A Wine Story

Tropical cuisine in Bordeaux

Quick! Imagine the ultimate, Michelin-star French meal. Chances are, you are thinking foie gras, canard, rich sauces, and endless courses of tiny little bites. In most regions of the world, you would be right.

You may correctly guess the wine region of Bordeaux, France, is filled with many such restaurants featuring highly trained chefs and spectacular cuisine. However, in the village of Saint-Gervais chef/owner Franck Descas has carved out a unique niche for himself as the master of cuisine from the sun.

What is cuisine from the sun, you might ask? Though Chef Descas has worked in many three-star Michelin rated restaurants in Paris and elsewhere, his Caribbean roots shine forth in his excellent "gastronomic" Au Sarment where the colorful French/Antilles cuisine tastes even better than it looks.

So, you may wonder, why would a world-class chef, who ran so many top restaurants, leave the lights of Paris for the tranquility of Saint-Gervais? As is the case with so many winemakers and innkeepers I've met here, Chef Descas and his wife Anne desired a simpler lifestyle for themselves and their three young children. The family lives above the restaurant and the children enjoy helping their parents out on occasion.

Led to the table by his charming wife Anne who manages the front of the house, we bask in the flavor of the warm Caribbean on a somewhat chill, rainy January night. For a starter, I order scallops flavored with vanilla and chestnut and served in a canoe-shaped serving dish. Delicious! Yet I glance an envious eye at my friend's dish, King Prawn and vegetable tempura drizzled with aged balsamic vinegar.

Unlike the United States, where top restaurants pack the room, the Descas's try to spread people out throughout the three main, pleasantly decorated rooms of their restaurant to give additional privacy. Anne is assisted by a highly trained young wait staff who, like Anne, speak and understand English.

For dinner, we order two fantastic dishes. The first is roast lobster with a citronella butter sauce, and vegetables with cocoa nut milk. This is an incredible dish, served with a fantastic Caribbean-spiced vegetable salad. I was instantly seduced by my order of Court bouillon, Creole style. The name may not sound all that exciting, but the presentation is gorgeous.

Anne arrives at the table and presents a large bowl with fillet of various fish arranged on the bottom. Onto that, she ladles a fresh seafood broth. Served on the side of this fragrant dish are at least thirteen tiny bowls containing condiments such as pistachio-flavored rice, kidney beans, pumpkin, bacon fricassee, finely diced banana, fresh flaked coconut, chives, hot sauce, and more. Flavoring the dish to one's individual taste makes a remarkably fun way to enjoy dinner.

Though this restaurant is Caribbean in tone, it is in France and as such, a cheese course is de rigueur. The cheese plate changes often and we enjoy St Nectaire farm cheese, goat's cheese marinated in olive oil, and Ostari sheep cheese.

Though there is barely room for dessert, we were told the desserts here rock the house, so we order Amarena cherries (small, dark, slightly sour cherries grown mostly in Bologna and Modena, preserved in sugar) over a Basque cake with ganache bombe and fresh cream. We also order their world-famous chocolate dessert, a large plate including fondant, ice-cream, millefeuille, rice pudding, banana crumble and coconut pie, Creole chocolate with spices, warm pie, mousse duo, and crème chocolate with almonds.

When you visit this incredible restaurant, try to bring as many friends as possible so each of you can order a different dish and share the fantastic, unusual, tropical tastes Chef Descas has to offer.

Au Sarment
Franck and Anne Descas
50, Rue de la lande
33240 Saint-Gervais
Tel: +33(0)5 57 43 44 73

Visiting Chateau Tayac

“Robert Parker spent an entire day here,” says the charming matriarch Annick Saturny, whose husband bought and created Château Tayac many decades ago. So far, this is the first Château I have visited that actually looks like the American ideal of what a Château should look like.

First, notice the imposing gates and long driveway that lead up to a spectacular mansion a few centuries old. The vineyard here, overlooking the junction between the Gironde and the Dordogne, dates back to Gallo-Roman times.

