Valvignères, Ardèche (Rhône)
We know that in the world of natural wine many of these vignerons who make a difference are outsiders, like coming from large cities and often with a completely different professional background, but sometimes they come from really far, like it's the case with Anders Frederik Steen, who moved years ago from Denmark with his wife and children to tend vineyards and make wine in this sweet region of Ardéche, in the southern Rhône. We visited him a few weeks ago (around mid-july, I'm pretty late for the publishing, sorry, that's why I backdate it to august...) and Valvignères was still the quiet and lovely village I appreciate, surrounded with hills in a mixed landscape of garrigue, woods and vineyards.
When Anders met us in this square facing his home and cellar, he told us that he started in 2013 with vinifying grapes sourced at Domaine Le Mazel, making his three first vintages (2013, 2014 & 2015) with Jean-Marc Brignot, the iconic winemaker from Jura who now lives much of his time on Sado Island in Japan. He had befriended Jean-Marc in his years working at Noma (2006-2008) where he was a sommelier. where Anders recounted how they went through a terrible hailstorm in the area a few weeks before during which the vines lost all their leaves and buds, there was nothing left and not much to do. But fortunately the artisan wine milieu is caring, and fellow growers came here to help and they tried to minimize the long-term shock on the vines by pruning what was left the appropriate way, a different pruning compared to the one in winter, with only 3 or 4 eyes, meaning relatively long, which helped the foliage grow back. He's spotting flowers growing, just that these new flowers and potential bunches are in a stage the vine goes through usually around the end of may, meaning these grapes should be ready to be picked theorically between november 15 and december 1st....
Following his time at Noma he studied in London, then opened a couple of venues in Copenhagen with friends from Noma, Relae and Manfred’s, and he stayed there until 2013 (he actually sold his shares in 2014). Even if at the beginning he just vinified purchased grapes he decided to move here because that was more convenient than keeping travelling between Scandinavia and France. He and Jean-Marc worked from the grapes of Gérald Oustric but also from the Bannwarth family in Alsace (which they vinified over there). He keeps buying grapes to these two growers to this day but a bit less as he and his wife have about 4 hectares of their own now. Doing négoce-only wines was common sense back then because he lived in Denmark and Jean-Marc in Japan but after setlling down here for good in 2017 with his wife Anne he could find parcels and work from his own fruit as well.
Both of them Anders and Anne do the vineyard work by themselves, with an extra team helping for the picking. He says that 4 hectares is the good size, it's not too big and even leaves them free time to do other things along the year, it's a good balance. If they tried to go up to 5, 6 or 7 hectares they'd have to hire someone and with the added costs you end up making more wine but without earning more [compulsory wage costs in France often prevent small farms to hire]. They like it this way, keeping the structure small, it's easier to handle. Speaking of Valvignères, Anders says it's a real "village de vignerons" (winegrower village) with these cellars underneath every house here as well as a room for farm animals, and in Valvignères wine has been made here since the Roman times. By the way this village which was known under its Roman name Vallis Vinaria was said by Pliny the Elder more than 2100 years ago (in Naturalis Historia) as having a very qualitative vineyard. The Rhône river was used as a highway to transport goods then, and wine travelled already, in amphorae if not in bottles. When Anders and his wife bought this village house it was in disrepair and was uninhabited for many years, so they fixed and renovated the whole house.
The basement with the cellar and chai is a bit small he says but he prefers to keep working there than having to build a big structure outside the village. During the harvest it's like in the old times, the red grapes are destemmed outside in front of the house before maceration and when they load the basket press, it's inside as it remains in the cellar (too heavy to be pulled out). In winter the cellar is cold of course, with temperature going down to 12 C or 13 C (53,6 to 55,4 F) which is borderline but that's OK [I know surface cellars that are really colder]. He says that don't have too many problems for the fermentation, and he credits in part the slow pressing for that because when you press slowly, the juice will carry the yeast all along, it's like washing gently the grape's skin with the juice. Some people tell him his slow pressing amounts to a maceration in the press, but in fact that's not the case because the juice flows uninterrupted. And the flowing juice takes with it also everything from the skin, it salinity, bitterness and acidity, things that are lost when you do a 5-6-hour press. Such shorter presses bring fruit-floral juices and his longer presses are more on the saline, acidic-plus style with a bitterness edge. When they press the whites (which are not destemmed), the stems help drain the juice out. He says he avoids picking green, including for the stems.
