Tavel, Rhone valley
Nadia and Christian Charmasson at Balazu des Vaussières are making wine in Tavel in the southern Rhône but don't look for the Tavel wines found in the supermarkets for analogy because they work on
a very artisanal way and tend their parcel without harming both the soil and the vines (and they label their wines as Vin de France meaning table wine anyway, which doesn't suit well the AOC-loving supermarkets...). They have been
farming along the procedures of biodynamy and also Maria Thun, starting in 2007 after a few years on this property and their cuvée range is very simple, they make a white, a rosé and a red, all blends. While we visited their farm we realized how different are the wines when all is done along these procedures, planet cycles calendar, herb tea spraying and letting literally the wine by its own in the cellar, it yields wines that feel so much better and alive. No surprise that with Pfifferling of L'Anglore they're considered the Natural Giants of Tavel...
The Charmasson farm is located just outside Tavel, it's a modest one-level house with a side building that was converted into a chai, the vines being just in the back with view over the first hills in the far. Like elsewhere in the region there's a push for more construction from both families and village administrations hungry for new payers of yearly local taxes, and on the other side of the small road there's already an encroachment of new houses, the village having allowed for more agricultural land to be turned constructible. Farmers usually don't resist especially when they sell their grapes to the local Coop, and they often end up dividing their parcels into as many individual lot for multiple residential units.
We were first received by Nadia, a warmful and energetic woman who explained the farm and their philosophy. I first asked about this vintage 2018 how the grapes had been going and she said they lost half the fruit load because of mildew
because of weather conditions in april and may that were closer to the ones of the Loire than the Rhône, with lots of rain with fog in the morning and a humidity level they never saw around here. Those who use copper had at least this resource but they don't use copper on their farm, only sulfur, clay and herb tea. Even the conventional growers stepped up their "normal" spraying procedures and used other, stronger chemicals, they also reduced the spacing of the sprays.
They're samely totally uncomprising on the cellar side and vinification, no additives of course, the juice ferments by itself and they let it alone, trusting mother nature that until now has done a good job. Their uncomprimising stance can be felt on this discreet line on the label (picture on right) which is intentionally the opposite way of regular wine labelling : Ne contient pas de sulfites (I must admit I looked twice when I read that, as even natural wine that had no sulfites added is usually labelled with the almost-compulsory "contains sulfites"), and they're indeed certain there's none, they had lab tests for their Japan exports and the lab couldn't find anything measurable. One of the reasons they didn't find any sulfites here is because Christian and Nadia basically don't even spray sulfur on the vines. Natural winemakers may not add any sulfites in their wines but if they spray the vines with sulfur, some measurable SO2 content can be found later in these wines.
I appreciate this stand which goes beyond the too-softened "no added sulfites" because as SO2 is the only additive that is somehow known to the average consumer, reading there is none of it will awaken something.
The chai had been cleaned for the harvest, Christian was still busy cleaning the tools when we arrived, the hoses, the pump, vats and the cement floor (this visit took place a short time before the picking). Christian says that he makes a list of all the
preparatory details and cleanings he has to go through prior to the harvest. The place is simple, there's just no oak, no barrels because they want the grapes to just express themselves. the temperature is controlled and it's cool (the region can be terribly hot in summer).
Nadia explains that they began with wine making around 1993 when they built the cellar part along the house but for the growing side they were already into it since 1983. Christian got this house from his grandfather plus the parcel of old vines next to it, after which Christian could get additional parcel through an exchange program of agricultural land managed by the village administration. He got new plantings for this additional surface and then they bought two other parcels. At the beginning they were selling the grapes to the Coop. When they built the cellar/chai in 1993 they sold their wine in bulk to the négoce. At the time it was clear because the domaine wasn't organic but on the other hand it was not conventional wine (already natural) (and anyway the négoce was buying at its preset rate). In 2004 they stop vinifying, making the deliberate choice to just sell the grapes during a trasition time when they'd convert to biodynamic farming.
They decided to make their wine again in 2008, vinifying all their fruit and bottling their wine, they had 5,5 hectares and it didn't make a lot of wine anyway. They never wanted to augment this surface in spite of a few opportunities that came their way in Tavel, they prefer to keep with this "taille humaine size in order to be able to do everything by themselves (except for the harvest).
when they
looked for a market for their bottles they contacted cavistes, you don't have many options for wines with biodynamic farming, the conventional retail isn't suited for these wines. Nadia says that Demeter helped a lot in that regard, they were oriented toward potential buyers for these wines.