Château Tayac’s romantic history begs that you pour yourself a glass of the Chateau’s wine, sit near a fireplace, and absorb its incredible history. According to the 17th Edition of Charles Cocks’ book Bordeaux and Its Wines (first published in 1845 and now edited under the direction of Bruno Boidron with contributions by several authors), in 1356, the Black Prince (eldest son of Edward III of England) annexed Bourg and converted the noble houses into fortresses, Six years later, Edward III had them razed, including a structure where Château Tayac now stands.

In 1415, Charles VII gave the lands to the house of Dreux and a feudal castle was built. In the 19th century, the Château was demolished and the present day version, built in the Renaissance style, was built in its place. In 1920, the Château fell into the hands of M. Boyer, who made a success of his vineyard before falling ill in 1940. Pierre Saturney, Madame’s husband, bought the property, renovated the vineyard using the Massale method of selection, restored and modernized the winemaking facilities, and made wines from this Château world famous.

As Madame Saturny gives me an extensive tour of the property, we are trailed by her friendly dogs. I meet Madame’s attractive young granddaughter. Despite the world-wide reputation of these fine wines, and the almost intimidating splendor of the castle-like living quarters of the Château, this is very much a down-to-earth, family run operation that takes great pride in its product.

In the tasting room we try the Prestige ‘98, well balanced and rich with black fruit, very likely to age for another ten years. The 2006 “Black Prince” is marked by the aroma and taste of candied violets, and is both smooth and highly concentrated. It is an intensely rich, well balanced wine with good structure and nicely integrated tannins.

Next is the Reserve 2003, a personal favorite. This wine has it all -- spice, full black fruit, and casis, nearly opaque in color and intensity.

Château Tayac, like virtually all the Châteaux in Bourg, are available to visitors by appointment. For contact information for the wineries of the region consult the links below. Most have their email information on their web sites. And as Robert Parker said, visit soon – Bourg is a hot new region.

Tasting Chateau Laniote

Quick! What does Saint Emilion mean to you? In your mind, does it represent the healing saint of the same name? Does it signify a quaint, ancient, walled village in Bordeaux? Or, for you wine lovers, does it represent chateaux offering quality, collectible wines?

Visiting vineyards in Saint Emilion is a special treat. Many are small and family-run. On my visit, I had the good fortune to have as my hosts the Laniote family. They have been making wine in St. Emilion for eight generations. While I can describe the high energy, passion for winemaking, and good humor of owners Arnaud and Florence de la Fillolie in words, drop by their web site for a fun, colorful peak at their approach to wine and family life.

If you have ever fantasized about what it might be like to leave the big city and move with your young children to a chateau in Saint Emilion, you will enjoy your visit with the Laniotes. The winery is open to the public (see their web site for hours and reservation policy)m and the de la Fillolie family speaks fluent English. Just breathing the peaceful air of this small estate and vineyard can motivate you to give up city life and devote yourself to the vines.

But don't.

This is the job of the de la Fillolies, and a job they do very well with a great deal of pleasure and excitement. Rather than drag high-heeled guests into the vineyard, Arnaud instead invites them into the cellar where he has set up a screening room to condense a year's worth of winery activities into an eight-minute film.

In the film we see workers picking, Arnaud punching down the cap (cake-y top of wine and grape skins as it macerates) and finally, Florence holding up a glass of the finished wine and speaking about its properties. Throughout the video, Arnaud entertains English-speaking guests by deliberately and hilariously mistranslating what is being said.

Despite this, I am led to understand the blend of their wine is 80 percent Merlot, 15 percent Cabernet Franc, and five percent Cabernet Sauvignon. The soil is sand and clay, and they pick the grapes by hand - five days for Merlot and one day for Cabernet Sauvignon. Maceration is two to four days, after which they use an old-fashioned basket press. Wine is aged in oak, and produced and fired under Arnaud's personal supervision.

Finally I taste the 2001 Chateau Laniote. It is a ruby color, medium intensity, with a very subtle floral aroma of violet and lilac, red fruit, and dry on the palate with a wonderfully light balance.

It is a delightful viewing and tasting experience.

