Aubert & Mascoli

Aubert & Mascoli are the Gilbert & George of the wine world. Parisian Guillaume Aubert (left) sports large black framed glasses and a neatly coiffed beard, while Naples-born Giuseppe Mascoli (right), a philosophy graduate, part-time artist and self-confessed playboy, has short silver curls, a Mediterranean tan and is dressed head to toe in green on our meeting. They make unlikely business partners, but the ebullient Mascoli is the yin to soft-spoken Aubert’s yang. Having built up a successful restaurant business, with a portfolio including Blacks in Soho, pizza institution Franco Manca and neighbourhood Italian Rocca in Dulwich, while working as a sole trader bringing wine into the UK, in 2009 Mascoli joined forces with independent importer Aubert after a tip off by Anita le Roy, owner of Monmouth Coffee Company. “We were doing very similar things and had the same small grower philosophy, so it made sense to work together,” Mascoli tells me over a triple espresso in one of Blacks’ powder blue rooms.

In less than three years the pair have grown the company considerably, and now represent over 35 small growers from Italy and France. Despite their success, they are keen to remain niche. “We need to stand out by bringing in wines not available anywhere else in the UK,” Aubert explains. But with both Germany and Austria boasting impressive natural wine credentials, why do they limit themselves to Italy and France? “It’s what we know,” says Mascoli. “I’m toying with the idea of bringing in Austrian wine, but my knowledge isn’t up to scratch yet.” Aubert admits that they buy with their heart and not their head. “It might not be best for business, but it’s best for us,” he says. Piedmont, Friuli and Tuscany are well represented from Italy, while the Loire, Languedoc and Roussillon make up the majority of the French offering, with cameos from Burgundy, Provence, the Rhône and Champagne. Their best seller is Piedmont-based Valle Unite, Franco Manca’s house wine, which can’t produce enough wine to supply demand.

The pair are pious in their devotion to natural wine, refusing to work with any producers that use sulphites or other additives. “People are trying to shortcut millions of years of history by manipulating wines with selected yeasts. I’d rather a wine have oddities than be tailor-made,” says Mascoli, who compares industrial wines to “cartoon characters” made to please children. “Natural wine is like a silent assassin,” Aubert interjects. “The more you drink, the less you can drink other wines. You start reacting badly to them, coming out in rashes and swelling up from all the sulphites,” he explains animatedly. Though passionate trumpet blowers for the natural wine movement, the duo didn’t set out to create a natural wine company – the focus was always on small growers – but, fittingly, it came about naturally. “The producers we started working with all happened to be natural, organic or biodynamic. It wasn’t by design,” says Aubert, adding: “There’s a libertarian element to the natural wine movement that appeals to me. I like the idea of questioning the status quo. It’s very left wing.”

The duo go on six buying trips a year, visiting restaurants and bars to sniff out the local winemaking talent. They mainly work in the on-trade, supplying top London restaurants and wine bars, including the newly opened Duck Soup in Soho, Terroirs, Hibiscus, Pied à Terre, Galvin La Chapelle and Tom’s Kitchen. “We sell in places where the sommelier is able to explain what natural wine is, as most people don’t know what it means. The definition is a bit blurred at the moment, which is a problem,” Aubert laments. To generate awareness of the brand, the pair took part in the Natural Wine Fair in London Bridge last autumn, and were surprised by the popularity of the event. Aubert believes the natural wine movement has gathered momentum so quickly in London because the city is more prone to the effects of trends than the rest of Europe. While he admits the hype will level out this year, he is adamant that natural wines are here to stay. “They’ve come into fashion due to the rise of the critical drinker. Consumers want to know the origin of everything. There’s more awareness now,” he says.

Mascoli concedes that natural doesn’t necessarily mean good. “There are a lot of really bad natural wines out there. The wines are so delicate, it’s easy to screw them up,” he says. Being a natural winemaker isn’t enough to earn an Aubert & Mascoli listing. “We import wines that are good before they’re anything else. If you have to excuse the wines by saying they’re natural that’s missing the point,” asserts Aubert, who says that to make good natural wine you need to “work like a bastard in the vineyard” and keep your winery “as clean as a hospital”.

Mascoli, meanwhile, believes natural wines require a critical approach. “They’re a bit like the works of Karl Marx: not intended for the masses. Marx was writing for a specific audience with a sufficient level of knowledge to understand and appreciate his work. The same can be said for natural wines,” he suggests. Having submitted work to last year’s Venice Biennale, does Mascoli see parallels with wine and art? “I see wine as the opposite of art,” he says. “God, the artist and the poet create out of nothing. The winemaker works with what is already in existence, acting as a pimp for nature, from the fruit he picks to the soil he respects. The winemaker is a shaman. He doesn’t create, he cures.”

