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What do you do if dry January - or some other dry month - is on your list, but you don’t want to give up wine? First, you need to listen to this podcast! We had the great pleasure of interviewing Duncan Shouler from Giesen Wines, and spoke to him in-depth about their zero-alcohol wines. Like many of the winemakers we talk to, Duncan did not start out to be a winemaker. In fact, he started out in marine biology and was surfing before finally listening to his calling. Duncan spent most of his career making “regular” wine, which is probably why his non-alcohol wines taste so good. In this episode, we talk to Duncan about how zero-alcohol wines are made, what the Spinning Cone process is to remove alcohol (sounds intimidating, but it’s not!), and why zero-alcohol is a category that is growing in popularity. Like all good wine, Giesen Wine is meant to be paired with food, and this is especially true for their zero-alcohol wines. Curious?!? Then listen in to learn more!
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Show Notes
Special Episode! Meet the (Wine) Makers #6: Duncan Shouler! 00:00
Today we are talking with a winemaker from New Zealand who is focused on making great, zero alcohol wines. You may not be familiar with zero-alcohol wines, but they are growing piece of the market, and there are a lot of winemakers, like our guest Duncan Shouler, who are trying to change people’s minds on low to no alcohol wine.
Introduction to the Interview with Duncan Shouler 00:28
Hello, and welcome to The Wine Pair Podcast! I’m Joe, your sommelier of reasonably priced wine, and for this special episode, I am on my own as my wine pairing partner in crime is busy making cakes for her Baby Cakes micro-barkery, which by the way you can learn more about if you head over to her website lovebabycakes.com.
Now, as a quick orientation to our podcast, what we usually do in each episode is learn about, taste, and review three wines that are reasonably priced, which means under $20, and should be easy to find. However, for this special set of episodes, we will interview people who are involved in actually making wine. Because part of what we want to do with our podcast is to educate ourselves and you on different aspects of wine knowledge in a fun, entertaining, and unstuffy way, even fun and entertaining as Decanter magazine has called our podcast, and that is what we are doing today!
A small plug before we get to the interview with Duncan - if you like what you are hearing or are interested in hearing our other “regular” episodes, please subscribe to our podcast so you can hear more - especially since you are only getting one half of The Wine Pair Podcast in this episode! You can also go to our website to send us a note or subscribe to our newsletter, you can follow us on Instagram at The Wine Pair Podcast, and, if you like what you are hearing, leave us a nice rating and review!
Ok, let’s get to the interview with Duncan Shouler
Interview with Duncan Shouler 01:52
Hello Duncan - and welcome to The Wine Pair Podcast.
For all of our listeners we have a really special treat as we are joined by Duncan Shouler who is the Chief Winemaker at Giesen Wines. Giesen Wines is from the beautiful country of New Zealand and specializes in Zero Alcohol wines where they use an innovative technique called Spinning Cones to dealcoholize their wines. So we’ll talk about that, the special challenges to making a great zero alcohol wine, and how Duncan works hard to make great tasting wine!
Thank you very much for joining us, Duncan
I’m very excited to learn more - zero alcohol wine is a really fascinating subject for me, but why don’t we start out with you telling us a little bit about you - your background, family, etc. and then we can talk about your fascinating wine adventure.
Interview Questions:
- Tell us a little about yourself - your background, your family, etc.
- Tell us about how you got into winemaking. Was this something you had planned for and pursued, or did it "find" you?
- Studied marine biology in Scotland, transferred to Auckland, and was a scuba instructor
- Returned to school to get a masters in wine making
- Did you have a mentor, or someone who taught you the ropes? Were there different people for creating dealcoholized wines?
- What do you think defines you as a winemaker and makes you and your wines special - and maybe think about that from the perspective of other zero alcohol wines as well as wines with alcohol in them?
- Do you lean more towards the art or the science of wine (or both)?
- What’s driving the new appreciation of alcohol-removed wines?
- How do you “remove” the alcohol to make Giesen 0% wines?
- What’s Next for Non-Alcoholic Wine and the Giesen 0% premium range?
- What’s something surprising, interesting, exciting, or funny you have learned about yourself when you were involved in making wine?
- Do you have to keep tasting wine with alcohol to make sure you are keeping things similar? Or would that be a distraction?
- Can we focus some time on Giesen 0% Sparkling Brut? As well as Giesen’s innovative spinning cone technology?
- Giesen Group is leading the category investment as the first New Zealand winery to own a spinning cone unit, allowing for winemaking innovation, varietal trials and ultimate quality control.
- Giesen Group continues to set the industry standard, now with plans to install a larger spinning cone unit by the end of this year.
- The installation will introduce a pioneering system that utilizes waste alcohol from the process as a fuel source, aligning with Giesen's strong commitment to sustainability.
- Are there any important or interesting stories about your wine or the people you work with that you think would be important for our audience to know?
- If we were to invite you to Sunday Night Dinner (a tradition in our Italian American family), what of your wines would you bring to pair with the food and why?
Outro and How to Find Duncan Shouler 41:14
Well, thank you very much for listening to our interview with Duncan Shouler, Chief Winemaker at Giesen Wines
Just in case you are worried about memorizing all of this, don’t worry, you can find out all of this information on our website thewinepairpodcast.com in our show notes for this episode
- Website: www.giesenwines.com
- Instagram: @giesenwines
- Retail: Giesen 0% is available nationwide at Wholefoods, Total Wine, Kroger Grocery Stores, and Boisson.
And, we hope you will subscribe to our podcast The Wine Pair Podcast and follow us on Instagram, and visit our website at thewinepairpodcast.com where you can reach out to us and sign up for our newsletter, and you can also reach out to me at joe@thewinepairpodcast.com if you want more information, and we look forward to hearing from you!
But for now it’s time to go, and as we like to say, life is short, so stop drinking shitty wine.