Chateau Guiraud's Sweeet Sauternes

Didier Galhaud, tall, dark, and slim, meets me at Chateau Guiraud in the Sauternes district of Bordeaux, and escorts me around the First Grand Cru Classe wine property, known for the spectacular sweet wine called Sauternes.

Grey mist swirls around us as we crunch our way down the gravel walkway towards the tasting room. Guiraud is your fantasy of the classic French chateau, right down to the turrets and chandeliers. Peacocks even show off their colorful plums in the garden. Dinner or décor, I wonder.

From this description, you might think I'm setting the scene for a romance novel or murder mystery. Actually, the grey mist — a cool morning fog — is a key ingredient for the success of quality wine production. Sauternes grapes need a moist, cool, foggy morning and a drying afternoon sunshine in order to achieve "noble rot."

Why Sauternes? Why now? Why Chateau Guiraud? Since you are reading this column, you are already a sophisticated connoisseur who is curious about new trends, and quite possibly, you may have dismissed sweet white wine as appropriate only for dessert. However, sweet white wine from Bordeaux pairs magnificently with foie gras, various varieties of cheeses, and even the right entrée.

How does Sauternes wine get so luscious and pleasantly sweet? The answer is Botrytis Cinerea, or noble rot, a beneficial mold that grows on grapes that have become extremely ripe. It attacks the inside of the grape and its skin. The skin is digested and, becoming thin and fragile, takes on a brown violet color. This is the initial stage, called "pourri plein."

The second stage is reached when the grape appears wrinkled and slightly dried. At this point the grape has become naturally "roasted" and is sometimes covered with the grey filaments of the fungus. The grapes are harvested by hand, picked in successive selections through the vines because Botrytis Cinera does not affect all of the grapes at the same time. It is very slow, irregular, and varies with location, grape variety, bunches of grapes, and even individual grapes.

Chateau Guiraud's grapes are 65 percent Semillon and 35 percent Sauvignon Blanc. The soils are sandy gravel for 80 percent of the surface, and clay gravel for the remainder. The sub-soils are very diverse, including pure gravels, red clay, limestone marls, and fossilized oyster beds with red and white clay.

In the winery, the grapes then undergo staged pressing, with the first pressing expressing 70-80 percent of the grape must. Separate batches are fermented in barrels over a period from three weeks to two months, when their progress is closely monitored. The wines undergo further barrel aging (18-24 months) before final blending and bottling.

The result is the most refreshing and delicious "Nectar of the Gods" you can imagine. Break away from the 'dessert wine' trap by pairing Sauternes with cheese, either during the cocktail hour or after the meal. What type of cheese? Because these wines are especially viscous and sweet, they are best reserved for cheese types that really require that level of sweetness, especially blue cheeses. I like to go high-end Roquefort, but also try Blue d'Auvergne, Fourme d'Ambert, and Livarot.

Experimentation is the spice of life. Bon Appetite!

Tasting Grand Cru Bordeaux at Ch La Lagune

            “Bonjour,” says English-speaking Jerome Juhe, part of the wine-making team at Chateau La Lagune. Handsome and compact with dark hair and electrifying enthusiasm for his company’s wine, he guides me through the remarkably modern and clean winemaking facilities, of which he is clearly proud.

            Looking at this spacious, almost futuristic winery, I find incredible juxtaposition between what I see and the ‘romance’ of its history, which was created in the 17^th century by the aristocratic Seguineau family. Researching the Chateau’s early years brings images familiar to anyone who might have seen the film Dangerous Liaisons or any film set in the sophisticated, aristocratic world of

France

during the 17^th and 18^th centuries. Though by all accounts  the first generation of the Seguineau family made a success of the Chateau, it was ultimately acquired by Jouffrey Piston, credited with building the winery up to the point it was included as a troisieme cru the1855

Bordeaux

classification.

