Webster’s Wine bar in Chicago. They had really eclectic wines off their wine list with very simple.
Thomas Keller the French Laundry. I had dinner with Greg Costelle the wine buyer. We were talking about selling our wine there, which is pretty exciting.
Bindi wine maker Michael Dhillon spoke with us about spirituality, perfectionism and his view on the environment.
Winemaker; Michael Dhillon
Your dad established the winery in 1988?
Yes, in 1988, I was a university studying economics of all things. We’d had this property in the family for four or five decades. My father wanted to diversify and do something on the property that would add value and hopefully allow it to be sustainable for the longer term.
You were studying economics. What changed?
I enjoyed going to university very much and developed a lot of friendships. But, I didn’t really perceive that it was going to be a vocation for me. Being involved with bringing vineyard here I became impassioned with wine and grapes and the whole culture of the wine.
I had the great fortune to meet Stuart Anderson who was the founder of Bell County in the 60’s. He had moved to this area to retire and became involved in a local vineyard here.
What sorts of things did Stuart Anderson pass on to you?
There’s a multitude of elements that are interesting and inspiring. First and foremost he’s just a wonderful person—very generous person, very giving. He’s got a really great humility but also great passion and desire, to understand wine, to understand vineyards. Someone like Stuart has been a profound influence.
When you meet someone like that who’s been making wine in a passionate way for 40 years, do you wonder how they maintain that drive?
If you are passionate about painting you aren’t going to do it for 20 years and then give it up. You are going to do it until you die. If you’re into music or whatever, if there is a strong connection or something that resonates within you—you don’t lose the energy for it. You don’t lose the stimulation.
It’s a privilege to find something in your life to do that has that importance and that ability to give you energy.
I spoke to Tim Kirk about a continual awe and wonder that you could ferment grapes every year, it was real joy, do you find that joy that matters?
You can have that with wine, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be.
Wine is a very simple and very complex beverage. If you want you can go to the supermarket and buy something that’s been grown ten tones to the acre and is made through a very industrial process, it costs you five dollars and it’s a perfectly adequate, satisfying beverage. Then that’s wine; that’s fine.
Then there’s a wine that is grown in a particular place. There may be only four or five barrels of that wine made. Vineyards are tended very carefully and the wine handled very appropriately, very softly. Thoughtfully, it’s tweaked here and there by the winemaker. It’s a pure representation of where the wine is coming from—that’s a completely different beverage.
With the economy going the way it’s going, the world becoming so globalized, how important or difficult is it to hold on to your land and your distinct geography?
It’s very important. There are so many more people in the world today that I think it’s lovely that people have an attraction to heirloom, varieties in animals and seeds. And they want to be organic and environmental. It’s a brilliant way of thinking. To help protect something is also a rich, thoughtful, spiritual way of living and doing things.
But with 6 billion people in the world, there are a lot of logistics that have to be overcome. I think there is a divergence in the world. Like you said, globalization, very large corporations meeting the needs of very large numbers of people, but also there are more and more farmer markets. I think there are two distinct and both growing markets.
Do you think, when you make something at a small level like that, it affords you an intimacy with your consumer?
Absolutely, it’s a great privilege to a be a small winery working at the high-end quality wise because you get to work with sommeliers, with chefs and with importers who are very passionate about fine wines.
To strive to be the very best you can, allows you to be involved with people who are like-minded.
Does that help you with the continual inspiration, that small feedback loop?
Yes, I went to a Pinot Noir workshop with 55, Victoria, Pinot Noir producers. And, in that group there are so many passionate people sharing ideas and tasting wines together. You go back to the winery and you think—‘right.’ And, you are looking at things with a greater spring in your step and a greater desire to make things better.
Tell me about the biodynamics.
We have a perspective about the farm. We want it to be a healthy place to work and a healthy place to live we want it to have a longevity. We have a hundred acres of indigenous grass lands that are quite rare. We leave them there and let them do their thing.
Certainly we don’t do everything in an environmental regime. Maybe we will one day. Maybe we never will. It’s part of the journey.
We’ve been using manure and quartz spray, seaweed and fish emulsions on the soil and the foliage. I think that the only thing we do at the moment that is really hard on the vineyard and the soil, is, once a year, we spray a light herbicide in conjunction with the fish emulsions because we have quite a bit of growth underneath the vines.
This year we put down a lot of straw mulch, which will restrict some of that competition under the vine, and make that soil promote worm activity. So hopefully, long term we can get rid of the herbicide. Hopefully we can keep going gently, gently down that path.
When someone says to me “I’m a perfectionist,” that more says to me “I’m dysfunctional”.
Do you buy the idea that there is a spiritual quality to Pinot?
No. I think Pinot Noir is a beautiful variety that has the ability to be sensitive to a vineyard site. It’s subtly complex, seductive and charming compared to other varieties, and not as overtly structured. But, I think spirituality is a bit more complicated than that.
I think it’s more sensitive than Shiraz or Cabernet or Chardonnay for producing good wine or poor wine.
If it’s so sensitive, why do you stick with it?
I think we can grow a unique Pinot Noir here. If you can do anything that is unique in the wine world you quite quickly differentiate yourself, and, allow yourself be yourself, rather than compete with people. I don t really feel like we compete with people. We just make Bindi wine.
If you aren’t in competition do you believe in a divine dissatisfaction that pushes you forward?
You have to be careful with that. There are a few things of concern. When someone says to me “I’m a perfectionist.” That more says to me “I’m dysfunctional”.
I think people will pursue a passion because they have an inherent dissatisfaction and it allows them to escape that. I would much rather people were driven by positives than reacting against something.
What are the positives that drive you?
I’ve been fortunate to have been inspired by so many people that have a generosity of spirit, and a generosity of time, knowledge and wine. And I immediately reacted to that as a positive thing.
I think a really strong love of the place where I was born and grew up, the land where the vineyard is. And, I really enjoy bettering that place, or putting something into it that allows it to be sustainable in the future. I think that’s a real pleasure.
