Lumen Wines Uses Fresh Ginger to Preserve Wine Without Sulfites

In the Santa Maria Valley of California, Lumen Wines is challenging a long-standing tradition in winemaking by using fresh ginger as a natural alternative to sulfites. The family-owned winery, led by Kali Kopley and Will Henry, has focused on low-intervention wines made from organically grown grapes. Their approach took an unexpected turn after a discovery in 2018 that changed how they think about wine preservation.

The story began at a dinner party hosted by Lane Tanner, a veteran winemaker and co-founder of Lumen. After preparing a meal with fresh ginger brought back from a trip abroad, Tanner found herself with leftover ginger and an open bottle of Chardonnay. Instead of discarding the ginger, she poured the remaining wine over it and stored the container in her refrigerator. Months later, she found the wine had not oxidized and tasted as fresh as when it was first opened.

This accidental experiment led Lumen to conduct formal trials in their cellar. In 2019, they produced small batches of wine by adding chopped ginger to fermentation tanks. After racking the wine off the ginger and bottling it, they monitored its stability over a year. According to Will Henry, the results were clear: the wines remained fresh without any added sulfites or preservatives. The team repeated the process for five vintages, each time finding that the wines held up well over time.

The exact reason why ginger works as an antioxidant in wine is still unknown. Ginger contains nearly 40 antioxidant compounds, but which ones are responsible for preserving wine remains unclear. Henry says that while more research would be needed to pinpoint the chemistry, Lumen prefers to keep their process natural and simple.

Managing the flavor impact of ginger has required careful attention during winemaking. The team uses large tea bags filled with chopped ginger, suspending them in fermenting juice and tasting daily to control how much ginger character is imparted to the wine. Their goal is subtlety—ginger should be a background note rather than a dominant flavor, similar to how oak is used in barrel aging. For their sparkling Pet Nat wine, they allow for a slightly stronger ginger presence.

Reactions from other winemakers have been mostly positive. Henry notes that many colleagues are intrigued by the idea and see it as an opportunity for innovation in natural winemaking. However, some traditionalists remain skeptical about introducing non-grape flavors into wine. Henry points out that many mass-produced wines already use additives and flavor enhancers that are less natural than ginger.

Lumen’s experiment is not unique; Henry is aware of other wineries around the world exploring botanicals as alternatives to sulfites. He believes that ginger may be just one of many plants capable of naturally preserving wine and expects further experimentation in this area.

The use of ginger at Lumen Wines highlights ongoing changes in how winemakers approach preservation and flavor. As consumer interest in natural and organic products grows, methods like these could become more common across California and beyond.