Entries from 2013

a vendangeur’s (pictoral) tale… (part seven)

By Marko de Morey et de la Vosne on October 22, 2013 #harvests#vintage 2013

Onwards…

First thing with Cyprien doing TESA paperwork for new vendangeur. Annie & Thierry in background.
Sweet loved up but v nice young couple – Vincent & Sophie.
Younger guys having breakfast
Refectory lean-to pre the off, some of the younger guys.
Now that’s what I call a sandwich or bread & jam ++ !
Refectory lean to pre the off. L-R Alice, Dede & Florent
Yard post brekkie before the off. Romain & Herve Arlaud to left.
A Motley Crew. L to R Jean-Pierre Feral, Sylvain, next two unknown, Mahmadoo, Christophe, and Romain with fag.
Finishing off in Vosne 1er Reas
Finishing off in Vosne 1er Reas 2. Jerome in space suit overalls from his regular employers, Du Pont Chemicals.
View of southern edge of Vosne from 1er Reas
Porteur Romain, a gentle giant or something else, but with ever present cigarette in Fuji close up.
Just had to snap this t shirt when I saw it. I want one !!!
Vosne 1er Reas fruit case
Departing Vosne 1er Reas – next stop Vosne Village to come.
Vosne Village looking towards Vosne from RN74 verge side
Vosne Village fruit in case
View of Vosne from Vosne Village adjoining RN74 southern edge of Vosne
Exiting Vosne Village after completion looking towards RN74
Domaine-G-Roumiers-Morey-1er-Clos-de-la-Bussiere-abuts-Arlauds-Morey-1er-Ruchots
Super nice guy, self effacing, top bloke Christophe Roumier in tractor seat by Morey Clos de la Bussieres
Domaine G Roumier’s tractor transport of the boss
Embarking on vans – lunchtime after hectic morning
Porteur Claude in atypical post lunch pose. He really did sleep & snore !
post lunch pre go again gathering. Alice C and AN Other.
Romain-Arlaud-in-front-of-Morey-1er-Ruchots.-Morey-St-Denis-southern-edge-in-background

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books in the post…

By billn on October 22, 2013 #books, maps, magazines, films even podcasts!#the market

clives-new-book

Ooh! Another day another book – it’s an avalanche! A nice delivery this morning – just leave it with me for a couple of weeks to digest 😉

oh, and yet another DRC fraud story broke cover yesterday too…

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wresting the crown back from jasper?

By billn on October 21, 2013 #books, maps, magazines, films even podcasts!

1-WP_20131017_005

1-WP_20131017_004I spotted a fantastic new book while I was doing the vendanges, not cheap at €69 in Athenaeum in Beaune, but once the pages are thumbed you are (I was!) compelled to buy.

Let’s be clear, it’s in French, but who cares with such wonderful new maps from Sylvain Pitiot – but wait, how can they have made such a mistake with such a beautifully presented (and expensive) book? There are two maps of Gevrey-Chambertin! Indeed there turns out to be two maps of most communes! Eventually the penny drops; one map is for the climats of that village e.g. Chapelle-Chambertin, the other is for the lieu-dits e.g. Gemeaux! Ooh! now that’s useful. There are also tables that define each climat (village lieu-dits too) to 4 decimal places (hectares) and list (for instance) exactly which lieu-dits make up Fixin’s Clos de Perrières. Add to that a list of the producers (almost, there is an occasional ‘missing’) who declared a particular Grand Cru in 2011 and this is a pretty terrific reference work.

I spoke with somebody at the BIVB, and they told me that there is another book with descriptions of the climats by the producers that is currently going through final ‘proofs’ – should be available in time for (my!) Christmas stocking. If they are indeed companion copies, then the locals are clearly trying to wrest the guru title back from Jasper Morris – though this book’s scope is narrower, and for most of the world, they will have to think about English versions for that to happen 😉

PS Sorry about the site being down yesterday – but my hosting company (it was them not me) didn’t feel the need to rush into doing anything remedial, after-all, it was only MIA for about 18 hours and nothing moves in Switzerland on a Sunday…!

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catching-up with andrew @legrappin

By billn on October 18, 2013 #producer update

andrew nielsen @ le grappin

In-between clearing-up the aftermath from the previous evening’s Paulée, and lunch on Thursday, I and the traveling Kiwi & Jura winemakers (from the home domaine) paid a visit to Andrew Nielsen in the shiny-new premises for Le Grappin, that he recently acquired in the centre of Beaune.

Okay, shiny-new it certainly isn’t – not yet anyway. Andrew moved in just before the harvest and his first job was to move all his tanks and barrels from Savigny-lès-Beaune to his new home – the former winery of Fanny Sabre. There may be apartments above him, but Andrew just has the ground-floor and cellar below – a cellar that once housed gunpowder! – It’s clearly a tight fit during the harvest period, but things will get easier over the next weeks, I’m sure.

It was good to see Andrew’s small production (smaller than it should have been) of (ex Morey) old gamay which was just about starting to ferment via carbonic maceration. More interesting for me was the chance to taste Andrew’s 2012s, the ones I’d ordered from his release offer – I’d ordered Savigny Blanc et Rouge and Beaune 1ers Boucherottes and Grèves blanc – and lovely they tasted too, I’m a happy purchaser. He is not quite sold-out if you are interested.

