I hit a winemaker’s dinner last night at Harris’ in San Francisco.  The steaks were fine but the wines, the wines were spectacular. The 2005 Benziger Tribute Sonoma Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon was extraordinary, and still on my mind: clean with soft tannins, a lingering chalkiness in the mouth and a full and luscious bouquet of grapes and soil.

Yes, you’re not going to get a flowery list of berries out of me on this one. The fifth installment of the winery’s biodynamic Bordeaux blend tastes the way it should. Like fermented grape juice nurtured from a vineyard that is treated like a unique, living, breathing organism, where the roots are a nervous system that is soothed by valerian and chamomile, not antidepressants.

Well worth the $80 for tasting older than its time; for easily lasting five days when I recork it and leave it on my counter, ungassed; for a pleasure that is consistent velvet from entry to finish. And for not singeing my nose hairs.

Leave it to Randall Grahm. His cork funeral is no much for what the eclectic winemaker has done this time. He’s put his money where his biodynamics are, making Santa Cruz-based Bonny Doon the first producer in the U.S. to list the ingredients of its wines on the back label.

It’s crazy, and I love it.

The initial wines with the new labels—the 2007 Ca’ del Solo Vineyard Albariño and Muscat, both from the Monterey County AVA—will be released next month. The Albariño will list biodynamic grapes and sulfur dioxide as the ingredients, and will also indicate that indigenous yeasts, organic yeast hulls and bentonite were used in the winemaking process.

Since going biodynamic in 2004, Grahm has spoken passionately about clean, green winemaking that’s low on additives. A marketing and trendsetting savant of sorts, I bet his move will encourage fellow winemakers to do the same.