We're tasting a first wine, a white, from a barrel :
__ Sauvignon Blanc 2020. Picked here near Valvignères, quite late in the season (tis was the last parcel they picked in 2020) and pressed along 5 days. Anders says that generally he's not a fan of Sauvignon since his sommelier years because when picked early there's always this metallic side with green notes of peas, asparagus which he doesn't like. It was the first time he worked with Sauvignon Blanc and he called Sébastien Riffault (whom he met in march on a wine fair) for advice. Sébastien told him to wait the longest possible, not pay attention to potential alcohol, otherwise he'd have these metallic notes. He also said that picking late and 2-3 days after a good rain was good, because even though potential alcohol initially went up, it goes down after the rain with the light diluting in the berries. That's what he did, the potential was then 16,5 %. What is interesting also is that around Valvignères it's normally only clay/limestone soils but his vineyard grow on blue marls (marnes bleues), like in Arbois (Jura), samely pushed to the surface by volcanic eruptions ages ago. He says that he feels something of Jura quality, related to the salinity of the wine for example, when he makes wine from this terroir, even if of course, with differences considering the climate and latitude here. That's the case with this Sauvignon, which he plans to keep in this barrel 3 or 4 years, and he thinks there's the possibility to have an élevage with oxidative style. Anyway here for his wines he doesn't top up the barrels, even the reds. I'm surprised especially that the wines don't become veil wines, and Anders says that they nonetheless get this light oxidative touch that makes a difference, and the wine gets accustomed to oxygen in the way, which makes them more stable.
The Sauvignon has a nice golden color. In the mouth, there's a bit of residual sugar, Anders says he didn't make an analysis but thinks there's 15 grams left.
These are the beauties hanging in this cellar, Anders says they make these with a group of amateurs of charcuterie which included Gérald Oustric, Hélène et Christophe Comte (Domaine des Vigneaux, a biodynamic domaine), Andrea Calek, Alain Allier, Philippe Pibarot, all people dealing with real wine and loving real charcuterie. They spend almost a week together, have three pigs delivered and Que la Fête Commence !... I ask if someone knows how to cut expertly, he says he's the one (he was also chef in his former life), but everyone takes part at some point. I remember having seen saucissons hanging elsewhere, coincidently in the Jura at Peggy & Jean-Pascal Buronfosse. Anders says that with these hot days of july we were through they're drying a bit, otherwise here in winter it's cold and humid, with is very good for the slow drying of the saucissons. By the way, try to say that in French several times, very hard : Le séchage des saucissons...
Here is the lard or lardo, or salo in Russian (сало), also a delicacy, here sprinkled with salt & spices. At the beginning they did that for the pickers when everybody eats together, and now they do it on a larger scale. Speaking of that, it makes me think to the piquette which is regaining favor among artisan winemakers as a way to get a light, easy-drinking, unpretentious "wine" to down with friends on a daily basis without undermining the wine reserves (on which the vigneron is supposed to make a living and can't give away without dire economic consequences). Anders says that coincidently he recently sent an email to the Douanes [short name for the administration overlooking the wineries in France] about if he could do some piquette, and the answer was positive, even for large volumes to sell (not only for private consumption), which may help this year as he'll have smaller volumes to work with. So he'll see later in the season.
__ Marsanne 2020, another white, from a barrel as well. Very different style here, very interesting wine, beautifully balanced for me, generous, and with an acidulous something which I like. Picked relatively late also. Anders feels it's not yet in place, with an acidity not yet in line with the other parameters, he thinks after another year it'll reach this balance. B. says it tastes a bit like if the malolactic was not completed, but he thinks it's completed because it tasted really different before. He doesn't make analysis and prefers to trust his taste than rely on a lab test, he just thinks the wije needs to wait right now.