            Cycles of good and bad times occurred for the next century. By the time George Brunet, an agricultural engineer, bought the Chateau in 1958 it had fallen on rough times. Brunet replanted the vineyard and set the tone for the success it is enjoying today under the Frey family.
            On the tour, Jerome Juhe shows me not one sorting table but three, so that only the ripest, most perfect grapes make the cut. The first sorting table vibrates, with the perforated belt eliminating all small residual plant matter, and so forth. The grape bunches next move to a second four-meter table where six people remove grapes that are less than perfect. After de-stemming, six more workers make a final meticulous selection.
            Yet even before the grapes roll onto the sorting table, Jerome tells me, workers have been carefully trained to cut only the most perfect grapes. Many of the pickers (around 140) have been faithful to La Lagune for generations, and arrive at harvest as family units. The job is difficult – the picking team cuts grapes by hand, placing them in small, perforated crates so as not to bruise them. At times, they may need to go through the vineyard in several waves to pick grapes at optimum ripeness.
            “They are paid well”, says Jerome, adding that the workers enjoy the traditional feast that most vineyard workers enjoy during the harvest. At mid-day, and workers feast on a variety of hearty meals that may include plum pork sausages, lamb, and stews, sometimes washed down with hearty red wine.
            Treating workers well, I discover, helps the quality of the grapes. Repeat pickers know the vineyard and know to choose the ripest grapes. By serving lunch, Chateaux let workers know they care and also gives the pickers a sense of solidarity.

            Once the grapes are selected and de-stemmed, they are lightly crushed and ready to go into the vats by gravity flow, without using pumps. Two stainless steal arms with a 4% gradient slowly feed the 72 temperature-controlled stainless steel vats, arranged in an arc of a circle. The large number of vats, of varying sizes, means that separate lots from different plots can be fermented separately, facilitating the fine-tuning of the final blend.
            Jerome is well-pleased to show off the new vat room (operational since 2004) with a surface area of over 2,000 meters. Quite a site, these gleaming silver vats, so pristine one can almost see their own reflection, and the tan hardwood floors. Architect Patrick Baggio won the competition to design this state-of-the-art room, with its timbered ceiling with exposed poplar beams. It’s difficult to describe the sensation of standing in this room at Chateau LaLune. Of course, you can understand why virtually all wine rooms, regardless of their modernity or condition, feel good. It is the room where magic is made. Alchemy. The allure of turning grapes into wine.

            Yet the beauty of this room with all its high tech touches, combined with the faint but still-there aroma of musk, raises your endorphins and just makes you feel good … and thirsty for a bottle of their award winning wine.
            Fermentation, Jerome now explains, is slow and gentle. The aim is to make the most of the grapes to maintain finesse, elegance, and balance. Extraction is maximized by pumping over a short period (this is the process of moving the heavy solids from the bottom of the vat to the top, thus breaking the thick cap that forms), twice a day. In some years, pre-fermentation maceration is carried out. Yeast is indigenous. Alcoholic fermentation lasts 4-6 days, pumping over both with and without oxygen. Post-fermentation vatting at 30 degrees for six days, and then the juice is pressed and run off in separate lots.

            From 2003 to today Chateau La Lagune started using 55% new barrels from the best oak-producing regions to barrel-age their wines, which gives the wines structure as well as complexity and toasty, vanilla overtones. Now the Chateau uses medium-toasted barrels (degrees of toasting, or charring, the interior of the wine barrel is an important factor for winemakers who want to achieve a certain style), but but may evolve towards medium plus in the future. The remaining 45% of the wine is aged in barrels that have been used for one previous vintage.
            Barrel aging lasts 15 - 18 months, with the glass bungs on top for the first six months and topping up several times a week. Then the barrels are turned with the bung on the side. The wine is racked every three months, and fined with egg whites before bottling.
            I’m a bit incredulous when we peer into the bottling room. It is such a small and simple operation. Several young women run the labeling machine, and at the end, a man gently puts the wine into cedar-scented wood boxes with the Chateau La Lagune insignia. Without much of a stretch, one well imagine a similar type of operation before the machine age.

            Now the tasting room is gorgeous and modern yet with ancient touches. The walls are limestone brick, and art is somewhat Mediterranean in theme. Of course, the 2 bottles of wine sitting on the table grab my attention at once. We taste a 2004 and 2005, both excellent but quite young with at least ten years of bottle aging in their future. Yet already, the wine has good red fruit, hints of violet, lavender, lilac, plum, smoke, and vanilla that will develop into a fine wine for a celebratory occasion that has yet to occur.
            Salute!

