-era study where men
might have retired from feminine companionship to partake in port and cigars.
Here, a genial sommelier dispenses hybrids and reserves from a cavernous glass
decanter. “I’m not the vineyard proprietor,” Glenn Buttrey declaims, “though
I’m often mistaken for him because I have gray hair.”
He possesses the affable habit of dubbing every question a good one. His renderings
generally maintain an easy-going détente between appreciation for the inherently
subjective nature of taste and his homegrown biases.
This bias is corded in his appraisal of organic wines. “They taste like salt-free
soup,” is his laid back assessment. I’m fairly certain the parallel isn’t drawn
as an endorsement to either entity.
Later, I retreat to Sedona’s raw food cafe, one place certain to appreciate the
unadulterated properties of biodynamic wine. According to their menu, Café Raw
Bliss doesn’t just serve food, it serves living superfood. (I picture friendly
bacteria and enzymes deploying in my body, like a contingent of Ms. Pacmans gobbling
away free radicals in single gulps.)
I enter the earthy restaurant with my coworker, Jared, firmly in tow. An ethereal
waitress wearing opaque tights and Uggs ushers us through a kaleidoscope of tables.
“Everything we offer is 100 percent vegan, raw and organic,” she explains.
“Yes,” I smile knowingly, “I was here yesterday.” I wonder if she can tell I
haven’t eaten animal products all weekend — well save for eggs in the morning
— but they are part of the free hotel breakfast, so that really doesn’t count.
“We actually just came to sample a glass of biodynamic wine,” I say. The truth
is I only managed to wrangle Jared into the place under the guise that it is
imperative wine research. He sits on the candy-colored chair regarding everything
with tolerant skepticism and responding to all my queries with a non-committal
smile.
“We don’t have any wine.” Wh….what?
“But it’s on the menu.”
“Yes, we’re out today. Can I recommend the kambucha? It’s a fermented tea that
we serve chilled in a wine glass.” I grapple with the idea for a moment. Kambucha
is a tea brewed from a mushroom that can split into independent organisms when
it is peeled in half.
I have a decided aversion to it, stemming from a stint in my childhood when my
mother took to brewing it in our linen closet. In my estimation, the flavor,
which is supposed to be akin to apple cider, more closely resembles sour vinegar.
A few minutes later the waitress sets a stemware tumbler of kambucha in front
of me, which I insist Jared share — for the health benefits. We both abandon
the last swallow, suspended with stringy strands of mushroom sediment.
About 20 miles southeast of Sedona, Alcantara Vineyards lies outside of Cottonwood.
Though Alcantara is not a certified organic farm, “we try to be as organic as
possible,” says vineyard owner Barbara Predmore. She also practices many sustainability
techniques — like introducing particular insects into the vineyard eco-system
— that are conducive to biodynamic farming.
The tasting room here is the central cavity in a gleaming new Tuscan farmhouse
that 
hasn’t quite settled into the property yet. Guests can cozy up to the granite-topped
bar that borders the kitchen where Katarina, Alcantara’s German-born tasting
and event manager, is stationed.
“We don’t add any sulfites to our wines during bottling,” Katarina relays as
she spreads the tasting menu before us. Nor, according to Predmore, do the wines
contain sugar additives or food coloring. In conventional vinification, these
types of properties are included in the fermentation process to ascertain and
standardize varieties.
Without them, winemaking becomes more art than science, giving the regional dialect
a greater opportunity to manifest itself. As a boutique winery, Alcantara winemakers
can withhold preservatives from their small controlled quantities to cultivate
a natural, authentic flavor.
Unbidden, Buttrey’s salt-free soup quip jumps to mind.
It occurs to me — just as I am poised to take my first sip — that maybe you have
to hold the salt to unmask Sedona wine country.
Top photo courtesy of Verde Canyon Railroad; bottom photos courtesy of ArizonaVinesandWines.com
If you go
Verde Canyon Railroad
300 N. Broadway, Clarkdale
800-293-7245
verdecanyonrr.com
Page Springs Cellars
1500 N. Page Springs Rd., Cornville
928-639-3004
pagespringscellars.com
Oak Creek Vineyards & Winery
1555 N. Page Springs Rd., Cornville
928-649-0290
oakcreekvineyards.net
Javelina Leap Vineyard and Winery
1565 Page Springs Rd., Cornville
928-649-2681
javelinaleapwinery.com
Alcantara Vineyards
3445 S. Grapevine Way, Verde Valley
928-649-VINE
alcantaravineyard.com
Red Rock Wine Country Tour
June 5-7, 2009
$655 per person
Contact
AAA Travel for more information.
