Wine Tasting, Vineyards, in France

Pierre Gagnaire cooking at his restaurant

Pierre Gagnaire in his restaurant Le Balzac

Paris, april 2021,
It's been more than a year (march 15) that the restaurants have been closed down in France because of the pandemic and higher risk of transmission among unmasked people sharing the same rooms for a couple of hours. French restaurants were then allowed to partly reopen again in june 2020 before having to shut down again on september 28 following the up-and-downs of the pandemic. This have been a heavy blow for many of them, even with measures taken by the authorities to alleviate their burden (rents, fixed expenses, salaries). You can listen to a few reports and interviews made recently on the British-accented French network France 24 to understand how they suffer and tried to adapt to minimize the losses. We all hope that this economic sector which gets our cities alive and thriving will get through these troubled times, but we're expecting many closures, especially for the small operations with little financial backing.

To illustrate this hope in a grand way, I'm publishing here pictures I shot some 10 years ago at Pierre Gagnaire's flagship restaurant Le Balzac. It was an assignment job for a photo shoot I made for a third party at the time (that's why I didn't publish it on Wineterroirs), it featured Pierre Gagnaire preparing an entree dish in the kitchen, a dish I and the writer were going to have for lunch right there in the restaurant afterwards, quite a magic experience... I alas didn't take notes then [always take notes!], and of course I forgot what the recipe was all about, but I think it was seafood (possibly scallops) cooked with mushrooms, among other ingredients. Enjoy !

Underground tasting

Underground tasting

Here is the third tasting I attended recently in the Loir-et-Cher (for professionals only as well), and this one was underground in many regards, not just because it took place in these deep cellars between Thésée and Montrichard, but also because it was intendly not publicized in order to avoid crowds, something understandable given the display of cellar galleries in general. I happened to see a poster announcing the event while in the tasting at Thésée. The poster specified not to disseminate the news on social media, and speaking with the organizer, this was meant during the two-day event (it was sunday-monday), in order not to attract crowds in these times where people are literally thirsty of such happy tastings but at the same time must not find themselves in overcrowded situations. I hadn't anticipated to come initially first because I was unaware of its very existence, but I jumped on the bandwagon excitingly when I learnt about it. The name for this event was "Vins Vivant et Résistant", a good, appealing program in a few words, you know what kind of wines you're dealing with. The event was set up by a few vignerons, they hadn't been contacted by the other events and so when they heard about it they decided to do their own thing as well.

This was as you can see a beautiful weekend indeed, bright sun, clear skies, ideal weather to be around on a motorcycle. I went there straight from my tour at Les Montils, where I tried to spit more than I'm used to (promised !) in order to be able to be there safe afterwards. At the door the first people I saw were Emily (the California native relocated in this part of the Loire), Ben (her partner in life), their daughter on the left who kind of learns to drive a forklift machine, and Maxime (of Archimède, the wine bar/restaurant in Saint Aignan). The three are holding their empty glasses for the picture but they'd get back a pour after this pause...

Sologne tastings

Olivier Lemasson

Ouchamps, Sologne (Loire)
There was another multi-location tasting event that weekend, it was in the Sologne region near Blois, the region that is home to many rebels, like Courtois, Villemade Lemasson, Venier, Puzelat and others. This professional tasting event was also taking place along 3 days (friday to monday), and spread over 6 locations, namely the facilities of Puzelat, Lemasson, Villemade, Venier, Tessier and P.O. Bonhomme, and the participating vignerons were part Loire, part from further regions. The tricky part was that you had to drive (ride the motorbike for me) between them, even if for a small distance, with the risk of breath checks in-between if the authorities were aware of the tasting, which they certainly were. That's why I went to only 3 of the 6 locations, and over two days, this felt more secure especially that there was a 45-50 km distance back to the other side of the Cher river afterwards.
Here is the first location I went to, the wine farm of Olivier Lemasson (les Vins Contés). The protocol (see the picture on right at the door) was here also very secure, I had reserved a time window for the visit (some days were fully booked), you'd bring your own glass, you'd get a cardboard cup to spit and leave your contact info in case of problem. Plus, you'd enter a given winery room only if the number of persons there was low enough.
At one point I shot this picture of Olivier near one of his tractors, a French make I had never heard of, Energic. It seems possible to find these old Energic tractors for sale on the Internet, and they're not that expensive.