Based in London, Andrew has done good business, personally selling his wines at farmers’ markets etcetera, he’s also done a good trade in ‘boxed’ wines – red, rosé and white – which sell well and massively cut down on the cost of transport versus heavy glass. Well-done Andrew!

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decuvage…

By billn on October 17, 2013 #harvests#vintage 2013

Waiting for the pressings
Waiting for the pressings…
Decuvage: Emptying the fermentation tanks, digging out the cap from those tanks and pressing the cap.

The day after our Paulée seems more Spring-like than Autumn; there’s a cool-ish blue sky, but bright sunshine too. I thought I was going to get my hands (and probably a lot more!) dirty this afternoon, as we planned to start the first ‘decuvage’ after lunch, but the boss decided to wait one more day – shame, my TGV awaits!

The whites are looking really good, so-far no surprises have lain in wait. The reds have extracted their colour rather easily and seem to offer very nice aromatics. Fermentations are well under-way here, with many temperatures closing in on to 30°C now. Despite apparently high potential alcohols (lots of people quoting 12-13+ at harvest), the truth is in the detail – these quoted figures are almost always based on the ‘legal’ potential alcohol, which deviates from the (different calculation) actual (analytical) alcohols achieved by as much as 0.8% this year – many are the domaines that planned to add 0.3-0.5% sugar (pretty-much as ‘usual’) but are finding that 0.5-1.0(+)% is required.

Very early days of-course, but the wines look surprisingly good after the harvest and triage travails. Let’s see how this continues…

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2008 maison romaine’s corton perrières…

By billn on October 17, 2013 #degustation

WP_20131006_007-001

2008 Maison Romaine, Corton Les Perrières
Maison Romain is a side-line label for one man and his horse; the pair occasionally manage to get paid in grapes for ploughing between the vines, rather than in hard cash. The wine-making approach has been described to me as ‘natural’, and in this case at least, I would say very successfully-so…
This wine offers up a a healthy whiff of stems but I have to say that they are very pretty stems – this is rather perfumed – and with a lovely red fruit underpinning too. I really like it! Mouth-filling flavours are edged with a slightly salty note and there’s a fine but far from bright acidity that’s coupled with very good length. This is very nice wine indeed, and wine which I would happily go out and buy, but given its low-sulfur credentials, I think that I would be looking to drink it over the short-to-medium term – and frankly, that’s no shame as it drinks very well already today!
Rebuy – Yes

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a vendangeur’s (pictoral) tale… (part six)

By Marko de Morey et de la Vosne on October 15, 2013 #harvests#vintage 2013

We finished lunchtime, praise be the lord, after another testing episode – it was so cold first thing back on that damn Haut Cotes de Nuit plateau, with a claggy mist exacerbating the cold, that my jacket had ice on the left arm (honestly) and you can imagine what one’s hands felt like – yes, blocks of ice. Really bad. Herve was shamed into a mid break before we turned back for a second pass with coffee and croissants supplied – sun out by then. Absolutely without a shadow of doubt THE most testing vendange one can imagine with a legacy of ailments for your’s truly who’s semi crippled. Cyprien agreed with me earlier this p.m the grapes from here were depressingly bad with rot, although deceptively looked good at the start . This is another new, first time for this year, terroir where Cyprien told me he had not had the ability to manage the vineyard how he’d have wished and that it was way too prolific. Flippin freezin again now sat typing here at the back of the cuverie and my RSI’d right arm is going bonkers – really painful. Hey ho !

Day 6 – Vosne Villages roadside along from Clos Vougeot – dragging Daniel on board to depart
Day 6 – Vosne Village roadside RN74 along from Clos Vougeot
Day 6 – Vosne in the mist from roadside RN74 plot of Vosne Village
Day 6 – Arlaud convoy en route thro Vosne to Petit Monts
Day 6 – Arlaud team commencing exit from Vosne Petit Monts (vines horizontal to the hill)
Day 6 – Looking down on Vosne from Petit Monts with R-L La Grande Rue, Romanee Conti & Richebourg
Day 6 – the relentless, impossible not to like, bundle of energy Mahmadoo celebrating exit of Petit Monts
Day 6 – Vosne 1er Petit Monts fruit
Day 6 – Vendangeur of another domaine in Vosne Petit Monts
Day 6 – Drouhin & Bouchard empty caisses en Petits Monts
Day 6 – Arlaud vendangeurs exiting Petit Monts 2
Day 6 – View down on Vosne with La Grande Rue right & Romanee Conti left
Day 6 – Arlaud vendangeurs exiting Petit Monts 3
Day 6 – Arlaud vendangeurs exiting Petit Monts 5
Day 6 – Arlaud vendangeurs exiting Petit Monts 6 with Herve phone in hand planning next move
Day 6 – Alice Chidaine, daughter of Francois Chidaine (Montlouis, Loire)
Day 6 – left to right Daniel, Dede & AN Other
Day 6 – Arlaud entering Bonnes Mares
Day 6 – Arlaud team splitting into botom & mid slope teams for Bonnes Mares, Alice Chidaine centre
Day 6 – Morey from Bonnes Mares vines
Day 6 – Bonnes Mares typical fruit
Day 6 – Bonnes Mares fruit in bucket
Day 6 – Arlaud team top of slope Bonnes Mares
Day 6 – Arlaud team descending Bonnes Mares
Day 6 – my favourite – Clos St Denis GC
Day 6 – confess cant recall where this is – Mazoyeres possibly
Day 6 – circa 8 pm cleaning triage set up one
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