What are vegetarian and vegan wines?
Most wines need to be ‘fined’ in order to clarify and stabilize them, to prevent hazes or cloudiness developing later on. Fining agents are added and then removed – they do not stay in the wine. However because some fining agents are animal-derived products they may therefore be unacceptable to vegetarians and vegans. Wines fined with bentonite (a clay) are suitable for both vegetarians and vegans. Wines fined with egg-white are acceptable to most vegetarians. Wines fined with isinglass (fish bladder) or gelatine would not be acceptable to most vegetarians and vegans. We ask our wine producers what fining agents they use and make this clear for our customers whenever we can. However, as a point of interest, please be aware that we cannot tell which adhesive has been used to affix labels and this could be animal-based.