Here we're going to taste whay looks like a rosé :
__ Blend of Gewürtztraminer sourced in Alsace from Stéphane Bannwarth and Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 (two barrels of this). Vin de France. Color : onion peel. Very interesting mouth, feels ready, very enjoyable although tasting temperature a bit higher than it should be, generous wine. Anders says
it's interesting to have a rosé with more depth, and on my second sip I appreciate the Gewürtz touch in this rosé. After we spent time chatting and were ready to taste something else, B. remarked that the blend had fully opened itself in her now-empty glass, with a very expressive nose. Anders says that Jacques Néauport ,who worked a lot with Jules Chauvet long time ago, used also to spend much time with Gérald Oustric (he lives in Ardèche actually) and he often said that there's a memory of wine in a glass and it's important to smell the glass when it's empty like here, I add that it's like the soul of the wine speaks even better than the wine itself.
Anders says that at the beginning when he came to Ardèche he wanted to vinify the great classics like Syrah, Grenache, Carignan etc, and Gérald offered him immediately at his start in 2013 to get Cabernet Sauvignon, something which as a former sommelier in Danemark made him uncomfortable because over there in Denmark this variety wine is difficult to find its pairing with their light version of French cuisine. So, well, he still couldn't turn down his offer and he accepted, he felt that if he wanted to get some other varieties he'd had to say yes. Same thing for Gewürtztraminer, that's a variety he never invested himself into in his Denmark years for about the same reasons but when Stéphane Bannwarth (biodynamic domaine in Alsace) offered him a grape load he accepted along some Pinot Gris, while he was eying some Pinot Noir, Pinot Blanc, Riesling, especially that they work on the Bildstœcklé terroir like Bruno Schueller, an extraordinary terroir indeed. And now after working with these varieties he got to love them. So this year (2020) he found it fun to blend the two said varieties (he took a barrel of Gewürtz 2019). The Cabernet was of course a direct press 2020 but it still brought some color [pressing lasted 3 days here].
On the right you can see the bottle filler (tireuse)
We walk into an adjacent cellar room filled with barrels that look newer. Anders says indeed they're new here, while in the other room they're like 10-15 years old, adding that he works mostly with a sigle cooperage, the Tonnellerie Claude Gillet in Saint Romain (Burgundy), a family business, now with the grandson in charge, and he often buys from them second-hand barrels, and he trusts them because they know which type of barrels he's looking for, without sulfur, without chemicals and so on, so he selects the source to fit his requirements. But at one point Anders needed many barrels and without a 2nd-hand batch available he had to choose new barrels, and to offset the newness of the oak (from Allier) the cooper made him a chauffe blanche, meaning no toasting when heating the oak, using a light fire. He's very happy with this cooper.
__ Viognier 2020 sourced from Gérald Oustric, pressed along 4 days in the basket press. Very harmonious, Umami feel, I would say, there's a wholeness and aerial style also, very enjoyable. B. asked if he plans to leave the wine in this barrel for more time, and he answers that initially his plans was to bottle it this year, but as he'll have less volume this year (2021) because of the hail losses, he'll keep the Viognier in there, because he avoids as much as possible to leave the barrels empty for a long time. B. wondered if the barrel will have a bigger imprint on the wine over time, but Anders thinks it will not, the fruit will quiet down, and with the light oxidative style brought by the no-topping-up policy, it will raise the acidity. About this no-ouillage (no topping up), we ask how many bottles he gets from a barrel, he says normally a full barrel makes 300 bottles but here without ouillage and after 1 or 2 years he'll get from 260 to 220 bottles instead. He says he likes the oxidative touch in a wine, it brings a balance, a structure that make the wine stronger. Speaking of sulfur he doesn't add anything in the wine, never, and he adds [I almost overlooked that end of his sentence and then woke up] in the vineyard the same, no sulfur... I asked again, yes, no sulfur AND NO COPPER in the vineyard ! Scroll down for more about this while we visited the vineyard.
