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Baghdad Blog
One of our readers sent me a link to a blog being written in Baghdad.
I have no idea who the writer is or whether or not he is a legitimate source. Regardless, with all the misinformation circulating these days, it is interesting to read the work of a seemingly non-professional writing directly under siege.
Take a look:
Baghdad Blog
Government Warning: (1) THE WINE IMPORTER HAS NO POLITICAL VIEWS AND THE VIEWS IN THE ABOVE TEXT DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE POLITICAL VIEWS OF THE THE WINE IMPORTER. THE WINE IMPORTER IS TOO BUSY FINDING GREAT WINE AND TRYING TO SELL THAT WINE TO BE OVERTAKEN BY POLITICAL SENTIMENTS. (2) ACCORDING TO THE SURGEON GENERAL, WOMEN SHOULD NOT DRINK ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES DURING PREGNANCY BECAUSE OF THE RISK OF BIRTH DEFECTS. (3) CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES IMPAIRS YOUR ABILITY TO DRIVE A CAR OR OPERATE MACHINERY, AND MAY CAUSE HEALTH PROBLEMS.
Morbidity
The dollar has gone up 4% against the Euro in the past few days.
``When war actually starts, the dollar could see a relief rally that may be substantive,'' said Stephen L. Jen, a currency economist at Morgan Stanley.
The dollar rose to $1.0573 against the euro at 10:40 a.m. in London, from $1.0630 late yesterday in New York. It earlier strengthened to $1.0543, its strongest since Jan. 16. Against the yen, it rose to 118.98 from 118.51.
The U.S. currency has strengthened 4 percent against Europe's common currency in the past five days as some investors speculate a quick war will remove an obstacle to a quickening of growth in the world's biggest economy
All this might mean lower wine prices if the dollar is able to sustain a rally over the next few weeks.
These are some of the morbid concerns that The Wine Importer has to evaluate on a daily basis. It is always comforting to know that the misery that is about to engulf the world will serve to lower the price of Mâcons, Beaujolais and Touraines.
Special Promotion from the Minervois AOC!
Acting out of solidary with America in this time of crisis, the Minervois Appellation in the South of France has announced a special program to aid the American consumer.
A consumer who buys 12 bottles of Minervois starting today through March 25th, will be eligible to receive a special Minvervois Freedom Defense Kit (pictured below).
The Minervois Freedom Defense Kit includes:
1. Food & water for 3 days
2. 60+ piece First Aid Kit
3. Survival gear: Duct tape, plastic sheets, glow sticks
space blanket, poncho, emergency whistle, heat packs & more.
4. Survival tools: Flashlight & radio combo, Swiss Army Knife & more.
Be sure to look for product details at your local wine store.
Capiche?
I'm travelling through the Rhône and have just learned that America's leading wine critic gave 96 points to one of the wines we sell. It's a Châteauneuf.
As excited as we are by by the score, it is the text that is truly thrilling. In describing the wine, the critic writes that the 96 point item:
"elicited the folowing words 'Mama-Mia.'"
This is the first time one of our wines has received the coveted Mama-Mia!
The Beaujolais is Filled with Wi-Fi Hot Zones!
Who would have guessed?
I'm writing this from a vineyard in Lachassagne, which is in the Southern part of the Beaujolais.
This Chardonnay Vineyard is set-up for high-speed wireless connections!
What a strange world!
Off to Southern France Today
We visited viticultural France above Lyon in February. Now, I'm off to the Rhône and Languedoc.
See you all soon. I'm writing this on my Compaq IPAQ from a Wi-Fi Hotspot at the aiport.
Gotta run.
They're boarding the plane!
Bear Hunters to Play Surprising Role in War on Terror
I just received an e-mail with the following report from the wire services:
(ALBANY-AP) The ongoing interrogation of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the September 11 terror attacks, has yielded information about a bold plan to poison U.S. drinking reservoirs that supply drinking water to large cities.
Since September 11, most reservoirs have been well guarded, so that it would be very difficult for intruders to do much damage. According to Mohammed, al-Qaida planned to get around security by recruiting and training bears to dump large quantities of toxins into reservoirs surrounded by hilly, wooded areas.
