A religious experience - Ruth Lewandowski Chilion

Simon encounters a gender bending orange wine from the Ruth Lewandowski estate in Utah, USA. And it's probably good for your soul too!

The first mystery to clear up about Ruth Lewandowski is that she's a man.

Or rather, "Ruth" is the name of the winery. The wines are made by Evan Lewandowski, who chose his favourite book from the bible to name the project. Ruth has a lot to do with the cycles of life and death, something very pertinent to farming and viticulture.

The second mystery is where this wine actually comes from. For the course of a whole evening, I thought I was drinking my first ever (orange) wine from Utah. Well, almost. The Cortese grapes for Chilion are grown in Mendocino county, California, but after harvesting and the start of fermentation, they're then trucked in large egg shaped tanks to Evan's small winery in Salt Lake City, where they'll stay for the rest of their upbringing.

Lewandowski fell in love with Utah while at University, and decided to return after a stint working in Alsace, France. Listening to him talk, Evan has a geeky enthusiasm (perhaps it's those glasses) mixed with a deep, deep passio…