Brawn

On a recent rainy Wednesday evening, I made the pilgrimage across town on the smooth moving East London line in search of Brawn. The arrival of this Columbia Road newcomer last November – sibling to small plates pioneer Terroirs in Charing Cross, was awaited with much anticipation by foodies and wine nuts alike.

Brawn is the English word used to describe the unloved (and largely uneaten) bits of a pig's head – tongue, cheeks, nose, which are boiled and pressed and wind up sharing terrine space with other piggy parts – trotters, offal. The American term for brawn is the euphemistic sounding 'head cheese'; words that don't move one to hunger. Brawn's brawn is Italian, served in a ravigote sauce. Usually an intrepid eater, I decided to steer clear.

Previous reviews have yet to touch on what a blink and you'll miss it venue Brawn is. Perched on an unassuming corner of Columbia Road, without even a sign to announce its presence, I marched straight past its St John inspired white walls, until, upon second inspection, I spotted my dining companion through the rain spattered window.

The aforementioned dining partner was Stuart Peskett of Square Meal fame: cue red carpet treatment from bread to bed. Hanging my sodden coat on a fire engine red stand, I surveyed my surroundings to a soundtrack of frantic jazz - pared down, industrial, canteen chic, with wooden red-topped tables and chairs that wouldn't look out of place in a primary school. Behind the sunflower filled bar are books dedicated to such culinary luminaries as Daniel Boulud. Speaking of culinary luminaries, shortly after my arrival, Charles Campion bounded through the door in all his Rubenesque glory. It seemed sweet and fitting, such a meaty man dining at, and presumably on brawn.

After Basque saucisse seche and parmesan chunks from the Taste Tickler section of the menu, our carnivorous feast began in earnest with ice cream scoop shaped pork rillettes sprinkled with paprika, served with gherkins on a wooden chopping board, which were rich, creamy and pleasingly porcine. While the chanterelles and warm duck egg yolk on toast and the chili prawns with gremolata both delighted, the hand chopped Tuscan beef disappointed. Served round and red with hunks of bread, it resembled a naked steak tartar, dressed only with a sprinkling of salt. I'm all for raw, but it was crying out for flavours outside of the meat sphere to break up the beefy monotony.

The main event however, didn't disappointed. While Mr Square Meal went for the popular duck confit with puy lentils, which was declared a success, I opted for the slightly more adventurous sounding Mongetes – a Catalan cassoulet containing pork belly, sausage and the large white beans after which the dish is named. Served in a rustic, round, brown dish, the ingredients were hidden under a film of crispy pork skin. Rich, wintry and warming, it doubled as central heating on this unapologetically cold January night.

The menu is playfully put together and changes daily. Some of the dishes require a French dictionary, others shout loudly of their provenance, from Dorset crab to Icelandic line caught cod. Pudding was an exciting affair. After Marina O'Loughlin described them as 'heaven', I had to experience the salted butter caramel crêpes. Heaven is an understatement. Slathered in gooey caramel with a heavy handed sprinkling of salt, the juxtaposition of sweet and savoury was exquisite.

You can't talk about Brawn without mentioning the wine. Backed by the team behind quirky French wine importers Les Caves de Pyrène, Brawn's evolving wine list is deliberately left field, made up of 150 natural and biodynamic bins from a range of regions. Sections are poetically named, allowing you to choose from ‘Stones, Shells & Sea’, or ‘Sunbaked, cicada-loud, ageless country of scrub and terraced hills'.

I tried a plethora of wines on my visit, highlights of which included a Sherry-like 2009 Anjou Chenin Blanc, a clean, precise Jura Chardonnay, and a fresh, minerally Syrah/Carignan blend from Pic Saint Loup in the Languedoc. Opening a bottle of natural wine is like playing Russian roulette, so high is the risk that it will be funky to the point of undrinkable. Co-owner Oli Barker told me the same wines change from day to day, depending on when they are opened, so seek out a biodynamic calendar, and save the detour to Brawn for a fruit day.

Brawn, 9 Columbia Road, London, E2 7RG , Tel: +44(0)20 7729 5692. A meal for two with wine, water and service costs about £80.

The Drinks Business

So we're a week into the new year, and I'm four days into a new job. The sense of a new beginning brought about by the new year has been heightened in 2011 by a change of employer. I left Decanter magazine before Christmas and started as staff writer at The Drinks Business this week, which recently celebrated its 100th issue.

It's an exciting move for me – the company is young, dynamic and forward thinking, and my new role will give me the freedom and time to do more of what I love – writing. It's a fascinating time for the wine industry. The landscape is changing – who is buying wine, what they're buying, where they're buying it, and how we're communicating about it is in a constant state of flux. We are finally seeing the democratisation of wine, both in terms of who's buying it, and who's writing about it.

Wine is no longer the reserve of middle-aged, middle class, white men. The doors have been flung open and everybody wants a slice of the action. Wine may be enjoying its moment in the sun, and with the revival of the wine bar in London, championed by the likes of Terroirs, 28-50, Vinoteca, Kensington Wine Rooms and more recently Bar Battu and Brawn, this trend is showing no signs of slowing.