Spring tasting in Thésée

At the door of the chai

Thésée, Touraine (Loire)
Professional tastings are slowly back, at least in the natural-wine world, and this is a healthy thing, there have been so few in the last 12 months. It seems the conventional/commercial wineries are way too fearful of the "what will people say" factor and of the authorities, and won't dare anything, plus they rarely do such collective tastings with fellow producers in the chai/cellar of one of them. That's what makes the artisan vintners stronger in many regards, they're never alone... Here is a tasting taking place in 3 locations in the village of Thésée over the course of 3 consecutive days (fri-mon), all 3 within a 2-minute walking distance of each other. the goal was to have just 3 producers pouring their wines in each of the venues in order to avoid any crowd effect. The event was also carefully planned, with attendees asked to register in advance so that the number of tasters along the 3-day event could be kept under a secure ceiling. Visitors would also bring their own glass (and food if needed) and leave their contact info (name, phone number, email) in case of need of contact tracing afterwards. They'd also be given a paper cup for secure individual spitting. You can see the list of these 9 vignerons on the Pdf file of this event, you certainly know many of them.
They/we were very lucky because the weather was beautiful during this weekend, maybe just a bit cold in the night (this was the full moon). I had arrived in the region from Paris the previous day and I parked my motorbike along the street in view this the chai of Noëlla Morantin, the first of the 3 venues in Thésée.

Le Temps des Rêveurs (Provence)

Jérôme Maillot outside his house

Pourrières, Var (Provence)
This is maybe in winter that you understand best why painters like Cézanne and Van Gogh flocked to the Sainte Victoire ridge at the edge of the Var and the Bouches-du-Rhône départements in Provence : like much of Provence there's a unique magic in the light, due probably by the strong winds that keep humidity & clouds at bay. Jérôme who is a native from the region lives in this house in the middle of his parcels with his wife and daughters, and the appeasing view of the Sainte Victoire in the far. The region is also very favorable for viticulture. If you're into AOCs, the village of Pourrières (pictured on right) belongs to the AOC Côtes de Provence Sainte Victoire, but you'll not find any mention of this domaine on the Pourrières-AOC page because Jérôme's wine farm (Le Temps des Rêveurs) only makes table wine, and that's OK for us because we care for what's in the bottle, not on the label....

Although the region has all these conditions for making uncorrected wine (and excellent reds) from heathy vines, beginning with this dry weather in summer and autumn allowing to eschew chemicals, it is pretty hard to find artisanal wine farms like we do in many other French regions, the main reason being that conventionally-made rosé keeps selling like crazy here and abroad, and there's little incentive to replace this easy cash cow with the more demanding natural winemaking with which you'll need more work (at least in the vineyard) and attention. In this sense, Provence is close to Champagne : when there's no end to the demand for the high-yields conventional stuff, why bother and look for risks ? It was rewarding to find that Provence also has its awakening to artisan winemaking, thanks to people like Jérôme Maillot for whom the bottom line doesn't come first.

Pruning Aunis, and a few new cuvées

Laurent at work

Pouillé, Touraine (Loire)
I also visited Laurent Saillard who was like Anouk & Paul in the vineyard pruning with a small team. The temperature was a bit less cold than a few days before (Thésée is just facing Pouillé on the other side of the Cher river) I found them in the parcel of Pineau d'Aunis (the one for the cuvée Scarlette) not very far from Laurent's chai on the plateau. The vines on this 50-are parcel are something like 50 years old. They began to prune in the very last days of november, worked an additional 2 weeks in december and now they had been kicking back to work for a few days when I stopped there (they started working at 8:30 am that day but i showed up wisely at 11). Normally they should be pruning at this quiet pace until mid march.

Laurent hasn't been to the U.S. for a while, the borders are closed, and the situation is pretty messy there. Asked if he has other Aunis elsewhere apart from this parcel, he reminds me that he planted some 2 years ago but they're not yet in production, should be next year hopefully. Until now they pruned some sauvignon, the day before they went in a parcel of gamay to see how it was faring.