“It’s not as crazy as it seems,” said CIA spokesman Jerry Longhorn, “Bears have been trained successfully for the circus, even lions have been trained. These bears wouldn’t have to do much, just carry a few cans of poison a piece, and dump it in the water supply. They probably wouldn’t even know the effect it was going to have.”
Bear hunters all over the Catskill area, the watershed for the reservoir supplying New York City, have begun organizing themselves in self-appointed anti-terror squads. “It’s just muzzle-loading season now, but we’ll get out there.” said Charles Ferguson, an avid bear hunter. “We’re asking them to extend the regular season.”
Bear hunting season is closed for rifles and shotguns, and is now open only for bows and muzzle-loaders. Muzzle-loaders are difficult to reload and are not very accurate.
Larry Johnson, assistant Commissioner of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, says he supports extending bear hunting season at least through the end of spring for all weapons that are allowed during the normal season. “If this plot is anything like what it seems,” Ferguson told AP, “then frankly it’s open season on bears. If there’s a way we can fight al-Qaida and help the sportsman, then we’re going to do what we can.”
But some hunters were careful to say that this isn’t just about hunting bears. “We have a patriotic duty to fight terror,” said one hunter who asked not to be identified, “it’s not just about getting a bear. When I’m out hunting, I’m looking to bag Osama. I think it’s wrong if you’re just going after bear.”
Meet the Wine Importer!
In a rare public appearance, The Wine Importer will be conducting a fabulous wine tasting at Chambers Street Wines in downtown Manhattan on Saturday, March 1st at 4 pm.
I will be featuring wines made from native French yeasts and without enzyme treatments. There will be a lot of obscure stuff shown, many hailing from the new Louis/Dressner Heirloom Wine Collection, a subsidiary of LDM Wines, Inc.
Do you wonder what type of meglomaniacal wine importer would refer to himself on the internet as The Wine Importer? Don't miss your chance to meet Joe Dressner tomorrow.
Pro-French Sentiment
I keep hearing about Americans boycotting French wine to protest Jacques Chirac's opposition to Bush's Iraq policy.
In some circles though, French practices remain chic. How many times does one hear American, Spanish, Italian or Portugese wine producers bragging about how they use "French Barrels?" As if "French Barrels" were a master race onto themselves.
I always want to grab one of these braggarts and explain to them that French Wine Producers can't find good French Barrels these days. Why pay a premium to import French Barrels that are no longer being made well, that are being mass-produced, poorly dried and poorly constructed?
Today, I received an e-mail solicitation from a winery (unrelated to the many offers I receive for breast or penile enlargement, viagra, mortgages, insurance and aid schemes for former Nigerian dictators) with a new perspective on French contributions to winemaking. A new angle to brag about:
Our winery - Dionysos Mereni has been established in 1959 in a village not far from Kishinev, Republic of Moldova. For today our winery is one of the leading high quality wine producers of the country. Our aim is to produce and export fine wines that make Moldova famous....
Specificity of production technology is that starting with the grape collecting, grapes are carefully checked and sorted by the varietal purity, ripeness and maturity, potential in tannin and phenol substances accumulation. Fermentation and extraction processes are thoroughly controlled maintaining the most optimal performance using enzyme substances and pure French yeasts. This technology allows preserving organoleptic characteristics of each grape varietal and fully reflect grape potential in wine....
For Christ's Sake!
Pure French Yeasts!
As Groucho Marx put it in the classic movie Duck Soup:
Hail Moldova!
Joe Dressner's Belated Top 100 Louis/Dressner Wines of the Year in No Particular Order
Domaine de la Sansonnière Anjou Blanc La Lune 2000 -- We took a gamble this year and started importing Mark Angeli's wines. Why a gamble? They cost a lot, are unknown, from obscure appellations, have no American press, the producer has no web site, and they have nothing to do with the types of wines everybody seems to drink regularly.
The problem was that we like his wines. We find them brilliant. What's the point of being a Wine Importer if you don't import wines you like?
Angeli is vinifying great parcels in Bonnezeaux as dry Chenin and the results show that Chenin from great terroir is every bit as expressive dry as when a molleux. What a pleasure to drink this wine!
Eric Texier Hermitage 1999 -- There is a lot of controversy about what Eric's sourcing was for this wine. I no longer care.