            

A peek at the wines of Chateau Haut Maco

Wouldn’t it be interesting to take a snapshot of the past? For example, on a recent trip to Bordeaux, I visited many of the same Chateau as our third president Thomas Jefferson. It was so interesting see the same topography, taste the “same” wines, and read his experiences of over two hundred years ago.

Of course, the region is visually virtually the same. Drive through Cotes de Bourg and you will see rolling limestone hills, wineries off the side of a winding road, and an austere dense forest. Merlot grows well here on the limestone soils, and today winemaking is both an art and a science, rendering even a modest $10 wine from this region an incredible value.

Why so affordable? Perhaps it’s because the Cotes de Bourg, being outside the Medoc, was not part of the 1855 classification of wine. This classification structured wines of the Medoc into five growths, or categories, and the new vintages of wines from the best First Growth Chateaux today sell for as much as 10,000 a case.

Bourg is understandably proud of their wine. To discover more about this under-rated appellation, I visited some wineries here. One was Chateau Haut Maco, founded by the brothers Jean and Bernard Mallet.

Why this Chateau? Perhaps I was channeling Thomas Jefferson when I performed a Google search on the Internet about wineries in Bourg and came across the winery’s blog. The topic was the harvest of 2007:

”Everything goes well, clusters bloom despite a completely abnormal weather, but a micro climate protects us from a fall in temperatures which would be disastrous for the smooth functioning of this phase if important to the lives of our vines.”

What drama! The lives of the vines were at stake! I had to see this blog entry in real life.

At the Chateau, I was met by jean-clad Hugues Mallet, who very proudly showed me around his family’s extensive vineyards and modern winery. The property includes 49 hectares including sixty-percent Merlot, thirty-five percent Cabernet Sauvignon, and five-percent Cabernet Franc.

The son of Jean Mallet, Hugues worked a harvest in Sonoma, California, spoke great English, and seemed keen on taking over the winery. After describing his 74 blocks of vines, pointing out that the best soil and grapes is found on the hillside, we tasted his wines.

Now the tasting room of Chateau Maco is quite modern and beautiful, glamorous enough to be the site of many catered dinners for groups and clients. It overlooks the barrels of aging Bordeaux in the cave below. I watched as he opened a flight of the 2003 vintage. First to taste was the Cuvee Jean Bernard, a spicy wine with notes of cherry. Next was Chateau Haut Maco, with bright, spicy red berry aromas. As a treat we try the 2000 Haut Maco, with similar flavors but smoother and silkier from age.

Bourg wines are quite a value – ask about them at your local wine store. And when in Bourg, make a reservation to visit this Chateau. It is quite an experience.

Chateau Haut Maco

A Visit to Chateau Haut Bailly

Wearing a bright red, very elegant, fitted jacket with glossy dark hair spilling over her shoulders, Noemie Ruelloux, communications manager for Chateau Haut-Bailly, welcomes me to the Chateau. Haut-Bailly is situated on the left bank of the River Garonne, south of Bordeaux in the commune of Pessac-Léognan.

Today the air is crisp and the classically styled Chateau and vineyard sparkle in the late afternoon sun. It is a picture perfect moment - the type you will always remember. Every vine is lovingly pruned and seems excited about the potential of the year ahead. Anticipation is virtually in the air.

Through the centuries, this vineyard has seen much upheaval. Dig into its history and you will see the visionaries who saw the magic I am seeing today and pulled together all their resources to buy it. One of the first is viticulturist Alcide Bellot des Minieres, who passionately expanded the vineyards and gave the winery a reputation to match the Deuxieme Cru further north. He was known as the "King of Wines," and due to his attention to scientific detail, prices for Haut-Bailly rose to a level similar to those of the Bordeaux First Growths (Lafite, Latour, Margaux, and Haut-Brion).

The second visionary was Daniel Sanders who brought it back to its former glory after many war-torn years of neglect. Today, Daniel's granddaughter Veronique Sanders runs the cellars, with U.S. banker Robert Wilmers owning the property. Together, Noemie and I tour the vineyards, my black high heels gently sinking into the slightly moist earth.

