Wine Tasting, Vineyards, in France

Snow White goes tasting

Snow White & wineCentre Pompidou, Paris (Visual story)
A bizarre happening took place a few days ago at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, a cultural center also short-named as Beaubourg.
In the basement of the Contemporary Art Museum and in the midst of the public and onlookers, a performance art installation staged by Catherine Baÿ had a dozen of Snow White (Blanche Neige in French) characters impersonate wine tasters. The whole thing which unfolded around a long table took a little more than one hour maybe, it was very curious, at times disconcerting with a destructuration feel, there was purposely odd reactions and attitudes by the comedians/dancers who performed the show.
A real sommelier, actually a sommelière named Lindaboie (real name : Linda Grabe), was invited to speak about the wine tasting by a female speaker and this gave a partly-conventional screening of the event. If you immersed yourself in the visual experience of the Snow White characters and the waiters & sommeliers, there were many instant impressions, both pictural and conceptual to enjoy.
Here are a few pics that I shot there. There were many more visual snapshots that I enjoyed but hadn't the time or the right angle to immortalize, so this is just to give you a glimpse of the real thing.
At the end of the show, the sommelier took off the cloth hiding the bottle, but instead of a real-Chateau label, we could see "Le Banquet de Blanche Neige" with the names of all the comedians.

Ampelidae (Loire)

Ampelidae : manoir de LavauguyotMarigny-Brizay, Haut-Poitou (Loire)
Ampelidae is a relatively recent winery which is atypical in many regards. Let's look at the Haut Poitou first : this is a sub-region of the Loire, it lies on the southern flank of the Appellation (the dark-green patch on this interactive Loire map), it doesn't have its own AOC and it was instead labelled until recently as a Loire VDQS (the last step before the AOC). From a 30 000-hectare-peak around 1865, the vineyard surface of the region fell to around 700 or 800 hectares today, spread on 40 villages. The heavy weight of the region is the Cave du Haut Poitou, the local coop to which 280 growers (520 hectares) sell their grapes, and which is under the management of Georges Duboeuf since 1994 (as I understand).
Another player who has been growing in importance in the Haut Poitou is Frédéric Brochet : a native of the region, his winery grew from a mere 1,5 hectare to 75 hectares, and with a production spilt in three"brands" : Ampelidae, the upper cuvées, Marigny Neuf, the mainstream but constant-quality series, and Brochet, 3 cuvées meant to express the particular character of Sauvignon through particular batches. More than half of of the vineyard surface is planted with Sauvignon, including the rare Fié Gris which is a variant of Sauvignon.
Frédéric Brochet has family roots in this village, his father had retained a tiny surface of vineyard along with other family properties at la Mailletterie near Marigny-Brizay (picture of the village's church on left). Since his grand parents' time, the land including the vineyard was rented to a farmer (fermage) who in return gave them part of the harvested grapes. Frédéric's grand parents, who had a café in Poitiers, sold the wine from these two casks in their café, it was more for fun and tradition than a real business then. Frédéric Brochet was raised in this twice-yearly tradition in the improvised facility near the Mailleterie mansion : at the harvest they would all meet there, and same at easter, the family would gather there again for the bottling of the two casks and have lunch together...
As Jamie Goode notes in his Ampelidae report, Frédéric Brochet didn't take the winery trail immediately, and his early years, if connected with wine, were more on the scientific study and writing side of the trade.
[This Ampiledae visit was set up without notice because of my unplanned presence near there and Frédéric Brochet was alas not present at that time. This text is the result of a telephone interview]

Pierre Beauger, Auvergne (Loire)

Pierre Beauger in his cellar in Jussat Jussat-Chanonat/Champeix, Auvergne (Loire - bottom-right of this map)
The first one who told me about Pierre Beauger was Pierre Jancou at Racines, and it was in almost lyrical tones : this vigneron who started his winery in 2001 was making extremely pure wines, if atypical, on the slopes of the Massif Central in Auvergne right near Gergovia (located near the village of La Roche Blanche) where the Gallic armies led by their chief Vercingetorix defeated the Roman army with Julius Caesar at its head in 52 B.C. Beyond the symbolic resonance of the area, Pierre Beauger happens to be a vigneron who works hard to revive the vineyards of the region, making wine on the most uninterventionist way on terraced slopes which were planted with vines long, long time ago.
Pierre Beauger is a native from Auvergne, and he has a brother and a sister. His father was raised in the multi-crop 7-hectare family farm, working with his own father, but he later started a negoce of his own dealing with garlic (Auvergne is known for its qualitative garlic) because the farm was too modest to make a living. Pierre Beauger put his roots back into the farm life with this winery (which he started in 2001), but his father, who is now 78, helps him all along for the vineyard tasks.