Here is a direct press (albeit a long one like usual, stretched over a 5 days) of Grenache Noir 2020, which made a rosé. They did one since 2016 and 2017, destemming the grapes and putting the grapes in the juice. He says he loves carbo but after experiencing it with Gérald he didn't want to copycat exactly what he learned there, moddifying it slightly with a destemming he learnt from Jean-Marc Brignot in Jura : using the direct-press juice in which destemmed grapes are immersed for "maceration". At the beginning he made a direct press with a pneumatic press which works quickly but since a few years that's only with a basket press. Here on the 1st day there was foulage (foot stomping), then all along the 5 days of pressing they separated the flowing juice every day, with 5 different types of juice. He put aside the first-day juice because lacking of concentration and matière. What we have in this barrel is day 2, day 3 and day 4, the last (day 5 was too macerated and too tannic and he blended it with some Grenache Blanc and he plans to bottle it in 2 days).
Very powerful wine with flower aromas like peony, harmonious, lovely. Blind I'd think it's a red rather than a rosé. Anders says he plans to keep the wine in there another year, because he thinks it's too high in alcohol. i kind of disagree, I feel it as powerful but balanced, no excessive alcohol actually.
Speaking of SO2 he says it's more useful to keep the winemaker from being anxious than anything else, and it ends up being the worst fault in a wine. He tasted recently superb old-vintage wines made without SO2, Mias 2001 from Le Mazel [Viognier], also Schueller Riesling 1998 Pfeiffenberg, and a Pierre Overnoy 1989, they were all so good. Of course, he knows that these cuvées went through up-and-downs, with years they didn't taste that good, but now they're up again. I can't agree, living wines offer more pleasure in spite of these occasional up-and-downs.
We now taste a red from a fiberglass tank with floating lid :
__ Grenache Noir & Grenache Blanc, the Grenache Noir here is the part he didn't use for the wine we just tasted before, this is the juice from the first day (more than 10 hectoliters, almost white) and the last day (4 hectoliters of dark red juice), both vinified together with the white juice of the Grenache Blanc (white of course). What is strange hgere is that it's a red, but actually there's only direct press here. B. says she's more into whites usually but this one impresses her, very delightful. Anders says that it's funny because for himself at the beginning he didn't like this wine at all. This is some kind of rosé as a direct press, albeit with the thicker tannins of the last day of pressing, Anders feels it like a red because of that. Because he hadn't enough room in the barrels (the 1919 stayed in barrels longer than expected), he exceptionally kept the wine in this plastic tank, which he uses generally only for maceration and blending.
I ask about this thing I immediately recognize as a wicker destemming grid, I thought he had it made somewhere in France (like the Vannerie de Villaines) but it comes from his home country Denmark where a friend has an artisanal workshop where he keeps making things the old way. Denmark has a policy of helping such workshops perpetuate old craftmanships (like potteries, Viking drakkar ships or things like that) and transmitting the skills through generations. there wasn't a destemming grid in his line of artefacts but he created one along Anders' specifications. Beatiful item, and you keep that for life. Anders says that he likes the gesture of destemming, they do that outside in front of the house and villagers pass by and are impressed by the scene, old folks remember having seen that in the streets in the mid-20th century, they drink a glass together, it's a beautiful moment in the harvest time. Plus, he does some sorting all the while destemming, putting on the side faulty grapes, leaves when they come across, so that only perfect grapes fall under the grid.
They use a pump but that's one of these pumps that are super soft on juice and wine, a peristaltic pump which he bought in Italy (they were in hurry back then and he couldn't find any available in France at the time) This pump merely pushes the juice/wine more than it pumps, Anders says it's magic, it works almost like gravity, without shock on the structure of the liquids.
Anders uses only basket presses, including one he borrows to Gérald Oustric, an old press formerly belonging to Yvon Métras. Gérald uses it for his devattings and Anders for his direct press. He says he likes working with a basket press because the juice comes out slowly. This one is a ratchet press (clic-clac like we say in French) while Yvon's is hydraulic but basically that's the same smooth pressing. He takes 3, 4, sometimes 5 days for a press load with a pause in the night : last tightening around midnight or 1 pm and first one around 5 pm. I'm amazed at how long his pressing is stretched, he says he keeps the juice flowing, even if very feeble and slow, and tightens the screw a bit when it stops, the pressure inside the load then restarts the slow flowing. Inside as it's tight there can't be bacteria, and outside they clean twice a day to avoid any contamination otherwise he'd have volatile going up. The problems can occur with the juice stains here and there, that's why hygiene counts.