The wine was incredibly forward on release, with an intense purity and all the textbook aromatics of great Syrah from the Northern Rhone. Almost a lesson in Hermitage. We sold too much of this wine and unfortunately have nothing left to drink or cellar.
For those who want to know: it is 100% Syrah.
Les Heretiques 2001 from André Iché-- Ok, this is not world-class wine. But I have to put this wine here since it costs us $.50 a bottle and we make huge mark-ups on this wine and sell enormous quantities and it will send my children through college....
The politburo over at Louis/Dressner found the initial release of the 2001 to be 'a little light in the loafers,' a tasting phrase originating in Park Slope and now taking geek circles by storm. We called Andre Iche, the owner of Chateau d'Oupa in the Minervois and complained. We then visited Iche in the summer and to our surprise he had reworked the assemblage without letting us know. Les Heretiques was 97% Carrignan with a little bit of assorted field blend of semi-undetermined origin. Iche keeps a stock of Syrah in vat for his better bottlings of Minervois and decided to redo the Heretiques assembly with 3% of this Syrah.
What an incredible difference it made! To the point where, frankly, this wine is simply too good for the price we pay.
We have worked with Andre for years, Andre being one of our original growers when we started out 34 years ago (along with Marc Ollivier). Other growers might tell us when we complain about the wine that we can't expect more for $.50 a bottle. They might make a trial assemblage with some Syrah and tell us we can have the blend if we agree to a price augmentation.
But Andre is deeply appreciative of the 50,000 annual case market we have developed for this wine. His interest was to get the best possible raw materials into the bottle. By doing so, not only does the consumer benefit, but I get to enjoy drinking a wine that costs me $.50 a bottle and that will send my children through college.
Bruce Schneider Cabernet Franc 1999 -- Once again, Bruce shows off what the North Fork of Long Island can do with Cabernet Franc. You get what you expect at the price of a top cuvee from Bernard Baudry or Pierre Breton. Kudos to Bruce for placing this all over New York and, surprising enough, Mexico City.
The main reason I like this wine so much is that everytime a wiseguy makes me taste a wine blind, I guess that it is Bruce Schneider's Cabernet Franc. No matter what the current release might be. Incredibly, this happened three times this year and each time I astounded the assembled wine lovers by being right on the money. The routine has become so frequent and convincing, that I have offers to headline the Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas.
Domaine de Bellivière Côteaux-du-Loir Rouges Gorges from Eric Nicolas -- Some consider this the Romanée-Conti of Pineau d'Aunis. Others, the Romanée-Vivant. I vacillate between the two points of view. I do know that this is incredibly refined Pineau d' Aunis with beautiful peppery notes that just sings.
Domaine Marcel Richaud Cairanne L' Ebrescade 2000 -- I worship Le Marcel. I became a wine importer so that I could import Marcel's wines. Richaud is a master blender, a master vigneron and a helluva guy. L'Ebrescade is his top bottling and the wine is frightenly massive while being horrifyingly balanced. Who can figure?
Domaine Viret Cuvée Cosmic 1999 -- Someone always has to push the envelope a step further and Domaine Viret has come along to practice cosmoculture. This is a special bottling done for us from their first vintage, that went through a particularly long élévage, about two years in total. Much of the wines from the estate are consciously made in a reductive style, but this bottling is intentionally oxidative. Don't ask me what this entails exactly, but it has something to do with oxygen. And lots of it. Nearly 1/3 of the available air supply in St-Maurice-sur-Eygues, where the Viret family does their magic stuff. It worked.-
Clos Roche Blanche Pineau d'Aunis Demi-Sec 1959 -- In all honesty, this is not available in every liquor store in America. In fact, only a tiny amount of this was imported. Of course, this is a great year. Of course, this is a great grape variety. And what could be better then the fabled Clos Roche Blanche of the Roussel family, one of the great vineyard sites of Touraine. A perennial Parker Best Buy!
