I do what I can with my three hectares
Katie Worobeck, Maison Maenad
Three hectares. That’s all Canadian-born Katie Worobeck has in south Jura. Still, she is not in doubt, she wants to do what she can to fight climate change. Which is why Katie bought her first vineyards in 2022; she had the ambition to make the land as diverse as possible, a regenerative haven with fruit trees, berries, herbs, grazing animals – and vines. So far, she has gotten the side-eye from other growers in the area who don’t want to understand what she’s doing. But she won’t let anyone – especially not old white men – tell her what to do.
Katie Worobeck stops the car at the side of the narrow road a few kilometres outside her hometown of Orbagna in the Jura. I climb out to see her vineyard, parcels that are just in their second year of regenerative farming. The previous owner was farming conventionally, had stopped using pesticides, but was still opening the soil between the rows. The first thing Katie did when she got the land, was to stop ploughing, as well as converting it to organics.
Maison Maenad, Jura, France
REGENERATIVE ORGANIC FARMING
FIRST HARVEST: 2020
SIZE: Three hectares (seven-and-a-half acres)
GRAPE VARIETIES: Savagnin, Chardonnay, Trousseau, Poulsard, Pinot Noir plus a mix of unknown hybrids
YIELD: 30–40 hl/ha
WINES TO SEEK OUT: De l’Avant, Les Oubliés