Here is the magic tool he used to eschew sulfur in barrel cleaning (even when he plans to leave a barrel empty for a while), he got tipped about it by Bruno Schueller, it's a UV lamp which you slip into the barrel and that kills the bacteria inside. In short, when you rack the wine, you don't even have to wash the barrel, you let it dry and thereafter you put the lamp (10 minutes) to erase the bacteria inside... It's effective for a month, so if empty longer, you just put the lamp again inside for 10 minutes and you're safe for another month. When he first heard about it from Bruno he was skeptical and was surprised (he thought) that Schueller would fall for one of these fancy (and innefective) gadgets, but he said he had borrowed it first from a friend and for two consecutive years had no volatile issue as a result. And the good side is it's not that expensive (compared to the loss of a full barrel of wine), 600 €. It's made by Rtech Solutions, a Beaune-based company.
__ Here we taste another pale red from 2020 : Made with destemmed grapes of Carignan macerated for 6 weeks in direct-press juice of Carignan (this was part of the time he spent in Alsace), then plended with Sauvignon Blanc/marsanne, then pressing of the macerated grapes and filling of a large barrel, a 500-liter demi-muid. In the mouth, you obviously feel a white character, be it from white tannin style or a peculiar acidity, i don't know. Anders says he tries to make a Carignan wine away from the concentrated, jammy style you can encounter in the south, he loves Poulsard, Pinot Noir, Pineau d'Aunis expressions but he of course can't make that here but there's a middle ground to be reached through these blends. He says Carignan in some regards can yield a similar refineness and elegance if you're careful, it begins in the vineyard where you must not have and excessive grape load per vine. This Carignan comes from Gérald Oustric who for him is a model, he works respectfully in the vineyard, vinifies naturally since 1996 and year after year these are beautiful wines, and without sulfites, he says Gérald doesn't make self-promotion and he is not enough praised for all his good work. He also gave strategic support for winegrowers who were tempted to vinify naturally, and at a time there was not the supporting milieu you now have everywhere including the wine bars and the buyers, Gilles Azzoni for example or Andrea Calek can testify about this help. There are initiators like him in many wine regions in France and he has a lot of respect for them, they helped around them without fearing the notion of concurrence or rivalry. That's indeed, as I write now and then, a major difference with the way conventional winegrowers behave, I think, because the latter, when you dig a bit, view their activity more like a business and the bottom line comes first. On the opposite philosophical range, Anders likes to tell what Pat Desplats (formerly partner at Les Griottes) regularly says : The day I sell more of my wine than I drink, I'll be depressed.... Indeed not the mainstream winegrower [they sometimes don't even drink their own wine !]. Anders sees Pat regularly because he helps him ship his cases to Denmark.
__ Another rosé type red. From a barrel sitting on the left from the basket press : Grenache Noir (from their own surface) & Chardonnay (from Gérald Oustric). The Chardonnay is a 2019 and was supposed to be vinified in white but he didn't like the juice and blended it with Grenache Noir (a direct press which afterthen had 20 % of grapes macerated in the juice), with a lower ration of grapes than juice (8 hectos of juice/2 hectos destemmed grapes), like they do usually, the goal being to get extraction without getting unpleasant tannins. In the mouth I feel residual sugar here.
Anne Bruun Blauert, Anders's wife and partner in the domaine joins us un the cellar, she speaks French as well, both with an accent (not as easy to learn a foreign language at adult age, compared to kids). They speak about how they do for the grapes they buy in Alsace to Stéphane Bannwarth, they do the vinifications up there in Alsace, where they leave the wine alone for long stretches of time of course as they live in Ardèche, so there also there's no topping-up on the barrels and as a matter of fact almost every barrel there develops a veil at the surface with some oxidative style, some more some less depending of the bottling delay (some are borderline Vin Jaune).
B. asked how they decide to do things, Anne says she didn't follow a training in wine, her former life in Denmark was not wine or food related, but they exchange about the type of wines both like to drink, she adds that somewhere it's good that she didn't have a formal training because that would hinder a frank approach to what pleases her in a wine. At the same time she aknowledges that Anders was not coerced by his former job into making what the market likes. Both say they're inspired by what they drink here and there, and that's why every year they do something different.