Domaine de Roally Mâcon Village 2000 -- This vintage was the last vintage for Henri Goyard, the vigneron who inspired Denyse and I to go into the wine racket. This micro-estate of under 4 hectares, along with Jean Thevenet's wines in Clessé, has always been our notion of what great Chardonnay can be. Picked at optimal maturity, at low yields and from fiercely maintained vineyard sites. I will greatly miss tasting the new vintage at Goyard, even though the baton has now been passed to Florent Thevenet, Jean's son. The 2000 vintage is classic, textbook Roally. One of these days, I have to import the 60 bottles of magnums that were bottled for me by Goyard. If you are nice to me, I might even give you a bottle. Maybe.
2000 Châteauneuf-du-Papes from Alain Junguenet -- A lot of us Wine Importers enjoy getting together. There is an easy-going camraderie between myself, Kermit Lynch, Peter Weygandt, Bobby Kacher, Fran Kysela, Jason Brandt Lewis, Bob Chadderdon, Russell Herman, and Peter Vezan. Vezan is not a national importer, but is an American agent based in Paris who works with a number of great wine estates. Leo Fox used to be part of this group, but Jason, Fran and Bobby argued that he talked too much, was grouchy and dominated all our get-togethers with lengthy anecdotes about Vinho Verde. Leo is no longer invited to our functions.
Anyhow, try as we might to involve Alain Junguenet, we could never get him involved. Alain is a loner and doesn't want to join us in our monthly drinking/eating/card-playing bouts. Have you ever played tarot, not the fortune telling variant, but the card game popular in French viticultural regions? If so, don't bet money with Bobby Chadderdon if you expect to pay any of your vigneron's bills!
So, even though he keeps a social distance, I want to salute Alain Junguenet for all the fabulous Châteauneuf he brings to America. Alain championned this AOC before it became hot and finally, with the last round of superb vintages, is being richly rewarded for all his hard work. My hats off to Alain Junguenet!
Pierre Breton Chinon Picasses 2000 Magnum -- we actually imported a bunch of magnums from Pierre to drink and give to our friends. All my pals in the Wine Importer club (see above) received gift magnums. I even snuck a 750 ML to Leo Fox (a magnum seemed inappropriate). Okay, this ain't a great vintage. But Pierre has worked the vineyard and wine with great style. Stylish. Yup. This is one stylish wine.
Domaine Luneau-Papin Muscadet Collection -- Every year we eat a marathon Sunday lunch with Monique and Pierre Luneau over there in the Muscadet. We don't do all that much business with them but they are both adorable, smart and make great wines. Plus, they make a great Sunday lunch.
So this summer, we were eating God-knows-what at about hour six of the luncheon and yet another bottle of an old vintage of L d'Or, their best bottling, came out to drink. All on its own!
Finally, we inquired: you have commercial quantities of all this stuff, no? And yes, they do. Not vast quantities, but more then Catherine Roussel has of the 1959 Touraine Pineau d'Aunis 1959 Demi-Sec.
So, we imported the Muscadet Mini-Cellar. One case with two bottles of six different vintages. Which vintages? You have to buy the case at your local retailer to find out. The case starts at 1990 and included video highlights of the past decade.
There are rumors that Monique and Pierre just offered us some 1989s. Stay tuned.
Alain Renardat Cerdon du Bugey -- I don't know another wine that gives so much pleasure. The wine has changed somewhat over the past few years and now has a significant chunk of Poulsard. This adds some finesse to the Gamay that's already hanging around the bottle. As America's leading importer of wines from the Bugey we take our responsibilities to the region seriously and drinking this wine with my children (probably the biggest fans I know of this wine) helps relief me of the great burdens I have to the region and its vignerons. The wine tastes particularly well in Poil Rouge, a hamlet of famed St-Gengoux-de-Scissé.
So many others....There are so many other wines I enjoyed last year, it is hard to remember them all. I want to thank all the people who bought the wines, drank the wines, reordered the wines and paid for the wines. Each of you has made an extremely valuable contribution to the continuing struggle to make real, artisan wines and to the fight against international terrorism. That's right -- drink a bottle from Mark Angeli and strike a blow against the dark forces of international terrorism!
When we speak of Weapons of Mass Destruction, my mind naturally wanders to many of the crappy industrial wines I have tasted over the years. Some of my colleagues call these Wines of Mass Destruction (WMDs). Perhaps, this is just the myopic thoughts of a provincial businessman. But I'm not buying duct tape and plastic sheeting -- it is time to call for America to clean its house of all the poisonous products that have been launched by the Viticole-Industrial Complex.