Poiré at les Capriades

Moses at the cellar door

Faverolles-sur-Cher, Touraine (Loire)
I visited recently Pascal Potaire and Moses Gadouche at their cellar at Les Capriades, everything was quiet in the facility, this is winter, a season where you just let the wines quietly make their way through the following spring. Pascal told me that the sparkling wines had a swift fermentation last autumn, this was all very smooth and easy this year. There was nothing to see for these wines, they were all bottled and lying sur lattes or on a few riddling tables or also on riddling pallets/cages (see pic above, don't disturb them !). But the interesting thing was to talk with Pascal about their new thing (for the past 3 years), the poiré, a petnat they make from old varieties of pears. Poiré, which I think is not even well known in France is sometimes dubbed the Normandy alternative for Champagne, it is registered in an Appellation and has both mainstream producers and artisan ones. But poiré has been made for ages in other regions as well, not just Normandy.

The process of making poiré takes place at about the same time than the winemaking, just a bit after it from what I understand, because these pears are of the late ripening type. Pascal told me that this poiré production was sparked by a few encounters and their love to make local products, as they source the fruits from the same département, the Loir-et-Cher.

Pruning time for Anouk & Paul

The team at work

Thésée, Touraine (Loire)
The temperature was pretty low when I came to see Anouk and Paul in their vineyard, with early mornings at minus 3 C (26,6 F) and highs at around + 3 C (37,4 F). Yes, pruning time is back and Touraine is known to be rather cold at this season, the humidity making it feel worse. Pruning is so important for the future fruit bearing but that's where you realize that if a vine has to suffer to make good wine (Jean-Michel Deiss explains it so well), the growers themselves have to go through tough trials before they get to see their fruit. Everybody had underpants (including me) to keep warm, and gloves (except Johan pictured below). We're here on the plateau above Thésée, reaching these parcels is easy : you drive up the small road on the left of the church, take the first left, then as soon as you see vines you take the 1st dirt/mud road on the left... I stopped my venerable Ami 8 (which behaves like a fear-nothing all-terrain vehicule) near this bicycle and car, it happened to belong to the small team, I could guess them in the far. Good thing I brought boots, it was very muddy.

Wine News (78)

Philippe Pacalet with Monica

7th arrondissement, Paris
This year is like no other also for wine events, tastings and other professional gatherings : be it in the spring or at autumn (the most intense seasons for these wine events) I had like usual received tons on invitations for wine-centered activities and every each of them (or almost) were backtracked, sometimes postponed at a later date and at the end, plain cancelled. I usually go only to a few of these events depending of my mood but this year even on my own standards I could have used more, this has been really a blank year. When I had the invite from Philippe Pacalet to taste a few of his wines in the fall I answered yes and when I saw that even with the imminent approach of a ban on gatherings the event was not cancelled (we were just days away from another lockdown) I was relieved, thinking, not everybody caves in fear.

This by-invitation-only tasting took place at the Galerie Mayaro in a quiet street of the 7th arrondissement. Philippe Pacalet had a few other (but private) tastings in Paris during the same week. It was a pleasure to see them all again, Monica, Philippe as well as his son who was behind one of the serving tables.

Chateau Gasqui (Provence)

François Miglio in the vineyard

Gonfaron, Var (Provence)
October-early november is certainly a very nice month to be in Provence, there are fewer tourists there at this time although the side roads are still busy with locals who often live in a village and commute to work in developped areas. We were in the middle of our couple of weeks there when the 2nd lockdown order was announced. I had two other visits planned in the area and could barely make this one by advancing the date at the last minute (the other ones will be for next time). In summer you can barely ride a motorbike in the day time because it's so hot, in october-november (and certainly september) it's much better especially inland where it's less populated and the light is so beautiful most of the time. The domaine is located between Gonfaron and Flassans-sur-Issole in the Var département, a region with valleys and rolling wilderness prone to forest fires every summer, although there hasn't been any big one these last few years, possibly thanks to preventive forest and undergrowth management.

Chateau Gasqui is interesting in many ways, first, the domaine is farmed on biodynamics, second it has quite a large surface with 32 hectares in production (it's always worth to keep in mind that this type of respectful and holistic farming is not reserved for tiny surfaces), and third (and this is not the least important reason), the domaine isn't a rosé-centered one like alas many wineries of the region, it is working hard to make beautiful, long-élevage reds, something most commercial wineries in the region have renounced because rosé is so easy and profitable. As a side note : in spite of favorable climate conditions, there are only 3 Demeter-certified biodynamic wineries on Côtes de Provence, Chateau Gasqui, Clos Réal and Domaine des Fouques, which make less than 80 hectares altogether compared to the 20 000 hectares of the appellation...