Otherwise they made a few wine fairs but soon stopped, for example the Grenier Saint Jean wine fair in Angers, it was Mark Angeli who had helped them come in after having seen their wines somewhere in Japan. Nadia says these wine fairs not suited for the size of their wine farm, the buyers look for larger volumes. Also sold to individual buyers and word-by-mouth also built their customer base. What you just need, Nadia syas, is to have your wine here and there and from there people will discover them and make them known to other people in other towns. they began to sell in Japan Early, through a Japan-based British importer, James Stanton, they also were imported later in the United States through Chambers Street Wines. They also iport in Belgium and U.K. In Paris you can find their wines at Le Lieu du Vin, a wine shop near the Père Lachaise, at Au Quai, a wine shop near the canal, also at La Cave d'Ivry in Ivry just outside Paris, L'Amitié Rit (sounds like L'Ami Thierry) in Montreuil, all these places being vibrant wine shops specializing in natural wines.
They have some 10 grape varieties on their 5,5-hectare surface, for the white Grenache Blanc, Roussanne, Marsanne, Viognier, Clairette, Bourboulenc, for the rosé and red GrenacheNoir, Cinsault, Carignan, Mourvèdre, Syrah. When they plan their cuvées they taste the grapes in the parcels and decide what they'll do. Nadia says that this year will be specuial certainly, they've been told by people around that
the vintage will have lower acidity. Christian who joins us now at this point odf the cnversation says that as he and Nadia never makes lab analysis for the wine or the juice, they have no idea about the acidiy levels. He says that instead of lab analysis they decide all by tasting, whether the grapes or the juice.
Speaking of his vineyard surface Christian confirms he has the initial one-hectare surface he got from his grandfather, and he planted the rest. The old parcel is complanted the old way, like it used to be done in the past, and when you walk through this parcel you see indeed a vine with white grapes here and there among red-grape vines. He says the elders planted 2 vines of Grenache and then one vine of Clairette, which balanced the acidity with the sugar. For the plantings he did it with 3 rows of this next to 3 rows of that but he says he's been conditionned by the peer and appellation pressure and he should have sticked to the real complantation mode that really blends the varieties in the parcel. Even though they've now planted their new parcels in altenate groups of rows they srtill do as if complanted, picking reds and whites along to mix sugar-loaded and acidic grapes, giving always chance an opportunity to express something in this random picking.
Christian says that at the beginning they had an oenologist who came here to give advice but that's over even if he was a nice man who taught them useful things at the start for the hygiene and cellar safety but for the rest they now trust the ressenti the feeling that comes empirically after years of winemaking. He says it's simple, you have to respect the soil, put the least possible of these products that harm the harmony of the soil. They do biodynamic preps and i ask if there's a group of growers around doing this type of farming, he says yes, he works with people like Patrick Maurel (Terres du Pic) in nearby Pic Saint Loup, a 5,5-hectare domaine who farms naturally and vinifies without sulfites (and who by the way sells all his wines locally). Christian also works with a big group, the Syndicat des Vignerons en Culture Biodynamique and the preps are made in Lambesc where its president lives.
Christian bought this small caterpillar-type crawler tractor second hand, it's from the 1960s and works well, no computer or electronics, very reliable, just that you feel the ground directly (no tires or shock absorbers). He found it in Mèze (beyond Montpellier) 125 km from here and drove all the way with his tractor and a trailer at the back to bring it here, using side roads not to disturb traffic...
Christian says that here around in Tavel growers and domaines are mostly conventional, dumping chemicals on the vines and the soil, and there are not much contact beyond bonjour, bonsoir, people think about money and there's an inner pollution in the mentality that prevents things to change. Christian says that in this regard he was lucky to have been raised by his gradfather who wasn't into this mentality and taught him the old way. And for the young people he says, it's hard to work differently, there's the family pressure, then the wine school that encourages this square productivist scheme.
This custom-made mixing machine was made by François Bouchet, an expert on Biodynamy who designed this mixer 25 years ago, it uses three different type of woods and there's a lead sheet to prevent the electric field coming from the motor and wiresfrom disturbing the dynamized water's harmony. I understand he got this machine after Pierre Masson, a friend of François Bouchet and also an expert in Biodynamy passed away recently (early august 2018). Pierre Masson himself came several times here in the domaine and he gave them advice to help the soil decompose with using more silica. This custom-made mixer was made obviously decades ago when no such tools were available on the market but its design also took into account the potential risk of magnetic fields. Chriqstian says that at the beginning he dynamized the preps by hand but that's pretty difficult to move water for a long time, even if there's only 150 liters in the barrel each time.