Once again, all my thanks.
Je vous prie de croire en mes sincères salutations.
Joe Dressner
The Wine Importer
Back in New York
I got a lot of valuable things done in France but am too lazy to post details here.
I also finished the Louis/Dressner Top 100 List, but am concerned that 43 of the Top 100 are no longer commercially available. Seventeen of these wines come from grape varieties no longer in existence. Can heirloom wines qualify for a Top 100?
I may not post this essay.
I have received an important e-mail from a reader with an urgent plea for oenological help:
Greetings Joe, My name is ......... I work for a company called vinotheque in montreal. We sell wine and beer making products across canada and we have clients in the u.s.a. also. My job is controlling inventory and placing order's. Our recent supplier for grape tannin has gone bankrupt. Iam looking for a new supplier and Iam having queit a bit of trouble finding one. Would you happen to know of any compaines who supply garpe tannin in bulk. any info would help.
Well, this is certainly the right spot to ask such a question.
Anyone out there have any ideas?
I received another e-mail combining a plea for grape tannins with an involved story about the former Nigerian Defense Minister. Somehow, if I put up $10,000 through an international wire I could get over $7,000,000 in tannin-controlled Merlot from pre-phylloxera vines in Uruguay.
Je vous prie de croire en mes sincères salutations.
2002 Red Burgundies Rock!
I'm in Burgundy tasting some fabulous wines.
Most of these wines have not yet begun their malos.
Yet, they are delicious.
Are malolactic fermentations really necessary, I ask?
Al Hotchkin
I just learned, here in Angers, that Al Hotchkin of the Burgundy Wine Company died yesterday from a heart attack.
Al was a long-time customer and supporter of our company and a tireless promoter and merchant of Burgundy. Al's notion of selling wine was the ultimate hand sell -- he spent enormous amounts of time in Burgundy and the Rhone visiting the growers he worked with and choosing which bottlings he would buy for his store.
Al was always on the lookout for new vignerons he could introduce into the market and was totally indifferent to press ratings and coverage. Al Hotchkin decided what was going to go into his store and what he would recommend to his customers. Not Parker, not the Wine Spectator.
Al did this all in an honest way that emphasized the vigneron rather then himself, the merchant. There were no new wood bottlings for Hotchkin, no attempt to portray the vignerons as savages tamed by Hotchkin the all-knowing American wine merchant. In a cynical world, Al truly loved the milieu of the independent, stubborn, creative and successful vigneron.
The store itself is run like an old-time merchant. The customers have names, the staff knows which wines they like and don't like and can give the customers intelligent suggestions about what to buy.
In these days of centralization and standardization, Al's way was a throwback to an old style of commerce -- one that was honest and heartfelt.
I will greatly miss him.
Illness Strikes Americans in Angers!
We've had some great tastings over the past few days here in the Loire.
25 of us enjoyed the annual Domaine de la Pepiere Muscadethon. Tasting who knows how many vintages of Muscadet going back to 1966.
Then there was the Domaine du Closel vertical going back to 1959. Incredibly, there was not a single bad bottle and just some stunning wines. Even in small vintages. Not only did we try moyen vintages, we also had several tres moyen and one tres, tres moyen vintage. This seems to be a new wine criticism term, the tres, tres moyen appellation, which was first made popular by North Berkeley Wine Imports.
All the big stars of the American wine scene are here. Kemit Lynch, Peter Weygandt, the Skurnik Brothers, Francois Eco, the Red Hook Brooklyn French guys, Peter Vezan, the French guy at Winebow, the Fruit of the Vine guys.
And then some.
I had planned to write more, but have been horribly busy taking care of the delegation, tasting fabulous 2002 Chinon barrel samples, and getting ill.
Like everyone else. There is some type of gastro virus here and on any given day, half the group is at our hotel performing unmentionable acts. I'm taking off today to sleep, as I'm suffering from Layonphobia. Somehow, the idea of drinking a sweet Layon is driving me to insane illness.
