A Guide to Vegan Wines

How to Choose the Right Wine for your Cruelty-Free Lifestyle

Sep 11, 2009
Krista Parker

Red Wine - Brown Club of Oregon

In this article you will find the common ingredients that make a wine not vegan friendly and some tips on what to look for.

If you are a vegan concerned about whether or not your favorite wine is vegan, check out this guide before popping open that new bottle of Merlot.

Filtering

Filtering (or fining) is the step in wine making which causes a wine or another alcoholic beverage to be "un-vegan". Traditional methods of filtering call for the use of egg albumin, casein (from milk), isinglass, and gelatin; none of which are vegan friendly.

Filtering is completed so that unwanted particles don't end up in the finished wine; these particles could be pieces of grape skin, proteins, or yeasts used in the process of wine-making. Vegan wines use non-animal ingredients for filtering. One item used to filter vegan wines is Bentonite (a clay). Some winemakers also produce unfiltered wine, meaning everything in the wine was left to settle.

Labels

Vegan wines are often not labeled so, although It is possible to find some wines with a "vegan" label. Winemakers feel that it is not necessary to label the wine as vegan or not due to the fact that the filtering agent is not left in the final product and therefore not a part of the wine itself. However, many vegans do have concern over any animal products in their wine at any time. Here are some common labels and how they relate to vegan wine:

Organic- If a wine is labeled organic, it does not mean that wine is vegan.
Kosher- Be careful when looking at wines not to confuse Kosher with Vegan. Kosher wines are often filtered using isinglass (a product made from the bladders of fish) instead of gelatin. Also note that if a wine is unfiltered it will also be both Kosher and vegan.
Unfiltered- Some winemakers label their wines as unfiltered because there are those (other than vegans) who prefer unfiltered wine.

Where to Buy

With some good research, it is possible to find vegan wines just about anywhere. When going out to buy a bottle of wine, keep a list handy with some companies that produce vegan wines.

For reference, check out the Vegan Wine Guide for a long list of vegan wines. Or, if you have a particular wine in mind (or another alcoholic beverage) check out the Vegan Beer and Wine Guide at Barnivore.

Making Vegan Wine

The Vegan Wine Guide offers a link for information about making your own vegan wine. To locate the link, visit the main Vegan Wine Guide page, then select Making Your Own.