__ Here is one of these wines vinified in Alsace which developed a veil after months without ouillage. Such a beautiful color and visual vibrancy through its light turbidity ! Pinot Blanc 2018 from the Bildstoecklé terroir at Domaine Bannwarth (also a terroir practiced by Bruno Schueller. Beautiful oxidative nose. Lovely mouth, B. says that it's a nice type of oxidative style, closer to a milky hazelnut than a nut. Super good length also, B. says that's because of the freshness that comes with it. Anders says that from his own impression, making a veil wine in a colder place (like a cellar) makes it less caramelized compared with those made the traditionnal way in an attic, and there's more acidity as well with the cellar veil wine. He noticed that Alice of Octavin vinifies Vin Jaune in cold temperature (at least when she was in her former location downtown Arbois), same for Jean-Marc Brignot, same at Puffeney and Pierre Overnoy. He says that he feels that when you vinifies a veil wine at lod (cellar) temperature you retain the acidity, you'll just need to have two more years to get to the end result but the acidity will be better. Here his idea was to top up this barrel with Sauvignon Blanc, but he has not yet fully decided what it'll do, it could be also a partial topping-up every year.
They had 6 barrels of Pinot Blanc and bottled the 5 others the previous week, but this was was different to they keep it for now.
We had been tasting, chatting for quite a long time in the cellar and Anders told us we'd take the air outside with a few bottles. This village square is lovely, there's a fountains (with water flowing several hours a day), plane trees and a restaurant where they have pizzas from time to time. Plus let's not forget that around the corner there's this iconic restaurant La Tour Cassée (see picture at the bottom of this page), the restaurant is managed by a transplant from Lyons, Claire Bouveron, and it is so good with great local food and a superb wine list. It is alas these days open only for dinner and she is said to be considering selling the place. Otherwise, a tip if you look to buy these artisan wines in a single place, there's an organic food shop in Alba La Romaine, Votre Marché Alba Terroir where you'll find many bottles of your favorite Ardèche winemakers (they have great cheeses too).
Asked how locals viewed him when they realized he was from faraway Denmark and changed life to make wine in their village of Ardèche with only 4 hectares, Anders says the reactions were diverse, from the people who were supportive and saw his move with friendly eyes to people who looked more mitigated, like maybe there was some kind of jealousy maybe, but anyway thanks to Gérald Oustric and his sister Jocelyn they could feel at home, especially that he joined the group of same-minded vignerons of the area and his circle of friends in the village. What may upset some older people is the fact he succeeds will selling all his wine from his tiny 4 hectares (plus négoce) as far as Japan and the United States. At the same time he understands this reaction from old-school farmers but on the other hand he finds it unjust, but nevermind, most of the reaction from the villagers are positive.
This fountain is flowing several hours per day, like until noon in the morning, and the afternoon between 2pm and 7pm, a good balance between the tradition and water-saving rigor. It is not flowing here because it was past noon. At one point it started to flow again by itself, really magic noise...
Anders says that when he and his family left Denmark for good to settle down in Valvignères, he was the only one among the 4 to speak some French, his wife didn't speak any, their Denmark-born children neither. But children are amazing, it took very little time for them to become articulate and even fluent in French, it took them only 3 months to speak and 6 months to not even retain a Danish accent... His son (the oldest of the two) speaks and reads in Danish (that's the language they use between themselves at home), he speaks/reads French, now English, and he begins with Italian... He and his wife encourage him to continue, mathematics can wait but for language skills he has obviously 5 years along which he'll learn without effort.
__ Wear Me like a Flower, Vin de France 2018 (Pinot Blanc), that's the Alsace-sourced Pinot Blanc from the 5 other barrels which they bottled over there a couple of weeks before in Alsace (they always bottle where they make the wine, they don't move the juice, except for the last barrel of veil Pinot Blanc which they brought down here. In short, Anders stays a week in Alsace at harvest time for the vinification (which is done in Laurent Bannwarth's old cellar, separately from Stéphane's) then that's all, they leave the wine by itself and they just visit 2 times a year to check.
