Wine Pairing Story (12)

The Best of WinterWinter is officially over but we still had freezing temperatures at night in France these past few days. Barbecue is usually associated with warmer, gentler days, but I consider that the cold season is also a great barbecue season, assuming that you manage to do your thing indoors. In the Loire, we usually set the barbecue in the middle of the fireplace, this way we enjoy the heat plus everything associated with an outdoor barbecue without setting a foot in the rain and cold. The winter barbecue connects you with your ancestors' genes and make you share what they could feel when they grilled some wild-animal meat in their caves and rejoiced around the fire. Unlike a summer barbecue where you take care to stay at a comfortable distance from the fire, here you can't get away from it and you take your time watching the grilling and cracking, with the juice dropping on the embers and bursting into full-fledged flames...

Starting the FireLet's rewind back a few minutes. I came to the Loire alone to do several things like buy some more wine in bulk and plant a few seeds (and relax too - there's nothing more relaxing than the countryside in winter) , and I must admit that I anticipated with relish the selfish pleasure of this solitary barbecue. The meat shelves don't precisely overflow with barbecue specials in winter but I picked some lamb and merguez sausages. I would have picked anything as long as it could be grilled, a barbecue has the rare particularity to be able to turn an ordinary (and probably hormones-laden) meat into something quite good.
I had just bought 10 liters of white Valencay this morning and had just finished bottling all of it. As 10 liters make a little more than 13 bottles, I had the remaining wine as apéritif (another reason to drink wine ...) sipping my glass while watching the table barbecue and turning the meat. White Valençay is a blend of Chardonnay and Sauvignon and while it costs between 3 and 4 Euro a bottle at the winery, you pay usually 2 Euro a liter or less in bulk. I pay 1,3 Euro/liter for this one and it makes a good everyday wine. This particular wine has gone through its malolactic fermentation and displays a pleasant richness in the mouth.Time for the Real ThingWine pairing with BBQ can be a hot (spicy ?) debate. Many people consider Syrah or Rhone wines as doing the job here, they may be right, even if grilled meat isn't always accompagnied with hot sauce. As always, I try not to plan and think too much and I just look around for some wine that would be unexpensive enough to risk a mismatch. I'll choose either a local wine or a wine I want to test by itself. This time I had nearly decided to try an Arbois Poulsard (Jura red) when I fell upon a bargain in a local shop where they sell leftovers from commercial bankruptcies. They don't know much about wine and set the price by the Appellation, thus underpricing occasionally wines from little-known Appellations or Table Wines by artisan vintners. When I saw the label from this Jasnières/Coteaux du Loir winery, I knew I was up for a bargain this day. The price setters of the thrift store had of course chosen a very low price : 1,9 Euro. The Coteaux du Loir, even viewed from another part of the Loire, is considered a minor Appellation and that's good for us as we can thus get Jasnières-quality wines at a substancially lower price (but would the people at this store even know anything about Jasnières anyway?). But here it was really dirt cheap. I also liked the sober design of the label, plus, for me, someone who still makes the effort to grow and vinify Pineau d'Aunis can't make a bad wine. This Coteaux du Loir Pineau d'Aunis 2001 was made by someone named jean-Marie Renvoisé (there's a phone number on the label : +33 2 43 44 89 37). I called the vigneron, he is making Jasnières wine (Chenin Blanc) from a 6-hectare vineyard plus Coteaux du Loir (this Pineau d'Aunis) from an additionnal 2-hectare surface. The price range for his wines goes from 5 to 8 Euro a bottle. Pineau d'Aunis, now a very rare variety, is slowly being rediscovered and Clos Roche Blanche (recently) or Jean-Pierre Robinot in the Loire make very beautiful wines with it.
Whatever, this surprising wine was the right match with my tender grilled lamb. This wine which has a clear-ruby color when young had a somehow faint color as it was peaking soon. It had this typical light pepperish aromas in the mouth with some red fruits notes. The wine found its right balance with the flavors of the grilled lamb, maybe because of the peppery side of Pineau d'Aunis.
I'll not say the same for the merguez but happily the ones these particular ones were not outrageously spicy and let's say it was almost OK. I'll look forward for wines from Mr Renvoisé.this Same Weekend in the Loire - very Short-Pruned Tree