It's that time of the year...

Yes, it's that time of the year again, when the leaves turn orange, the birds fly south, and the grapes ripen on the vine.

Harvest.

Old-vine grapes being picked at Clos Bagatelle in St Chinian

Back in 2006 I worked the harvest in Burgundy, and let me tell you, it wasn't easy, and I was 6 years younger than now.  I had pains in places I didn't know existed, and some in places I wished I had never discovered.  That said, it was a magical experience that I'd happily do again if I were younger.  MUCH younger.  At this point in my life, I prefer to sit back and try to move these amazing wines, and let the pros handle harvest.  

Into the bin with you, my pretties

Well, harvest has been going on now for a while in the South of France, but my winemakers being busy and all, they are only now getting around to sending me pics and reports.

Anyone want some St Jean de Muscat grapes?  These are Christine Deleuze's brother's pickings, he'll make an amazing sweet wine from it

2012 has been a very difficult year in most of France, Spain and Italy.  Between lousy weather, heat waves, hail and problems with mildew and oidium in the fields (especially in Champagne, where a tornado actually touched down in the vineyards), my winemakers have been super busy.  Over the next few days and weeks I'll be posting harvest reports from our wineries (assuming the winemakers haven't passed out from exhaustion), with maybe a few pictures (again, assuming the winemakers remember what I keep asking them for!).  So stay tuned.

Here's the first report from Clos Bagatelle in St Chinian (full picture album is on our Facebook Fan page at www.Facebook.com/Vinotas - become a Fan!): the year started tough, with cool and wet weather followed by summer hear waves, but September was warm with cool nights, which kept the grapes fresh, maintaining the levels of acidity we've come to expect from Christine's wines.  As they say in France, September makes the wine, meaning that the entire year can be crappy, but if September is nice, then you'll have some good wines.  However, volumes are down by 20%, something I'm seeing across the board.  Still, quality and color are looking good, but we'll know more early next year.

Cheers!

Beaune… Rhymes with Home

Beaune rhymes with home...
OK, well maybe not that much, but in my mind it does, and that’s all that counts.

Troglodytes on the Loire
I took the sloooooooooooooow train from Angers to Beaune, a leisurely 6 hour ride on a TER (ironically that stands for Train Express Regional, which, I suppose if you weren’t going from one side of the country to the other, it might qualify as). One interesting thing about following the Loire upstream was passing by its renowned chalk cliffs and hillsides, into which intrepid folks had dug charming homes and wineries. I once stayed in one of these so-called “troglodyte” places, in a B&B outside Azay-le-Rideau. My room was an old kitchen complete with bread oven, dug right into the living rock. Super cool.

Streets suffused with history
I arrived in Beaune at 9:30pm and started walking into town. I couldn’t help but grinning immediately: it had been 4.5 years since I’d last been here, and I was happier than a schoolboy on Christmas morning. I didn’t care that it was freezing, I didn’t care that my laptop bag kept falling off my suitcase on the uneven cobblestones, I didn’t care that it was pitch black and there was no one out: I was home.

Place Monge
There’s something about Beaune and Burgundy for me. The first time I visited, I felt like I was coming home, as if I actually belonged here. Maybe in a past life, I was a Burgundian Duke or winemaker (more likely a peasant, but hey, I’d have lived in Burgundy!). To me, this is IT. This is the vinous Holy Land. I do love other wine regions, but my soul belongs here. I don’t know how or why, that’s just the way it is. Your money may vary.

Hey, nice house!
And that, however, is the key word: money. To enjoy these wines, money is what you need these days. Wines from the area have shot up in price as their popularity has increased, which sucks for those of us on a budget. And it certainly doesn’t help that the better ones are made in tiny quantities. Of course, they’re much cheaper at the source, so I took advantage of that… But I was here for work, not play, or at least not that much play.

Love these guys
I was here to meet some new winemakers and visit some old friends at better-known domaines like Dujac, Jadot, and Evening Land/Lafond. Whitney Woodham, a friend from NYC who’s the GM for Evening Land, generously drove me around, and as we passed from one legendary medieval village to another I couldn’t keep the grin off my face. The sun shone on naked vines carpeting the eastern side of the valley as we wandered, and I leaned forward hungrily, trying to drink in all the sights in case I didn’t come back for a while.