The wine has a nice apricot color. Full mouthed wine.
The labels are quite small compared to the "norm", they have the size of a back label actually, very minimalist, Anders says that with his former experience as sommelier he got to realize that the big names and classic domaines have these samely-classic labels which work well with the fine-dining restaurants in Europe and a bit less in a small wine bar in Tokyo. On the other hand many natural-wine labels with provocative designs might work well in wine bars and less in upscale restaurants, so he found the middle ground where the wine is in the center without distraction. Anders also always tells on the label about where the grapes come from, with the name of the grower clearly displayed.
Speaking of the sales, I asked the export share, he says almos everything is exported, to Scandinavia, the United States [started with Chris Terrell and Vineyardgate, now Zev Rovine], Japan, Korea, the U.K. and other countries. they didn't make efforts to sell in France actually because orders were small volumes like a few cases while exports were sized in pallets. You can find their wines at La Buvette in Paris still.
__ On s'éloigne....on s'approche, Vin de France 2017 (Gewürztraminer), Les Raisins de La Famille Bannwarth. Samely, vinified and bottled in Alsace, two weeks before this visit (so it stayed 3,5 years in barrels, without topping up). Such a color also, unfiltered like the rest, no sulfites added like the rest. Asked if he ever had accidents happening in these conditions, he says no, in Alsace as well as here. And he says Laurent's cellar over there is so quiet that he's sure it helps the wine get through. And when he has questions on a given cuvée, he trusts more friends and fellow winemakers whom he calls to come taste, than getting a lab analysis : through their own experience he'll learn and avoid bad decisions triggered by fear.
Anise aromas, the wine makes nice legs inside the glass. This wine with 3,5 years of élevage just had a racking in may 2018 and was bottled years later (early july 2021), that's all, very simple, no intervention whatsoever, not even ouillage. These bottles are not yet on the market but will soon be.
In the area there are vignerons who work for the coopérative and others who make wine at the domaine. All suffered losses with the hail this year, between 60 % and 90 %, but the ones who use to sell to the coop basically took their vacation now, not even planning to take care of the remaining bunches on their vines, this is a different mindset, they got the insurance money and already forget about this vintage, they'll not move their combine for the 20 % or 10 % remaining bunches. When you saw people in the vineyard in these days (we were in mid-july) this was certainly a domaine who makes its own wine, because whether they were insured or not, they'll try to make the best of what still hangs on the vines. Plus, Anders says that he loves being among the vines, he just saw that new flowers are popping up and he's wondering with excitement if they will translate into ripe grapes around early september.
They have all their vineyard in the same area, this is a 10-hectare block, the vineyard part making 4 hectares and the rest being grassland and garrigue, and the soil is wholly blue marls, which is atypical for Valignères. So, speaking of the vineyard management, they don't use any sulfur and neither any copper (let's remind that these two chemicals known when they're blended as ther Bordeaux mix or bouillie bordelaise), which is really very rare even among organic grower and natural-wine vignerons. At the beginning like every organic grower they used both sulfur and copper but then begzan to try to lower the doses, especially of copper. For the sulfur, the group of same-minded grower around here had ordered mineral sulfur from the Etna region, which was already much better than oil-based sulfer because after 2-3 weeks you sprated it, it's gone. For copper that's another story and he felt more incentive to stop using it, because it will stay in the ground, it kind of finds its way in the wine, gets in the lungs if you work in the vineyard as well. They made trials here since 2017, with in 2018 using sea water instead of copper, an idea sourced from thissmall group of growers in Alsace, Pierre Frick, Julien Meyer, Bruno Schueller and Stéphane Bannwarth who had been working on this for a longer time. So he used in 2018 and 2019 sea water with herbs extracts and in 2020 he added lacto fermentation of selected herbs, which yields a very acidic liquid including many amino acids which coat the vine leaves with proteins, which themselves beat the disease. So in 2020 they used ridiculous amounts of copper, or 5 % of the doses accepted by Ecocert (and Ecocert is already much lower in its dose ceiling than the regular organic certifications).
