Food & Wine USA - (10)October 2020

OCTOBER 2020 23

TASTING THE PAST
BY KEVIN BEGOS
An unusual wine that science
reporter Kevin Begos finds
in a hotel minibar in Amman,
Jordan, leads him on a quest to
unearth the origins of wine. This
book weaves together history
and science as Begos visits
winemakers, archaeologists,
grape geneticists, and more.
($27, barnesandnoble.com)

THE WORLD ATLAS OF WINE

BY HUGH JOHNSON AND

JANCIS ROBINSON

Hugh Johnson and Jancis

Robinson’s masterwork lays

out the geography of wine with

comprehensive maps of every

wine region, information on soil

and climatic characteristics,

and sharply written prose. This

book is a must-have. ($65,

barnesandnoble.com)

NATURAL WINE FOR THE

PEOPLE BY ALICE FEIRING

Natural wine’s meteoric, con-

troversial, and much-discussed

rise is best explained by Alice

Feiring, who artfully distills the

basics of this noninterventionist

movement in her short, emi-

nently readable tome. ($19,

penguinrandomhouse.com)

THE WINE BIBLE

BY KAREN MACNEIL

It’s important to have a sub-

stantial book on hand to effec-

tively look up everything to do

with fermented grapes. Karen

MacNeil’s opus fills that role.

Whether you want to learn the

basics or delve into obscurities,

MacNeil’s readable and com-

prehensive book has what you

need. ($25, winespeed.com)

WINE: A GRAPHIC HISTORY

BY BENOIST SIMMAT AND

DANIEL CASANAVE

French wine writer Benoist

Simmat teams up with illus-

trator Daniel Casanave for a

charming comic-art foray into

wine’s history. From wine’s

distant origins up to the current

era, the book is surprisingly

comprehensive and just a lot of

fun. ($25, selfmadehero.com)

THE TASTEMAKER

ALTHOUGH THE NATURAL WINE movement

has swept the country, it still remains

largely concentrated in metropolitan

areas like New York City, Chicago, and

Los Angeles. That there’s a natural wine

distributor in Elkader—a tiny town in

Iowa—feels as unlikely as the journey

that landed its owner, Algerian-born

Frederique Boudouani, the founder

of Abu Nawas Beverage Company, in

Elkader in the first place.

“Honestly, I came here to live my

American dream,” explains Boudoua-

ni. He was attending graduate school

in Boston when 9/11 transpired. In the

surge of Islamophobia that followed, he

started feeling ostracized from his com-

munity and began to study the history

of Islam in America. He was surprised to

learn that one of the very first mosques

in America was built in Cedar Rapids,

Iowa, and that Iowa is the only state that

has a town named after an Arab Mus-

lim: Elkader, after Emir Abdelkader, an

Algerian religious and military leader

who resisted French colonial rule in the

19th century.

After several visits, Boudouani and his

life partner, Iowa native Brian Bruening,

moved to Elkader in 2006 and opened

Schera’s, the town’s first Algerian res-

taurant. But they didn’t feel immediately

welcomed by Elkader’s 1,400 residents.

Change Bubbles

West Frederique

Boudouani is an

unlikely champion

for natural wine in

the Midwest.

By Nabil Ayers

“At first, people had a problem with

a gay Muslim coming to their town,”

Boudouani says.

As the restaurant’s fame grew, new

customers began traveling from out of

town, shopping at the antiques mall and

staying at bed-and-breakfasts in town.

Soon enough, Schera’s catalyzed a min-

iature economic boom for Elkader.

“I remember an Algerian group that

visited here,” Boudouani says. “They

were asking, ‘How big is the Algerian

community in Elkader?’ and I was like,

‘You’re looking at it.’” (Elkader is 98%

white.)

Schera’s opened with what Boudoua-

ni describes as an “epic wine list,” for

which he had to travel several hours each

week to pick up a particularly interesting

case of wine or a cool keg of beer. “I’m

not going to be a good ambassador for

anything I don’t enjoy,” he says. Growing

increasingly frustrated with having no

local source to access the products he

coveted, Boudouani took matters into

his own hands and opened Abu Nawas

in 2011.

Over time, Boudouani has built Abu

Nawas into a hub of small, unique mak-

ers and distributes not only natural wine

but also craft beer and artisanal foods.

He now sells many sought-after labels

that were previously unavailable in the

region, such as MicroBio Wines, from

Segovia, Spain; the Rhône Valley’s Eric

Texier; eastern Austria’s Meinklang;

and Sonoma County’s Coturri Winery,

a pioneer of the natural and organic wine

movement in the U.S.

“When I started doing natural wine,

people looked at me like I had four

heads,” says Boudouani. But now Iowans

are drinking more natural wine than

ever. Tony Coturri even cites Abu Nawas

as one of his top distributors.

When Boudouani left Boston in 2006,

Iowa seemed an unlikely place to seek

acceptance, to establish roots and ingrain

himself in the local culture. As much as

Elkader’s residents had misconceptions

about him, he says, he realized he had

held similar stereotypes about them. But

he has found success and happiness in

Elkader.

“We’re all full of stereotypes.” Boud-

ouani pauses, considering his neighbors.

“And I think it’s really beautiful when

we’re proven wrong.”

illustration by RACHELLE BAKER