Last night we had a fabulous dinner at Les Tonnelles. It cost a fortune and I couldn't taste a thing I was eating. We also had a lot of great wines I couldn't taste, but did pay for. Somehow, Franck Peillot is now on the wine list here.
As Master of Wine Linus Kessler said:
It's harshin' on my mellow man!
Geek Wine Tasting in Saumur Cave
Today was the big hipster tasting in Saumur at the Grande Vignolles Caves. This is the annual get together of every hipster winemaker and wine buyer in France. This is a milieu where Thierry Puzelat is considered a conservative winemaker....part of the old guard.
We left at about noon from the Clos Roche Blanche, with Catherine Roussel driving one of these horrible white trucks that every vigneron/vigneronne in France seems to own. They are practical vehicles and they don't sell SUVs here, so you can't really blame them. Anyhow, it started to snow again and before long we were lost in an endless traffic jam in the woods around Chinon.
It reached the point where absolutely no one was moving, so we made a u-turn (we, being four cars driving various Americans) and went through Cravant-sur-Coteaux. In the 34 years I have been attending the SIVAL, I have never seen so much snow and inclement weather as we've had so far.
Finally, we arrived. There's Pierre Breton! Nicolas Renard! Jo Landron! Jo Pithon! Plus 600 people crammed into a cellar built into the tufa that perhaps could have accomodated 100 people semi-comfortably. But the 600 attendants were a who's who of the French geek wine scene.
Wait a second, there's Marcel Richaud! Jean Foillard from Morgon! Yosuka Goda the famous Japanese importer! Mark Whitmore, the famous American importer. Arnaud, who one day will hopefull open his restaurant in Red Hook with 12 different cuvees from Domaine Mazaal! And over there....it's Claude Marechal pouring wines opposite some guy in biodynamie in Coillure whose name I didn't get. Three different Jasnieres producers were there, including Eric Nicolas, the one we represent. And Patrick Bauduin from the Layon! Rene Mosse! My God! It's geek heaven.
Marcel Richaud promised us some more L'Ebrescade 2000. Jesus, I hope we get some because this is some fabulous wine. I don't know anyone else in the southern Rhone whose wines I love more then Marcel's and it was great to see him, even if a drunk guy from a French wine bar stepped on my foot and spilled wine all over my pant's leg while I was talking to Marcel.
Of course, there was important business to do here, in the epicenter of French geekdom. Hey, wait a second....isn't that Christian Chaussard?
Louis/Dressner Selections is now carrying the fabulous Moscato, Barbera d' Asti and Dolcetto Monferrato from Bera Vittorio & Figlio in Canelli. Noted wine tasted Linus Kessler, who is with our group, tasted these wines, turned to me and said:
"Dude....these wines rock!"
Frankly, I thought so myself. Bera is pals with a lot of our French vignerons pals and works naturally to make beautiful, pure wines. You're all going to love this stuff.
All the members in our group are in good shape, except Dave from Detroit who suffered from food poisoning today. Tomorrow, others will suffer from food poisoning, which is practically a sport on these sort of wine trips.
I had an excellent dinner myself at my favorite Kabob place in downtown Saumur. Next time you in Saumur, be sure to order the Chicken Kabob and tell them Joe Dressner sent you.
I'm going to try to get some sleep now. Tomorrow is the famous, annual Muscadethon at Marc Ollivier's. God only knows how many vintages and cuvees of Muscadet we will tasting. Let alone, how many oysters we will eat.
At Clos Roche Blanche
We got out of our snowstorm, onto the autoroute and barrelled into Clos Roche Blanche in the Cher. Joining us here were various other Americans who traffic in obscure Loire Valley wines and who occassionally buy wines from Louis/Dressner Selections.
First the tour of the vineyards: Didier Barouillet is now doing experimental plantings of various herbs and flowers that are used to balance the vineyard's ecosystem. One flower, for instance, will attract insects that kill off other insects that propogate vine disease. This is exciting work that is being done to show how it is possible to maintain a healthy vineyard without using insecticides.
Then the tastings: 2002 is a good harvest, but a short one. Catherine Roussel and Didier Barouillet have sold off 9 hectares of vines and have a far smaller estate these days. Several years ago they had 32 hectares, but they now have only 19 hectares. Additionally, the Sauvignon Blanc this year was at 30 hectolitres/hectares, a tiny yield. Ideally, it would have been 20% higher and still the same quality.