Whitney poses in front of the Evening Land offices
My tastings went pretty well, I am happy to report, though there’s a lot of work left to be done, as usual. Pricing is relatively stratospheric, especially to someone used to dealing with much lower price points. With the economy improving and my network of customers asking for better wines, I want a Burgundy. So we’ll see. Keeping fingers, toes, ears, eyes and tongue crossed…

Jadot's chai
I should add that the 2010 reds/whites at the places I tasted were very nice, with pure fruit and exceptional structure, reminding me of slightly warmer, more balanced 2008s. Now that’s a vintage I’m really enjoying for its pure red fruit and bright acidity. As for the 2011s, well, it’s a tough call as they haven’t even gone through malo yet, but there was excellent potential in the ones I tried. Of course, with Burgundy, there's always one rule year in, year out: producer, producer, producer.

Oooooooooh sooooo good
My four days in Beaune flew by in a flash. There were several wonderful dinners with some lovely wines, new acquaintances were made, old friendships were rekindled, and despite the freakishly cold weather (5°F one morning, you read that right) the sun was bright, the sky was blue, and there was a spring in my step. I boarded the slow TER back to Angers with more than a tinge of regret. I promise I’ll be back, Beaune, and sooner than 4.5 years. That, I promise you.

Au revoir ma Belle Bourgogne!
Cheers!
PS: Pictures of Burgundy can be found HERE.

Geektime in Angers

The Chateau with a sprinkling of snow
Just when I thought I had geeked out enough on Organic or Biodynamic wines in Montpellier, here came the real geek shows in Angers, in the Loire Valley: La Renaissance des Terroirs, La Dive Bouteille, and the new Salon des Vignerons Bio (because another one is what’s really needed…), one after another. Basically three days of non-stop small producer Organic, Biodynamic or Natural wines being poured by the winemakers themselves, usually in absolutely stunning settings.

The center of Angers
Angers is a small lovely city in the Loire Valley. It’s very old, and sort of looks like what I imagine a scrubbed down medieval 5th and 6th Arrondissement in Paris would look like without all the knights, the peasants or the Plague. It’s always a pleasure to be there, even if in winter it can be pretty cold and humid. Luckily, we have lots of yummy wines and delicious food to keep us warm.

The Renaissance des Appellations Show
First up: La Renaissance des Appellations at the ancient Greniers St Jean. This stunning setting almost overwhelms you when you enter, with high ceilings, gorgeous wooden arches and stone pillars embracing the thirsty crowd. The room is quickly filled with Natural, Organic or Biodynamic fans, both journalists and buyers. Some of the favorites of the geek crowds are always in attendance (Pinon, Huards, Larmandier, etc…), and their tables are always crowded. There are also lots of interesting new producers, and it's a thrill to discover something new and delicious. Still, despite the increasing quality of the wines, there are still way too many bad examples using their labels as marketing tools. Natural/Organic/Biodynamic should not be an excuse for sloppy winemaking.

The Chateau de Brézé
The next day was the Main Event that I'd been really looking forward to: La Dive Bouteille. If I thought the Greniers St Jean were beautiful, the Château de Brézé outside Saumur, where this tasting takes place, is absolutely stunning. This breathtaking castle has very steep moats that were never filled with water, and there are stairs that lead to caves cut into its sides, where the tastings were held.

The caves fill up
This tasting is much more informal, as the winemakers stand next to overturned barrels and pour you their wines. You pretty much spit onto the cave floor, which is always fun. Each cave has several regions, and you can find some pretty amazing wines here. Again, there are some crappy ones too, but that’s to be expected. There’s a lot more energy here among both the presenters and the attendees, it’s more like a wine geek festival than a business meet and greet like the Renaissance. Which is fine by me.

Jean-Pascal and Pascal say "bonjour"
I was joined by my Muscadet producer Jean-Pascal Aubron and my Azay-le-Rideau winemaker Pascal Pibaleau, both of whom have a natural curiosity and love discovering what their neighbors are doing (warning, I’m biased about them as I think they’re doing some great work, so deal with it. It’s my blog after all). As we bounced from barrel to barrel, it was so thrilling to hear them compare notes with their friends. Why’d you do this? Why’d you do that? How’s this turning out? As a wine-lover, and someone who loves learning how things are made, this was beyond cool. And MAN were some of those wines good.