They do many of their preps here, using this barrel standing now near the vines and which was made by a cooper near Reims who designed such wooden vessels for biodynamic preparations. Speaking of the preparations, there are several schools derived from Rudolf Steiner's agricultural teachings, the Alex Podolinski one and the Maria Thun one, they rather follow the latter enen though some of the groups they attended were tilting for the former. tHe preps are slightly different with the Maria Thun school, for example the silica used for the preps isn't buried in horns but in a barrel with eggshells and basalt.
They built their winery mostly without outside financing, finding the needed tools and vats second hand here and there, they got the vats in Italy, there was no Euro back then and they were cheap, they drove there on the Adriatic with a trailer to bring them over here. They always managed in spite of their meager means to find the tools they needed. Today of course Christian looks on Le Bon Coin for second-hand winemaking tools when he needs something. They eschewed bank loans to set up their winery, the only loans they took were for two parcels they purchased and 3 large vats, the rest was self financed. The first year of their fully operative winery (2008 if I'm right) they even did the harvest (plus the chai work like the pressing) by themselves, and this was 5 hectoliters of wine (they had around 3 hectares back then). Nadia says that even with little money there are alternative ways to still make the job, you just have to think differently.
We first taste the white of the domaine, the Cuvée Vin Libre 2016, a blend of Grenache Blanc, Roussanne, Viognier, Clairette, Marsanne and Bourboulenc, all on silica and sandy soils. The wine is vinified in vats (nothing in barrel in their domaine).
No filmtration, just decanted through a long élevage, looks very clear.
The label
symbol refers to Nadia's Kabyle origins (the Kabyles or Berbers retain a distinctive culture not always well accepted by the Arab rulers of North Africa), it's actually the cultural Berber flag, but Kabyles had their own alphabet for centuries long before the Arab invasion, it is said to have been a Punic variant of the Phoenician script. The sign on the label represents the free human being, it is one of these old Kabyle symbols. Nadia says that she chose this label also for women who hold a particular place in the Kabyle culture (read ethnologist Camille Lacoste-Dujardin on women Kabyles), and Christian adds that there are similarities in the original Kabyle religious creed, with planets playing a central role.
Color : wheat yellow. Super velvety feel on the nose. Nice oiliness and viscosity, energy feel in the mouth, with power and sharpness. Good acidity too, and thanks to the Bourboulenc a good aromatic character, Christian says. The alcohols seems high but this powerful wine is vivid at the same time.
This year was very difficult with the mildew but Christian still didn't use any copper, just herb teas, silica and clay (bentonite), he only uses sulfur when he has some precise threats of oidium. He still had to spray some 30 times this year because of the disease threat. He
also makes compost tea, but they noted that
this year mildew was particularly resistant and agressive and they don't know why, if it has to do with the chemicals used by conventional growers or something else, Nadia says she was puzzled by its force and the fact it looked as if it was more aerial than soil-based this year. Christian says that Steiner advised to keep small ponds here, and their to kind of park the fungi responsible for mildew, and here as there's no such ponds, and the fungi becoming more resistant with the use of chemicals, they kind of prey on their parcels that may feel like comfortable ponds for them.
On the left you can see the articulated tractor Christian uses for the sprays, it's Italian made and appropriately narro to pass between the rows. He regrets not having his horses anymore, they had a couple of ones which they gave when they had difficulties a few years ago. He says it's important to keep animals in a farm. The sprayer above is the one they use for the dynamized preps, it works without pump, it's like a backpack sprayer, and it's good because it doesn't harm the dynamization qualities of the prep. They use this sprayer for silica preps and bach flowers concoctions.
On the right you can see another sprayer used for clay and herb teas, this one has a pump. He usually mixes clay (bentonite) with cow-dung tea, herb tea. I ask about milk as well, he says he uses low-fat milk to dilute essential oils.
Further in the tight side-building with the tools, Christian shows me his different dry herbs and keaves he uses for the herb teas and sprays, these are Netlles, Pepper Mint, Horsetail, Yarrow, Thyme, Chamomile, Dandelion and other ones. He shows me in the same room the clay he recovered directly from a drilling, he has also some magnesia, along the bentonite, the diatomaceous earth and the basalt dust... He also uses sometimes small doses of baking soda, and he has some quicklime he'll try to turn into slaked lime. It's considered a phyto product and he can't buy it directly because they only sell these products to growers who passed the Brevet (a diploma) even though slaked lime isn't one of these harmful chemicals.
