If you don’t know or care much about wine, then the language around it can sound like Greek. Or French, perhaps, is more accurate. “Terroir,” “appellation,” “cuvee.” It can all be overwhelming. Go to a restaurant, order a bottle. Which wine do you like? Red or white? For a lot of us, that’s as far as goes.

Acadiana feels like Michelob Ultra country. People here drink light beers so they can drink a lot of beers. So maybe wine and wine culture would seem foreign to us…despite the French undertones of our lifestyle.

Maybe try thinking of wine this way: As an expression of place. That’s what “terroir” means: the earth, the air, the water that made the wine. We talk about food this way in Louisiana all the time. You could argue that gumbos and boudins have terroir. But you’d probably be thrown out of the party.

Denny Culbert, Christiaan Mader, Katie Culbert – in the studio at KRVS

Christiaan’s guests on this edition of Out to Lunch Acadiana, Acadiana’s First Couple of Cool, Denny and Katie Culbert, are trying to tap into that obsession with place with their boutique, natural wine shop: Wild Child Wines.

Wild Child opened in 2020 in Downtown Lafayette and has since grown a cult following with its select imports of small batch wines from around the globe. The shop has a small wine bar for tasting and teaching. Those have been consistent themes for the Culberts, who have spent the better part of the last decade building culture around local foodways with initiatives like Runaway Dish, a series of popup dinners that introduced adventure to Lafayette’s culinary scene.

Denny Culbert

Outside of Wine Child, Denny is a photographer with credits in Saveur, Garden & Gun and Vice magazines.

Katie Culbert

Katie owns and operates the boutique clothing shop Kiki and its two locations in Lafayette and Baton Rouge.

This edition of Out to Lunch Acadiana was recorded in the studios of KRVS in Lafayette. Here’s more lunchtime conversation about local Acadiana booze, namely vodka made from rice.