So with these exciting times, we need publications that are at the forefront of these changes. We need wine writing to reflect what's going on in the industry – to hold a mirror up to the truth. This week The Drinks Business surpassed 1,000 followers on Twitter. A mini milestone, but a significant one. For any business to flourish in 2011, it can't afford to be out of the loop, and the loop is very much entwined with social media right now. As a society, we are growing ever more impatient. We have come to expect a constant stream of information to be communicated to us the minute it happens. A magazine simply can't do this, so tools like Twitter, Facebook and Youtube are becoming an ever-important way to bridge the communication gap.

So that's where our focus will lie at db as we move further into 2011. I'm intrigued to see what the year has in store for the wine world, and am excited about being able to play an interactive part in these changes – to communicate them as they happen, and contribute to the debate. The new year is a time of hope and reflection. A chance to wipe the slate clean and turn things around. With my new year has come change, which is essential for a fulfilling existence. 'There is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun' – Christopher McCandless.

Bar Battu, Brawn, Fulham Wine Rooms, Vinoteca Marylebone: London's wine awakening

Once could be called a fluke, twice a coincidence, but now with half a dozen respectable natural wine bars in operation around London town, it's safe to call it a movement. It all started two years ago with Terroirs - the Charing Cross-based brainchild of Les Cave de Pyrene's managing director Eric Narioo, who this week opened his second natural wine bar – Brawn, in Columbia Road, E2.

I remember being impressed with Terroirs when I visited shortly after it opened. There was something different about it, from the pared down interiors and laid back bistro food, to the exciting and varied wine list offering everything from the funky to the downright strange, it was clear Terroirs was onto something. It successfully tapped into a previously unexploited niche and quickly had Londoners lapping up its unadulterated wines.

Two years on, and I've heard talk of a serious dip in the quality of service. Complacency seems to have set in, and with its reputation secured, the bar doesn't feel it needs to try anymore. Wine folk are fickle, and we're quick to switch allegiance if standards drop, so the savvy Terroirs crowd of yore has migrated to Xavier Rousset's hugely successful 28-50 Wine Workshop and Kitchen in Fetter Lane, and more recently the newly-opened Bar Battu in the City.

28-50 isn't a natural wine bar per se, but does offer an extensive number of wines by the glass, along with an impressive collectors' list, which Xavier personally sources from private cellars. After much hype from the wine trade, I made the pilgrimage to Bar Battu last week, and was pleasantly surprised. I'm slightly distrusting of natural wines. I don't really understand them (there's no official definition of what constitutes a natural wine), and I'm often thrown by their unpredictability, cloudy appearance and savage aromas.

Despite my reservations, I think it's a fantastically brave move to open a natural wine bar in the City. If the wine trade are suspicious of naked wines, then the average punter must be positively fearful of them. But fear is borne of ignorance – all we need is to be taught. London is light years behind France in embracing the natural wine movement, and a decade behind New York, but with bars like Terroirs and Battu, we finally seem to be catching on.

I shared a bottle of white and red on my visit and enjoyed the symbols on the menu that help novices navigate the list of unfamiliar names – while a cloud predictably denotes cloudiness, a white bull appears next to semi-wild wines, and a red bull beside really wild ones. Our white Burgundy was light, fresh and uplifting, but the Languedoc red was fiercely feral. It smelt and tasted like a pig pen, and somewhat traumatised one of my fellow imbibers. But that's the deal with natural wines - you never quite know what you're getting until you open it.

I've yet to visit Brawn (it opened yesterday), but set in an old wood-turning mill in the gritty climes of Shoreditch, it promises an evolving list of 150 natural and biodynamic bins covering a range of styles and regions, including 12 wines by the glass and 500ml caraffe. Only time will tell if it has the muscle to compete with London's better established drinking dens.

Aside from the natural wine bar revolution currently gripping London, a sprinkling of sister wine bars have also popped up in the last month, beginning with the Fulham Wine Rooms in early November, which is hoping to mirror the success of the Kensington Wine Rooms. On my visit last week the vast, cavernous space was empty - making my friend and I feel like a pair of church mice in a wine cathedral. That said, it was nearly midnight on a Monday. The Enomatic selection was impressive - including favourites from Kensington such as Ken Forrester's the FMC, and new arrivals: a stunning Sassicaia 1998.

Last week, Farringdon favourite Vinoteca opened a sister bar in Seymour Place, Marylebone, completing a hat-trick of exciting openings in the past month. Having only worked in wine for the past three years, I've been lucky enough to join the industry at an incredibly fertile time, and the pace of change is showing no signs of slowing down. The mushrooming of forward thinking, relaxed, informed wine bars in the city is helping to put wine firmly on the cool map, and opening Londoners' eyes to the phenomenal selection of wines the city has to offer. I'm excited to see where the trend will move next.