Christian picks the herbs and plants himself, and on the right lunar days
__ Cuvée Sept syllabes, Rosé 2015, blend of Grenache Noir, Grenache Blanc, Carignan and Cinsault. 19 hectoliters total. Unfiltered also. The name of the cuvée with the number 7 refers also to the Kabyle culture where it's a healing number. The wine is lightly turbid with
mesmerizing reflections. Onion peel color. The mouth is indeed very fruity, very supple and aerial,
there's a light tickling on the tongue, and you drink that wine so easily, comme du petit lait (like whey) as we say in France. Super wine. They were very worried at the beginning because the tank gave off odd smells like volcano sulfur even though they hadn't put anything of course; plus the sugars wouldn't finish to ferment, the acidity was weird, they were very worried. They ended up racking the vat, taking away the gross lees and put the wine back on its thin lees and what comes next, and after a while the wine went fine, Christian says they were lucky. Then says Nadia, they trapped the wine by deciding one day to bottle it with the small residual sugar it had (this was autumn 2016 probably, Christian says), and it turned fine, it kept fermenting a bit but not much, just enough for this tickling feel on the tongue. Good job anyway, whether it was intuition or chance, this rosé rocks, and I'm not usually a fan of rosé. and oddly, Nadia says it's close to the Tavel rosé, for once, even if it's labelled as table wine.
the label represents the tree of life, it's a drawing made by their daughter. This wine was exported to Japan, the United States, Belium and the United Kingdom, plus some was sold here in France. Nadia says they still have some to sell. Price here is 12 €, good deal.
They bottle everything themselves by gravity, by batches of 7 to 10 hectoliters each time, using a rotating 7-spout bottle filler (picture on left) which they got second hand in Burgundy. They just clean the bottles with hot water, no chemicals either for cleaning.
__ Cuvée Dent de Lion 2013, red blend vinified also in tanks, no added sulfites. Very exciting nose with meaty notes, the color is cloudy, very appealing. Nadia says 2013 was a very nice vintage, same for 2012 which was even more on the fruit side. Here we feel dry leaves, spices, B. feels incense aromas too, she's right.
In the mouth, nice tannic grip, mokka notes, earthy dust feel, dry leaves aromas too.
they vinify
whole-clustered with juice in the bottom and put the successive layers of grapes with CO2 between each, leaving this by itself from 15 days to 2 months without doing anything, they don't even open to taste.
Asked how they decide to stop and move one after 15 days, one months or more, they say it depends of the condition of the grapes that particular vintage, its degree of fragility, they plan in advance the lengt of the maceration. And even though they don't taste they can hear the sound of the fermentations, the primary one, then the malolactic which sounds a bit different for a trained ear. Nadia says that it all depends of what you made before, and depending of what you pick and what you want to make, they kind of feel the needed maceration length, and like Nadia says, they trust their grapes. Asked if they had accidents she says yes, once for a rosé which was kind of bitter-sweet, they had discussions about it, it would have been still saleable as such but they chose not to, because they first have to like a wine before selling it.
Christian brings a bunch of red grapes (don't remember which variety) for us to taste, he says the seeds have to be dark for the ripeness, these grapestaste good, almost table grapes for me.
Here is how most the wines spend 3 years hidden from the outide world, sealed in a stainless-vat with a simple blanket to slow the temperature changes. The only time they open is when they decide it's time to bottle, and they don't have the option to seal the lid back and continue, when it's open it's for good. It's the same challenge for the long macerations, when they keep the fermenter closed for 2 months with the only sign of life being the CO2 going out, they don't taste either and when they choose to open it's to press right away.
Speaking of corks, they've had lots of problems in the past with regular corks, whether for drips or tainted smells and they switched to sugarcane-based corks by Nomacorc, they now have a few years' perspective with these new closures and they're happy about them, very safe, reliable and recyclable.
Asked about the work on the soil in the vineyard, Christian says they only till in autumn, superficially. Otherwise they cut the grass when needed using a wire brush cutter. In summer they don't cut the grass, he sazys it's better to keep the weeds cover, it protects the vines, leaving the soil naked under the sun is not good. Here on the picture (this visit was around september 8) the soil is very green and it's very unusual, it should be yellow dry at this time of the year, that's because there has been these unusual rains, not only in april-may but even later during summer.
When we left I spotted this road sign near the coop (the building of which can be seen in the background), proving that the traffic is pretty jammed just outside of the village with tractors
pulling gondolas and rushing to the Coopérative (named Les Vignerons de Tavel) to unload their grapes. I found funny to find such a danger sign associated with harvest, you might find underlying reasons if you think twice...
Most of these grapes are alas picked with combine, the maximum grape load per hectare is 8000 kilograms and the yields go up to 46 hectoliters per hectare. So as a contrast to the humble tools seen above you can stumble upon giant straddle harvesters like this one on the left. You can find all the details of the [conventional] Tavel Appellation in this Pdf document (in French) and reading between the lines in this type of administrative document helps understand what the Appellations are about.
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