François Dhumes, Auvergne (Loire)

François Dhumes pouring his roséPérignat-sur-Allier, Auvergne, Loire
The first wine that I had in Auvergne was François Dhumes' rosé, and it was a welcome and refreshing respite in this sunny summer day.
François is a soft-spoken young vigneron, a native from Auvergne who shares his time between his own small surface of vineyards and outside work he makes for Patrick Bouju's vineyards and also for Vincent Tricot, another vigneron working organic. This helps him make a living and face the expenses of starting a winery.
Making a pause in the middle of the day, he and Patrick started to picnic under the shade of a tree with me as guest when Patrick had to drive back to his facility because a truck driver was waiting for a pallet of wine there (the freight company was supposed to call ahead to come take the wine but the truck just dropped without notice instead).
With the company of his two lovely dogs whom I discovered are keen amateurs of cheese rind, we chatted about his own work and winemaking. François Dhumes's vineyard is located at a short distance of Clermont-Ferrand (south-east of) on slopes with volcanic soils (browse to the bottom-right of this Loire Appellatios map and zoom when centered on the pink patch of the wine region of Auvergne).

La Bohème, Auvergne (Loire)

Patrick Bouju in la Bohème vineyardGlaine-Montaigut, Auvergne (Loire).
The Auvergne wine region is the south-eastern-most Loire Appellation, it's so outcentered that few people know it's part of the family of Loire wines. Actually, two other small Loire Appellations are even further east : the Forez and the Côte Roannaise wines [Scroll down to the bottom-right on this interactive Loire map and thereafter enlarge the map to visualize these Loire Appellations].

Auvergne is part of what the French call the Massif Central, a mountain range in central France resulting from volcanic activity. What is striking is that out of a total of maybe 50 wineries in activity in Auvergne, 10 stand out for making additives-free wines from organicly-grown grapes. Patrick Bouju is one of these daring growers and vintners, this young vigneron who is originally from Tours further west along the Loire river settled in this remote mountainous region a few years ago and started his winery on rented vineyards, some of them being planted with very old vines. He makes several cuvées there, out of a total surface of 4,7 hectares, all labelled as table wines. He used to ask the agreement for his red Côtes d'Auvergne Corent (Corent is a terroir from Auvergne), but the new Appellation rules don't recognize the Corent reds, only the rosés, so he sticks to the vin-de-table label, or as they call it now, vin de France. He has lots of Gamay, and the interesting thing is that this is a local variety of Gamay with quite a few differences compared to Gamay elsewhere.
I reached the region by motorcycle, the trip was beautiful (I used the regular highway, not the toll one). After parking the bike near the vineyard where Patrick and his aide François were working, I could eat with relish these bird-scarred cherries. In Auvergne, there seems to be cherry trees (often complanted in vineyards) and walnut trees everywhere, and it seems that the Auvergnats are now too rich to bother picking the fruits...

Wine News (31)

Josh Adler & Meg ZimbeckParis, between le Louvre & Chatelet
That was a few weeks ago in Paris : a few bloggers with a taste for good food, mostly American expats living in Paris, started a new blog named Paris by Mouth, and the inauguration evening took place at the Spring wine shop in Paris. Meg Zimbeck who is the editor along with Barbra Austin, contacted me through Sharon and here we go, good company and good wine to go with. the new website or blog will deal with tips on food, restaurants and other venues in Paris. Most of the contributors of Paris by Mouth are expats, but they include a couple of French like Clotilde Dussolier and Bruno Verjus with a keen knowledge on food and chefs. Expect insider tips, expats know often better than longtime residents in any city.
Lots of people during this evening, are there so many american expats in Paris or did they come from abroad for the good wine and Daniel Roses's mini-dishes ? I loved the wines that Josh filled my glass with, this Melon de Bourgogne, this Breton's Dilettante and a Mercurey that I was happy to discover. The mood of this evening was excellent, some people even came with their baby and it was so crowded that the party took place mostly on the sidewalk, Josh passing through the guests with a bottle to fill the glasses.
Later I sneaked into the restaurant a few meters away with Daniel Rose and a couple of persons, it's still under construction, with a street level and two in the basement. The chef doesn't make any predictions about the opening day, it should be in the next weeks or months.