The soil here is a mix of sand and Tertiary gravel over Faluns de Leognan, which is soft soil, rich in sandstone and fossilized shells. The vines are 65 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 25 percent Merlot, and 10 percent Cabernet Franc, with small plantings of Petit Verdot and Malbac. Workers, I learn, harvest by hand with three tiers of sorting: first in the vineyard, next when the grapes are destemmed in the winery, and then by using a sorting table before vinification.

You might have heard the statement, "Great wine is made in the vineyard." To that end, quality is key here. Vines are vigorously pruned for small yields. Sometimes vines are thinned after flowering. The varieties are kept separate until blending. Fermentation occurs in temperature-controlled concrete vats. Typically there is a three-week cuvaison, and then up to eight months in oak (roughly half new each vintage). The wines are assembled in stainless steel, and bottled without fining or filtration.

Finally, we taste the wine. Below are my tasting notes. Typically, I take notes in the fashion dictated by the Wine and Spirits Educational Trust.

La Parde de Haut Bailly 2003 (second label)
Color: dark purple, fushia rim, watery white meniscus, tears fast to form and fade.
Nose: Medium+ intensity, very intense red tart berries such as cranberries, pomegranate, subtle violet.
Palate: Dry, acid is medium, tannin is high minus, body is medium, alcohol is medium, length is very, very, very long.
Flavor intensity is intense, including muddled violets, blue berries, tealeaves, and black currant.

Chateau Haut Bailly 2004 (Grand Cru)
Color: purple, medium + intensity, very dark, tears medium to form and fall.
Nose: medium intensity, vanilla, caramel, cinnamon, red ripe fruit.
Palate: dry, acid is medium +, tannin is medium, body is medium, alcohol is medium, length is very long. Flavor intensity is pronounced with grainy tannins, black currant leaf, vanilla, beets, and rhubarb.

Chateau Haut-Bailly
By appointment only.
Phone: +33 5 56 64 75 11
E-mail: visite@chateau-haut-bailly.com
Monday through Friday: 9 to 12 a.m. and 2 to 5 p.m.
Group visits: up to 15-20 persons max.
French, English, German, Flemish.

Review: l’Auburge Du Porche

“May we be of service with the menu?” asks a fellow restaurant guest with an English accent, seeing a friend and I discussing amongst ourselves the translation of the menu at l’Auburge Du Porche, a charming restaurant and Inn near the Gironde River in Côte de Blaye.

In Manhattan, with its modern take on French cuisine, I can always understand menu items written in French. But Christine and Dominique Lanfroid-Nazac, chef and proprietors of this establishment, pride themselves on a traditional, country French menu. As a result, the menu lists the kind of pate and foie gras rich menu you will not likely see in the land of Sex and the City.

As you may know, the French are experts at using foods to their full potential. A cow transcends steak and ribs. Chefs use the brains, pancreas, kidneys, and more. Goose deconstructs into foie gras. Everything is a pig is used except the hoofs, yet then again, this is reduced to gelatin. 

On this drizzly, chill, January moonlight night, a meal of substance is most welcome. Blaye is a delightful, vibrant, yet remote historical region of Bordeaux, so you won’t find many restaurants of this quality open on Sunday this time of the year. The restaurant offers the kind of warm atmosphere most welcome after zigzagging down the hilly streets of Blaye (in high heels, no less) from Villa Premayac, a gorgeous, rather palatial Inn with an unique history. l’Auburge Du Porche is an Inn as well, yet as the rooms are occupied we have not been able to see them.

As we settle in, a server brings bread and their excellent onion marmalade along with the wine list. Like many places in Europe, wines are quite a bargain here, and the list reflects the local wineries which date from ancient times. The Greeks and then the Romans who came to settle in this providential area were the first to grasp the value of planting vines and launching the wine trade. Today the wines in this region can rival those of the better known regions, yet the real pleasure in visiting Côte de Blaye is to take in its historical past and enjoy traditional cuisine.