The new Salon des Vignerons Bio de la Loire
Finally, the newest show on the block arrived, and this was more like a Renaissance-light than something completely different. That said, there were many more small and younger wineries, which can be both good (high quality, exciting wines), and bad (high prices, small production, or just plain bad wines). Pascal was showing his wines here too, so it was great catching up with him as he’s such a wonderful person, full of warmth and humility despite the quality of his wines.

That night, Jean-Pascal drove in from his winery in Vallet to join us for a long, delicious and wine-soaked dinner, my last one in Angers for a week. I said my sad farewells to them, only to be reminded that we’d be seeing each other in a few days at the huge Salon des Vins de la Loire.

Finally, off to BURGUNDY!!!!
Cheers!

PS: Here's a full album of pictures from La Dive Bouteille for your enjoyment.
PPS: There are also picture albums of Domaine Sauvaire-Reilhe and Chateau la Croix des Pins in that Facebook folder.

InterMezzo Visits

Domaine Sauvaire-Reilhe's 16th Century tower
After Millesime Bio, I had some time before the next round of shows in Angers, in the Loire, so I headed off to Crespian, in the Coteaux du Languedoc, north of Nîmes. Yes, I was going to be abusing my palate some more, er, I mean tasting more wine, but this time at the domaines themselves. I was there to see Hervé Sauvaire, owner and winemaker at Domaine Sauvaire-Reilhe. His family has owned this winery since the 1600s, when one of his ancestors received it as a wedding gift. Talk about a generous present!

Old-vine Carignan
Their home still has a 16th century tower, though of course it’s been renovated. Hervé met me at the train station and we drove up into his vineyards, located on rocky hillsides around his house. He’s got some crazy old vine Grenache, Carignan and Vermentino, as well as Syrah, planted in super rocky soils. When you see where these vines grow, you wonder how they can survive let alone thrive.

The winery- look Ma, no oak!
Hervé shares his chai with 2 other winemakers, and while one of them does use oak, Hervé does not. To me, this keeps the wines fresh and light on their feet, with bracing acidity balancing out the beautiful, deep minerally fruit. And while his winemaking’s not “Certified” Organic or Biodynamic or Natural, he does take loving care of his soils, as they have fed his family for centuries with the quality of his wines. And I’m not the only one to think so, his wines have been selling very well in the NY market, which makes me very happy.

Say Bonjour to Hervé!
Hervé himself is really lovely and down to earth, with huge hands that have been weathered by years in the vineyards. He’s serious, but a smile comes easily to his face. It’s people like him that make this business worthwhile. Getting them the recognition for their work is something that delights me, and just recharges my batteries. So after a hearty lunch of bull stew (a local specialty that was delicious) and his wines, off I went to see my newest winery, in the Ventoux, Croix des Pins.

Bienvenue to Croix des Pins
Croix des Pins was an old and crumbling property until Jean-Pierre Valade and two of his wine-making friends got together and started renovating it. They also purchased some vineyards at the foot of the steep Dentelles de Montmirail mountains, all old-vine Syrah and Grenache on terraced hillsides. Using Organic principles, their goal is to make wines that are pure expressions of their local terroirs. Yeah, every winemaker says that, but at the end of the day the proof is in the bottle. These wines are crisp, spicy representations of their appellations, Ventoux, Gigondas and Crozes Hermitage. And I’m not the only one to think that, Steve Tanzer’s Rhône reviewer Josh Raynolds scored them well:


And thus another long, lusty dinner with lots of wine ensued, and lots of laughter. These are soulful, good-humored folks who are thrilled to be bringing these vineyards back to life. And I’m really happy to be able to represent them in the US.
Gnarly old vines
Cheers!

Millesime Bio 2012

Every year, a horde of thirsty wine buyers makes its way to Montpellier for the annual Organic and Biodynamic wines trade show, Millesime Bio. It doesn’t hurt that the show takes place in the South of France, where the ambient temperature upon arrival was 60F. For reference, despite a relatively mild winter, when I left New York it was 28F and we were delayed 2 hours while the plane was de-iced. Lovely.

