Vegan Winos Can Now Enjoy Certified Murder-Free Chianti

Any vegan worth his or her Bragg's Liquid Aminos knows that wine is often not entirely animal-free.

We're not talking about yeast, which is definitely not a plant and only technically a fungus, at least as we commonly conceive of them. In its natural, unfiltered state, wine can be clouded with dead yeast cells, grape bits, and other effluvia created during the fermentation process. To give you a sparklingly clear glass of booze, winemakers often use fining agents made from blood and bone marrow, casein from milk, chitin from shellfish shells, egg albumen, gelatin, and isinglass, made from delicious fish bladders.

These de-veganizing ingredients are used far and wide in both winemaking and beer brewing, but lately some producers have begun backing away from them in order to appeal to a crunchier customer base.

One such company is Fattoria Casabianca, an Italian winery located near Siena in the Chianti region. It claims to have made the first certified vegan Chianti in existence.

"The grape is traced every step of the way, from our organically farmed vineyards to the bottle," Alberto Cenni, Casabianca's manager, told Italian wire service ANSA. The winery's agronomist, Giacomo Sensi, noted that the whole operation is animal-free, from the fields to the adhesives used on the bottle labels. The winery, which produces 400,000 bottles a year, said that all of its wines will go vegan starting with the 2014 harvest.

But wait—is this really the first vegan Chianti?

Not at all, if you do a little digging. Casabianca may be the first winery to be certified by the Associazione Vegetariana Italiana, a private non-profit organization, but other vintners in the Chianti region long ago decided to eschew animal products.

Querciabella—which has vineyards in Chianti's Greve, Panzano, Radda, and Gaiole comunes—claims that it has been committed to animal-free organic farming since 1988, following the principles of biodynamic viticulture. (Presumably without the cow skulls.) And that's not an accident: Querciabella says that its farming practices are "not only key to producing wines of exquisite quality and marked territoriality, but is also a direct challenge against the industrialized farming establishment – an economic behemoth based on the systematic exploitation of animals, which scientific research shows to have devastating effects on our planet." (PETA, meet your wine wet dream.)

But Querciabella is hardly alone. Barnivore, a site which tallies which of the world's booze offerings are friendly to vegans, has a list of more than a dozen Chianti producers who claim that their wine is vegan.

Wineries don't always advertise that fact, however. "Our wines contain no animal ingredients, and we do not use animal products for the treatment or filtration of wines," said a representative from the Monte Bernardi winery in an email to Barnivore. "[The] wine is made using only indigenous yeasts and bacteria. The regular addition of sulfur is kept at the minimum necessary to protect the taste and the natural color of the grape. That's it!" Though Monte Bernardi, located in Panzano, doesn't use the word "vegan" on its site, it does note that it farms biodynamically and refrains from using filtration or fining ingredients.

Remember, vegans: A quick call or email can often be of more use than a label.