You’d be hard-pressed to find a more loyal adherent to the hybrid grape movement than Matthew Niess.
Working from a small vineyard along the Sonoma Coast, Niess has dedicated much of his energies bucking the conventional wisdom of his winemaking region. Surrounded by neighboring vineyards that have developed reputations for wines sourced from so-called “noble grapes” — Rieslings, Chardonnays, and Pinot Noirs, among others — Niess is on a mission to promote grapes of a different variety.
Fifty different varieties, in fact.
Almost all wines with which people are familiar are sourced from grapes that stem from the European vitis vinifera species. For centuries, vintners slowly perfected practices around the growing of these grapes, and developed an entire culture around their production and consumption.
But this long tradition is running afoul of the changing climate, which increasingly imposes erratic new weather-related challenges on winemakers around the world. Withering heatwaves, punishing frosts, and new diseases take a heavy toll on vitis vinifera vines, which haven’t had a chance to evolve to handle such events. Centuries of hyper-specific growing techniques boxed them out of learning to adapt.
In response, a new generation of winemakers have started to research and invest seriously in hybrid grapes — which cross vitis vinifera with long-ignored indigenous species of grapes. They do so because these hybrid grapes have shown an unmatched resiliency in the face of climate changes. They are resistant to certain diseases and pests, many of them can withstand more intense temperature changes and be grown in unconventional regions, and they are able to produce quality grapes.
Niess, the founder of North American Press in Sonoma County, is pioneering research into how these grapes are able to grow across different wine regions in California. I spoke with him recently to learn more about his work.
What was your path into winemaking?
I got into wine through food. I didn’t go to culinary school, but I did work in restaurants all through high school and college, where I studied engineering. I cooked professionally for 10 years. I had a very good time, and it was a lot of fun. But it is also a very difficult profession to grow old in, so I needed to accept my shortcomings and bow out of the restaurant world.
After school I was an engineer for awhile, but I wanted to be making something, so I found my way to winemaking. I took some winemaking classes back in 2009 down in the central coast of California. All the passion I had for cooking really transferred into wine.
Can you tell me a little about your introduction to hybrid grapes?
When I first got into wine, I only knew that hybrid grapes made terrible wine — because that’s what everyone says. It’s a stigma that gets passed around. It’s what you’re taught in school. So that’s what I thought, and why did I even need to ask questions? It’s what everyone said, so it must be true.
But it wasn’t based on any personal, actual experience whatsoever.
The stigma, how did it originate?
It came mostly from Europe, in an effort to preserve their grapes over there. Most hybrids were outlawed there, at least in France. So it’s a stigma that has remained in place for decades.
It sounds like you had a moment when the tide turned for you, when the stigma lost its power.
My fascination started because I was interested in native California plants. Watching everyone water lawns filled with non-indigenous, water-intensive plants was strange to me. Why would you not decorate your yard with all the native flora and fauna that’s meant to be here, that are less water intensive?
It took a long time, but then I thought, “Whoa. Wait a second. What about grapes?”
At the time, I didn’t know there was a native grape indigenous to California. Turns out there’s one indigenous species right here in Sonoma County, ironically surrounded by all these vineyards that are growing non-hybrid grapes.
It was like falling down a rabbit hole. I started going online and ordering wines sourced from hybrid grapes around the country. And they were pretty good. I specifically remember ordering wine from TerraVox in Missouri and being very impressed.
So you’re ordering out-of-state wine online while sitting in the heart of California wine country?
Here in California I’d walk into a wine shop and ask if they had any wines from Vermont and the people behind the counter would just look at me like, “What are you talking about?”
It really wasn’t until I started working with hybrids myself here in California that I truly got into this niche space. I kept thinking, “What if we just grew these grapes in the world famous AVAs of California?” And it wasn’t until I started farming that I came across the only hybrid vineyard that I knew existed in California. It incidentally happened to be from across the street from where I was sourcing grapes.
I contacted the grower and it turns out they were looking for someone who wanted to take over the farming. My first vintage was in 2019 — and that’s when I took the giant leap of faith of quitting my job to do it full time.
In other words, you liked the quality of the wine you were producing?
I was like, “Oh my god, this makes great wine.” It finally compared to what I’d been taught was good. The reality is that if you have a wine made from a hybrid grape and it is bad, it’s not the grape’s fault. You can make bad wine from European grapes, too, if you plant it in the wrong area or don’t know what you’re doing. But no one is saying you shouldn’t grow them.
That was my big A-Ha moment. And then I kind of went bonkers and planted the stuff everywhere.
Which varieties are you leaning into?
That’s yet to be seen. I’m really taking the long road, and I’m trying to resist jumping onto something that could be seen as trendy because it’s a new and interesting variety. Still, there are a few that I’m really excited about. Baco Noir. Traminette in a cooler spot is easier to grow. Aramella, a descendent of Traminette. And Lenoir.
You work in experimental vineyards in Dry Creek Valley and Mendocino, and you’re experimenting with some 50 grape varietals. That’s a lot.
None of them are being grown in any significant amount. But yes, this is what I’m doing.
To my knowledge, 99% of these grapes have never been grown in California, so I’m willing to take on the task of figuring out which varieties grow best in the state. The only way to do that is to try them all. I’ve selected different micro-climates across California so then the varieties within these micro-climates will be distinct and different from one another.
Do you have high hopes for them?
I wouldn’t expect even most of these to do well, but there’s no one to call up and ask because no one has ever done this before. So let’s say of these 50, maybe only five might do well? That’s a potential reality. Maybe 90% of them we’ll end up culling.
I’m not trying to make these vines easy to grow. I’m not irrigating them or spraying them. The point is to weed them out. I want to be really brutal because I want to figure out which ones can handle climate change or true regenerative farming — which ones can you walk away from and they’ll still grow there.
This is the experimental block. My goal is to take the time and effort to figure out which varieties grow well, produce well, and make good wine. And that process just takes a long time.
You’re a stone’s throw from Silicon Valley so I have to ask: As you find hybrid success stories are you developing your own cache of intellectual property?
I don’t think so? I don’t know?
As time goes on I have gotten more requests to be a consultant on other projects. But I don’t charge money for my knowledge. I just want the grapes.
If I can tell you what to grow, and where to grow it, in return I just want some of your grapes. I don’t have land. Land out here in California is expensive, and I’m not in a position right now to buy my own vineyard. So as I get requests from hybrid growers, part of the deal is I get a portion of the grapes that are grown.
What’s the tougher challenge: Nailing a solid hybrid grape wine or successfully marketing one to people who aren’t familiar with hybrid grapes?
I think the marketing is huge. The wines I make are pretty good, but it’s really the sales that are my hardest challenge. It’s an entire conversation that you have to have with every single customer. They may have no idea what this is and you need to explain to them why it’s worth putting their money down to open and try it. But also, in large part, that’s because I’m here in California. In other parts of the country it’s less like that. I have a harder time selling my wine locally than I do in other parts of the country.
With hybrid grape wines I often feel like every bottle I buy is singular and hyper-artisanal. This can make it tough for a wine newcomer to develop a loyalty or develop purchasing habits informed by expectation and consistency. Is this a problem in your eyes?
I think that’s true. There are wine regions that have been established for a long, long time and they’ve had centuries to work out the kinks of what grapes work in certain regions. In the hybrid world, we’re just trying to figure this thing out. There isn’t a lot of continuity or things you can rely on. We don’t even know where which grapes grow well yet. It’s kind of like the Wild West right now.
This conversation was edited and condensed for clarity.