Le Choo-Choo arrives
Usually I fly straight from Charles de Gaulle, but this year I took the TGV from the airport to Montpellier. Happily enough, I ended up doing a Grand Tour of France through some of my favorite wine regions, heading East through Champagne, South through Burgundy and the Rhône, then West through the Languedoc to get to my goal. And it only took 4 hours! Looking out the window as we flew at airliner speeds, I had to smile: even now, with years of experience under my belt, it always amazes me that such a small country (slightly larger than the state of New York) has so many different landscapes. From the flat green fields and farms of the north to the undulating rocky forests in the East to the dry bare stone of the South, this country has scenery for everyone.

Welcome to a wine trade show
The trade show itself is several halls worth of wines that have been made according to Organic and Biodynamic principles. It’s also (sadly) still an excuse for a lot of people to make a lot of bad wine. That said, and my blazé attitude aside, there are some really stunning things to be found these days. Of course, this also depends on the price, but that’s the nature of the business (and a business it is, make no mistake about that).

Row upon row of wine
When these wines taste good, they’re great, really bright, living things, expressive of their origins and of the care the winemaker put into the vines and the winemaking. When they’re bad, they can (sometimes literally) smell and taste like shit. Bad Organic/Biodynamic wines take on an odd, nearly BO-like aroma and get sharp spiky notes in the mouth. Good Organic/Biodynamic wines, to put it mildly, go down smooth and feel alive, with vibrant fruit and lovely acidity and minerality.

Pascal Pibaleau at his stand
The first thing that hits you when you walk through the door is the smell: it smells like WINE. And that just brings a smile to my face. For two and a half days, I wandered the tables of Millesime Bio, stopping to see people I knew and meet people I needed to know. I also had the chance to hang out with one of my winemakers, Pascal Pibaleau, who makes biodynamic sparkling, whites and reds in Azay-le-Rideau in the Loire (yummy stuff too but I am biased, of course). By the end of Day One my teeth hurt like Hell, and I’m pretty sure I yelped the moment the toothpaste hit them that first night (for those who don’t know, young wines tend to have lots of acidity, and that sensitizes the enamel on your teeth).

Like an evil wine-swilling Santa Claus, I had made my list and checked it twice, I knew which wines were naughty (already imported) and which ones were nice (undiscovered). Let’s face it, you can’t go in there without some homework: it would be like visiting the Louvre with no real clue of what works of art you wanted to see. You’d end up getting lost for days and someone would have to call Seal Team 6 to rescue you.

And for the record, it’s not an orgy of foie gras and cheese (sadly). In fact, most of the meals were pretty well-balanced, though the best part was sitting with various random winemakers and trying their wines at the table. I mean, wine is made to be both convivial and served with food, so this was a great showcase for them. As opposed to the relatively scientific method employed when standing in front of a table trying not to spit wine into your neighbor’s glass.

I will say that I still do love going to a table full of anticipatory dread, sort of like a child on Christmas Day running to the tree, hoping to unwrap something good but also hoping it’s not brown socks. More often than not in my line of work, it’s brown socks (some of these wines actually smelled/tasted similar to what I imagine old brown socks would be like). The worst part is finding something that’s delicious and checks off all your requirements, only to discover that it’s WAY too expensive. Talk about deflating your dreams…

On this trip, I found a few wineries I would love to work with, but there’s a lot of negotiations to be had before any hard decisions can be made. I was also lucky enough to have the time to visit some wineries I am working with south of Montpellier (there’s nothing like a few hours in the warm sun on a mid-January day to revive the batteries), as well as see another one of my winemakers, Christine Deleuze of Clos Bagatelle in St Chinian (while she doesn’t make Organic/Biodynamic wines, she does make some damn delicious ones using sustainable practices - again, I am shamelessly unapologetically biased, deal with it).

But it’s not easy: you’re on your feet all day from 8am to 5-7pm, there are long dinners afterwards with customers or winemakers, and your liver is just taking a heck of a beating even with the spitting, not to mention what must be happening to your teeth. And frankly, let’s not forget when you stumble onto a bad wine and have to remain poker-faced as the winemaker tells you his family’s been doing this for hundreds of years and thinks they’ve got the secret to success. Good luck with that one.

All in all, however, I am happy to report that there is a definitive qualitative trend that’s pointing upward. More people are making good Organic/Biodynamic wines at relatively affordable prices than at any other time. All it takes is the right importer to bring them in (Me! Me!).
Cheers!

Annnnnnd...