Vertical Tasting in Touraine (Loire)

Tasting at the cellar doorMareuil, Touraine (Loire)
A vertical tasting allows to extend the scope of understanding about a particular estate : it helps you project the wines that you're interested in into the future and guess how they will age and behave and so on. Of course, when vintners change for the better their vinification techniques and farming management, a vertical tasting will not necessarily bear lessons on how the recent wines of the estate will behave after a few years : in-between, you have already the vintage personality, and a gradual change in the farming/cellar work which will also play a decisive role in how the wine will feel 10 to 15 years from now. Didier and Catherine of Clos Roche Blanche in the Loire turned to organic farming in 1992, dropping the cellar additives in parallel, except for the SO2 that they use moderaletly.
This estate vertical tasting was a project that both Jim Budd and Didier Barrouillet had in mind : organize a small, friendly tasting with different vintages of Clos Roche Blanche wines and see how older vintages taste. This was set up at the winery, and because of uncertain weather with sunny moments alternating with grey clouds and wind, the event took place right in the entrance of the deep cellar.

Women Winemakers

Winemaker Catherine Breton pouring her winesJune, spring, wine, sidewalk, Paris...and women winemakers...
You may have been through these sidewalk tastings quite a number of times, comes the spring and its nice mild weather, and you just can't resist the urge to spend a couple of hours tasting at Caves Augé. One can easily get hooked to these sidewalk tastings, they're casual and professional at the same time, it's almost a family thing where the children learn their first good-taste lessons, and they've got just about the size that allow me to go round all the tables (the casks, actually) with enough time to chat with each winemaker and with whoever happens to speak to me. It may look that I spend all my time there on Boulevard Haussmann but I missed many of this wine-shop's tastings for different reasons, like not being in town or having other things to do.
The thread of this particular tasting was the women-winemakers and the event was dubbed "Wonder Women". Some 10 female winemakers from different regions of France were pouring their wines in person and answering to any question about the cuvées. This women-only thing was fun, and it may be just an impression but there were maybe a bit more women among the tasters too...
As always at Augé the invited winemakers for these tastings are vinifying their wines without additives corrections and their vineyards are usually farmed organicly or even biodynamicly. I'm always surprised to see these winemakers come here in person for these sidewalk tastings, Marc Sibard (the wine shop manager) must have a trick. It maybe the fact that they all have a dinner together at Le Baratin (a natural-wine bar which is also famous for its food) the same day...

Domaine de la Butte (Loire)

Jacky Blot above the Mi-Pente vineyardBourgueil, Bourgueil AOC (Loire)
Jacky Blot's Cabernet-Franc wines from his Domaine de la Butte in Bourgueil are among the best-valued reds of the Loire valley. Bourgueil is of course Cabernet-Franc country, and the region seems to suit this variety very well. With the mild weather and when possible the right terroir, it turns into very beautiful wines that can compete with the two more prestigious regions that are Burgundy and Bordeaux. Somehow Jacky Blot succeeded in keeping reasonable wine prices in spite of a vineyard farming which is conducted quite as meticulously as the one of Grands Crus of Bordeaux or Burgundy. Back in 2004 when we visited Jacky Blot, we only saw shortly the Domaine de la Taille aux Loups in Montlouis where the whites are made, the two estates (la Taille aux Loups & Domaine de la Butte) being about 70 kilometers apart from each other. As I wrote in this 2004 visit report, Jacky Blot was initially in the wine trade, he was a wine broker in Tours. He decided at sme point to make wine himself and bought 8 hectares of old vineyards in Montlouis, a Loire Appellation which was at the time (some 22 years ago) shadowed by the better-known Vouvray. His low yields, short pruning and minimal-amount of sulphur at the fermentation changed the reputation of the Montlouis wines for the best and he can be credited for giving this white-wine Appellation a much higher status.

On Vin d'Honneur & Apéro Géant

The Vin d'honneur, a French institution On vin d'honneur or vin de l'amitié
There's hardly something more deeply rooted in the French fabric than the traditional Vin D'Honneur which takes place at the end of inaugurations, speeches and at ceremonies of various kinds that dot the social life of the French provinces. It takes place in the office of a business, in the town hall or at the fire department, any place and any excuse is good for a healthy rejoicing and socializing along a self-serve table with wine, kir or sparkling. I regularly write a few lines to honor this civilized practice which help tighten bonds in the community and is a welcome fun in the routine of daily life.
This story takes place in Valençay (Berry, southern Loire) at the inauguration of Talleyrand's tomb, which was transferred inside a former chapel. Talleyrand, who was Napoleon's foreign minister had his home in the Chateau de Valençay, a beautiful architectural monument which is open to visitors.