It's no secret that I love wine. Oregon is one of the world's great wine-making regions and produces a lot of world-class pinot noir, and there are few things I enjoy more than taking a day to bounce between vineyard tasting rooms and

, making new discoveries along the way. And as part of the

, I occasionally get to be a loud-mouth about my likes and dislikes (rosé is a year-round pleasure; over-oaked wines make me cranky; and too many California cabernets have the subtlety of an Adam Lambert ballad).

So here's a dilemma I hadn't focused much attention on: Not all wines are vegan. What's that? We're talking fermented grape juice. How can it not be vegan?

My wine panel colleague and friend Katherine Cole

, which explains how some wines are made with egg whites to promote clarity, while others use animal-based gelatin to remove particulates. And the process of making wine attracts fruit flies, and a few of the pesky critters may find their way into the fermentation tanks. We're talking minute amounts of the animal matter in gigantic vintages, but I can understand why truly devoted vegans would object.

Going vegan

Katherine points out that there is now a vegan wine section at the

, and she notes that a couple of Oregon wineries I enjoy adhere to vegan wine-making practices. I've also found a useful site called

, which tracks which wines, beers and spirits are vegan-friendly. That's good and useful info as I think about what wines I'll buy in the future.

But what should I do with the dozen or so cases of really good wine that are in a climate-controlled storage locker? I've amassed some pretty terrific bottles over the years as a member of various wine clubs, and I'm scared to look at Barnivore's ratings. Since we're probably talking parts per million, I'm inclined to enjoy my cellar-dwellers even though I've made the switch to a vegan diet. But

still

...

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