After a tad over a year of posting on a f*$&#ng pain in the ass server, we're back where we started, on Blogspot. Their ease of use and clean lines make us think we really screwed up by going somewhere else, so we sincerely apologize.

Come back and I promise to blather on incessantly about the wines I try to import into the US, I promise.

Oh, and now we're also on Twitter, which I'm pretty sure is a sign of the Apocalypse... But if you want to follow us, we're at @VinotasWines

I have to say, it's good to be back.
Cheers!

Le Beaujolais Nouveau Grolleau Pétillant est arrivé!

La Perlette Sparkling Grolleau
I know all the signs say the Beaujolais Nouveau has arrived, but screw that fruity banana-y crap. How about some real wine? Something that'll make you sit up and go "Whoa". How about some Sparkling Grolleau?

Pascal Pibaleau's wonderfully eccentric and deliciously different sparkling wine has finally landed, just in time for Turkey Day. Grolleau is usually made into innocuous still red and rosé, but in Pascal's hands it's turned into a sparkling jewel. This wine has character, is alive, and truly tastes unique. It certainly doesn't hurt that it's from a biodynamic Loire Valley producer in Azay-le-Rideau. After manually harvesting the grapes, Pascal halts the alcoholic fermentation partway through, then lets the wine sit on its lees until disgorgement, at which time no sulfur and no dosage are added. You end up with a lightly sparkling ("perlant" in French) wine that starts off fruity and ends with a super dry and rather nutty aspect. How cool is that?

And I know it's stupid, but I really do love that label. At first you see a grape vine with bubbles rising from it, but take a longer look and you see something else, something more whimsical. This reflects Pascal's character. Like me, he doesn't take himself too seriously, though he is dead serious about the quality of his wines.

So if you're looking for an affordable (under-$20) sparkling rosé for Thanksgiving or for the end-of-year holidays, uncork (or better yet, saber) a bottle of Pascal Pibaleau's Sparkling Grolleau La Perlette.

Man, I love this stuff.
Cheers!

A Day on the Farm

 

Well, summer's the slow season in the wine business, so I've been planning for Fall and watching my expenses. Well, trying to do that last one. And, it's been brutally hot in New York, I mean just disgusting. So, an escape from the steamy city seemed in order last Saturday, damn the torpedoes. Of course, it just happened to also be one of the most beautiful days we've been blessed with in a long time, with barely a hint of humidity to glisten one's skin. Fantastic!

Heading north on the MetroNorth train, we found ourselves surrounded by lush greenery and a beautiful working farm, in all its colorful, smelly glory. It always amazes me that if you travel barely 20 miles due north of Manhattan and its steel and concrete canyons, you can find yourself in a wild oasis. Here, outside the picturesque town of Tarrytown, is the Blue Hill at Stone Barns farm complex.

Here, the "farm to table" concept is practiced to the utmost. Crops are rotated, animals change pastures with the seasons, and everything is self-sustaining. All the food grown here is used in the two Blue Hill restaurants, the one at the farm as well as the one down in the city.

 

Truly addictive tomatoes
As expected, the foodstuffs are incredibly tasty. In fact, looking at these tomatoes again, I know I'd do unholy things for more of them. Yes, they're that good, with snappy skin and juicy flesh that just screams REAL TOMATO.

 

Peppers anyone?
Peppers were bright and alive, but man those tomatoes... I'm in love. Did I mention that I'd do very naughty things for more of them?

 

As we wandered the grounds, we were observed by a happy looking herd of black and brown cows, lazing in the afternoon sun.

 

Elsewhere, a shed full of seemingly very happy turkeys gobble-gobbled and hopped around, looking at us with curiosity. Maybe we were the main attraction to them?

 

Further down the road, very big Berkshire pigs rolled around in the mud and snorted and followed their keepers to get their meal, also seemingly quite happy to be out and about and free to roam their pens. I'm no animal expert, having grown up mainly in cities, but these seemed really content and relaxed, never fearing people. There was definitely a relaxed air about the whole place. This probably translates into the quality of what is grown and made here, as we would discover later that night.

 

There were other sheds and small barns, where different things were stored. Here, French Rose garlic was hung to dry, the door open to let the breeze tease them.

 

In a greenhouse, onions sat in long rows, drying out slowly.