So the wines are round, with a little less acidity then last year, but with the same characteristic minerality. But, there will be a lot less of the Sauvignon, with LDM Wines getting about 60 percent of our normal allocation.
We also got to taste Didier's latest experiment with Pineau d'Aunis. Didier made the rosé he always makes, but also made a Pineau d'Aunis Rouge. Pineau d'Aunis is a thin skinned grape and does not give a great deal of color, but the rouge version is far more colorful then the rose. It has more fruit and more of the characterisic peppery flavors that great Pineau d' Aunis can bring.
Then some oddities: a
59 Pinot Gris from the Clos that was colored like a Sherry. An absolutely delicious wine that was fresh and candied. Hard to imagine that it was so old, the wine could have been only 10 years old. Then a 1966 Romorantin that was all tissane and caramel. What a shame that the AOC in its stupidity now bans these grape varieties in the Touraine!
Then the dinner: I was too drunk at this point to remember anything I ate but everyone seemed to like it. I do remember the fabulous goat cheese from Selles-sur-Cher. This is an AOC in goat cheese with a great deal of prestige, but (as with wine) where a lot of crappy industrial goat cheese is made. Catherine and Didier have friends that have a small farm who make fabulous, creamy, concentrated and pure chévre.
Eating this cheese while drinking the Clos Roche Blanche Sauvignon Blanc is always one of the great pleasures of coming here.
By the way, I have written before about the problems of getting the AOC. At this writing, all the Clos Roche Blanche whites have been rejected by the INAO on the basis that they are oxidized. The INAO has also rejected the reds on the basis that they are vinegar.
There will be appeals and most likely the wines will get the AOC. But what a crazy, bureaucratic and arbitrary system this has turned into. The seeming goal of every local AOC is to enforce standardization and mediocrity. What a shame.
Marooned in Auvergne Snowstorm
I'm in France since yesterday morning trying to find some good wine.
Yesterday's highlights was a tasting with Eric Texier. The 2001 Brezeme is now in bottle and will be immensely pleasing to everyone who enjoyed the 1999 and 1998 vintage so much. This does not have the concentration of the 2000, but is ready to go, ready to drink. There is no Vieilles Vignes in this vintage as only two barrels were made.
Then, we were off to Jean-Paul Brun's this morning. The 2002 Beaujolais Chardonnay is in bottle and Jean-Paul is now using new horizontal cuves that keep a longer lees contact. These are large steel cuves that are shaped like barrels. The vintage is full, with floral elements, a wine that cchardonnes, as we say in the Maconnais.
Then, we were off to the Auvergne to visit Domaine de Peyra. We will be selling small quantities of these sulfer-free Gamays around the country, except in New York, where Peyra already has a customer. Peyra also has old vine Gamay (40 to 100-years-old) that are worked at low yields. The wines are then fermented during a 25 day cold carbonic maceration using only carbon dioxide. This is the same technique used by Marcel Lapierre and the Gang of Four in Morgon, but here there is an additional advantage -- the harvest is usually in mid-October and the area stays cool. So where the boys in Morgon have to refrigerate their fermenting wines to keep them cool, the Peyra boys can work more naturally. The wines are stunning Gamays made for immediate, juicy consumption and are mostly at 10 degrees of natural alcohol. They are also horribly expensive, but you will want to buy large quantities.
From Peyra, we were supposed to go to the glamorous Clos Roche Blanche. Tomorrow, there are 14 or so Americans parachuting into Marueil-sur-Cher for a dinner with the charming Catherine Roussel and the dapper Didier Barouillet. Unfortunately, we drove into a snow storm in the Masif Central and I am writing this from a chain hotel off the Autoroute. I am writing from my IPAQ PocketPC, my trusted companion, and cannot be held accountable for typos.
Tune-in tomorrow for more details.
I'm Cold, Depressed and Have Been in a Bike Accident
My apologies for being inactive on this site.
I've turned into an aging American with little hope or prospects. I now bear an uncanny resemblance to Jack Nicholson's character in the movie Schmidt.
I would like to apologize to my family, friends and the wine trade.