So retrospectively it was obvious that it was negligible and in 2021 he even got rid of these small amount of copper. Of course he needs perspective to be sure, like 10 years, to see if this works durably under different weather circumstances and disease pressure. But this year since the last week of june to this visit mid july they had a big push of mildew, now it's Oidium, but there's no disease on the vines so it seems to work. Speaking of sulfur, it has also a negative effect on the natural yeast living on the grapes' skin, which may cause stalling fermentations later. with the sea water they sparay after the rain so that the thing remains on the foliage, while the Bordeaux mix is sprayed before the rain. His group found out also that Sulfur-copper spraysalso tend to have a negative effect on the vines for 3 days following the spraying, like if their immune system took a hit, while the sea-wate/herbsr spray keeps the immune system healthy while keeping the disease at bay.
For the anecdote Anders travels with his family to Marseille, near which (on the east side, Baie des Singes) he found a quiet and clean beach where he fills several 30-liter plastic cans see on his Instagram account, there are pictures when they go fill these cans).
As you can see, even the thick canes have scars caused by the hail. these leaves are new foliage, the hail teared off everything, leaves, flowers, buds. They're still wondering what they'll do with the 2020 and the 2021 canes, how they'll manage the pruning to correct this mess. He plans to show this to growers from the older generation and ask them advice on how to prune this. tHe bunch on the left is what you see generally in mid may, and this visit was in mid july... It's a bit strange he says, he works these days in the vineyard precisely with the 2022 vintage in mind as the fruit volume should be negligible this autumn 2021. He still keeps the hope to be able to pick the newer bunches at the end of november.
Another important thing here is that they don't plow the soil, they instead leave the weeds grow, the goal here being to avoid oxidize the soil as they look for acidity. And if they open the soil with blades they liberate fungi that go after the foliage. Since 2017 they passed only twice total with a plow (under the vine as I understand), they just mow the grass from time to time, they'll do it soon, but just to make it easier for the pickers who often pick scantily dressed and for whom dry and sharp weeds are painful.
In the winter season when there's no foliage they have a woman who came here with her 300-stronf flock, sheep, goats and even a donkey, they remained a month here and cleaned the whole surface from its weeds all the while leaving manure. Of course you can't do that when there's foliage on the vines, the sheep, and even more the goats would leave them bare.
The good thing here is that the whole area is free of chemicals, there's no intermingling of conventional farming that could dent the harmony (always a problem otherwise, for example when it's windy).
Here is the blue marl (marne bleue) that make this micro-terroir peculiar in Valvignères.
Here you can see what remained on the vines after this terrible hailstorm : only fragments of leaves like this one. Whgat you see in the background is the new foliage grown back long after the destruction. Vines are resilient indeed and rebound even after the worst accidents.
We reach a parcel named "la vigne des enfants", it's a parcel that was lended to them in 2017 by Gérald Oustric, there's a lot of green grass on the ground, this is Syrah, with bunches that look like the ones of Pinot Noir, this is a surviving bunch as the hail came from the opposite side of the post. In a normal year they'd pick 100 hectoliters out of their total surface of a bit more than 4 hectares but this year if he makes 5 or 10 hectoliters he'll be happy.
Here it seems a shoot freaked out and tied up chaotically its own leaf instead of looking for/grabbing a firm support like a wire, could be the after effects of the hailstorm. Is PTSD listed as a disease for shoots, and counseling advised ?...
Of course if you pass through Valvignères make sure to eat at La tour Cassée, this restaurant offers great local homemade food with a suberb wine list. Alas now closed for lunch, open for dinners only. It's pretty rare for a village with only 500 inhabitants to have a restaurant of this level, may it last as long as possible. I'll link soon to a page with a few pictures I made in 2017 while having dinner here (there will be no notes to go with, sorry).
What a great gosh darn article of a brave gosh darn winemaker. Inspiring stuff Anders. Courageous winemaking! Bert.... this was a long one but I could have read on for another ten thousand words and a million more pictures!
Posted by: Avram Deixler | September 07, 2021 at 04:33 AM
Excelent pictures! Thanks
Posted by: ESPACIO VINOS WEB | September 07, 2021 at 03:35 PM