 

Lettuce, bright and vibrant, sat happily in the dirt of the greenhouse, soaking up the heat and light.

 

The path back to the restaurant was lit by brightly colored flowers, a welcome invitation to enjoy all the farm has to offer.

 

We sat down for an early dinner, knowing that Blue Hill here has no menu. It's just a tasting of what's fresh that day. You can, however, choose 5 or 8 courses. As you can imagine, we chose the long dinner, and settled in for what was to become one of the best meals I've eaten this year. Everything was so alive with flavor and color and aromas, I just wanted to bask in almost every dish's glory. I won't put up pictures to tease you, plus I'll be honest and say that I don't recall all that we ate (there were, as you can imagine, more than a few bottles of wine consumed as none of us was driving).

BUT, the main take-away from this experience was that when vegetables are grown in healthy conditions, and when animals are free to explore and roam at their leisure, everything tastes better and fresher and frankly cleaner. It just feels RIGHT. And that's something we should all be striving for, even in the cities.
Cheers!

Meet Champagne Bourgeois-Diaz

 

Jérome Bourgeois, winemaker
Anyone who reads this blog knows I like Champagne. Heck, let's be honest, I LOVE Champagne. I do like other bubblies (especially Cremants and Perlants, some Cavas and Proseccos too), but the French stuff is where it's at for me. Maybe it's genetic, who knows? So as someone who represents small, high-quality growers, it's killed me that I couldn't find a good Champagne at the right price point. Until now.

 

Harvesting grapes
I was turned on to Champagne Bourgeois-Diaz in, of all places, Montpellier, which is in the South, nowhere near the Champagne region. A friend in the business in France proferred a glass and said "Tais-toi et bois" ("Shut up and drink"). Lo and behold, here was a gorgeous bubbly, tart with bright acidity and minerality, with lovely, lively fruit aspects. What is this, I inquired, and he showed me the bottle. A few quick calls and emails, and poof, here we are.

 

Stainless steel fermenting tanks
This tiny family-owned estate farms their own 7 hectares (17.29 acres), scattered around the town of Crouttes-sur-Marne, south-west of Reims. The vineyards are planted on clay and chalk soils, and composed of 55% Pinot Meunier, 30% Pinot Noir and 15% Chardonnay and have a south-west exposition. All the wines are made using a traditional basket press, with a minimal dosage (9g/l for the Brut), and while the basic cuvée is aged in stainless steel, the higher end bottlings see some light oak ageing.

 

Oak ageing some of the wines
Jérome Bourgeois, the young winemaker, believes in showcasing his terroirs, and this is evident in the final product, which is both reflective of the high quality fruit he gets and a platform for the land’s characteristics.

To achieve this purity of expression of the land's character, Jérome has gone biodynamic. What does this mean? No man-made chemicals are ever used, a careful ecological balance is maintained in the vineyard by allowing cover crops to grow between the rows (check out the wild-looking vineyard in the picture above), and the biodynamic calendar is scrupulously followed, among other things. Whether you believe in biodynamie or not, maintaining a healthy vineyard and not polluting the earth can't be half bad. And the end product reflects this: the wines are alive with an energy one doesn't find in the mass-market bubblies out there.

 

Filling the old-time basket press with Pinot Noir
Jérome currently makes four different cuvées:
-the Brut Distinguée (40% Pinot Meunier, 40% Chardonnay - of which 20% is vin de réserve - and 20% Pinot Noir);
-the Rosé Distinguée (an assemblage 40% Pinot Meunier, 40% Chardonnay and 20% Pinot Noir, of which 18% is AOC Champagne still red wine);
-the Cuvée du Fils is a wine that sees some oak-ageing and is composed of 40% Pinot Meunier, 30% Pinot Noir and 30% Chardonnay (half of which sees wood);
-Lastly, the 2004 Le Millesime is a blend of 50% Pinot Noir and 50% Chardonnay, aged in oak barrels until Jérome feels it’s ready.

Look for this label soon!
Best of all, Jérome is not afraid to experiment: his next projects will be a Zero Brut (no dosage added) and a Rosé de Saignée (meaning extended skin contact to extract the necessary color and flavor profiles).

I will be showing these wines around to various distributors in the next few weeks, so hopefully one of them will see the light and pick him up. How cool would it be to serve these wines sometime this Fall? Wish me luck!
Cheers!