First bottle of the night is Chateau Segonzac Vieilles Vignes 2001, Cru Bourgeois. The 2002 vintage made the “top 100” list of 100 wines priced $8-$25 selected by an independent jury in a blind tasting of over 300 wines. Living in Manhattan, I know (and trust) members of the jury, especially Roger Dagorn Master Sommelier, Chanterelle, who is passionate about wine education and a mentor to many. Chateau Ségonzac, AOC First-Cotes-de-Blaye, has an extensive vineyard of 33 hectares in a single plot located on a slope in the limestone bedrock limestone. Tasting notes include aroma of black, concentrated fruit and blackberry, plum, and deep fruit on the palate. Quite nice. As a certified sommelier myself, I’m intrigued by the way our wine server peels the plastic cap of the wine bottle in a way so as to form a receptacle for the cork.   

With the help of the English party, who turn out to be expatriates who live in Blaye full time, we maneuver the menu. As a starter, I enjoy the fish soup. It is Marseilles style with a Blaye twist. A rich, red broth fashioned from the juices and bones of the local fish, served with accompaniments. My companion has duck foie gras, an enormous portion. As the evening progresses and we taste our way through delicious scallops and canard, we enjoy other wines from the region including Chateau Haut Guilert Cote de Blaye 2002, with its dusty, raspberry nose, earth, and red cherry nose and similar flavors on the palate.

As we discuss and take notes on the wines of Blaye, a gentleman from the English party introduces himself and tells us we must visit straight away the Maison du Vin in Blaye to enjoy complimentary tastings of the wines of the region.

Reservations are necessary here, in addition to a good appetite. The restaurant offers rare traditional dishes and even with the inflated Euro, is quite a value. Wines are outstanding representations of the region.

l’Auburge Du Porche (both a restaurant and an Inn)
Proprietors Christine et Dominique Lanfroid-Nazac
5 rue Ernest Régnier
33390 BLAYE
Tél: 05 57 42 22 69
Fax: 05 57 42 82 83
contact@auberge-du-porche.com

Bordeaux Information
http://www.Bordeaux.com

Maison Du Vin
http://www.aoc-blaye.com/index.php?contain=04

Visiting Chateau Paloumey in Bordeaux

"Welcome to Chateau Paloumey," says Martine Cazeneuve, owner and winemaker of this 22-hectare, award-winning, Bordeaux Supérieur property. Fashionably dressed and accessorized, Madame Cazeneuve greets me at the door with her public relations executive Barbara Engerer.

I am tasting my way through the Medoc, and am curious to visit this Chateau as it is one of several now run by a female winemaker. Madame Cazeneuve shows me around her property and explains that she bought it in 1990 when, due to negligence on the part of the elderly previous owners, not a vine was left.

Madame's vines are thriving now, and the vista of the vineyards just now being pruned from the elevated tasting room is gorgeous. As I taste her Chateau Paloumey 2003, I can't help but notice its fresh fruit flavors, especially red fruit such as strawberry and framboise, with a nice integration of oak. Also, I find it a distinctively 'feminine' wine, especially considering the region.

Many wines from the Medoc are quite masculine, with smokey notes, aggressive tannins, and aromas of tobacco and cigar box. Nodding in agreement, Madame explains her goal is to create a wine that has excellent balance and reveals the fruit of the region. "Not too strong," she says, "just elegant with finesse."

Madame is generous enough to invite me for lunch. We walk six feet across the gravely path that separates her chateau from her charming private living quarters, as elegant in decor as her winery. It's clear she takes pride in arranging important things in her life just so — her living space as well as her wine — and is a stickler for the smallest of details. This observation is also born out in her lunch.

The chicken we enjoy is no mere chicken, but a carefully roasted chicken fresh from the Pyrenees, where it is a delicacy and quite delicious. Salad, pumpkin soup, and a selection of three cheeses (a generous slab of Gouda, a tiny circle of Chevre, and a wedge of Saint Nectaire with a tan rind) rounded out the meal.

I really liked the wines of Chateau Paloumey, and sense that as good as they are now, they will only get better in time. The winery is quite modern. The casks in the aging room are housed in such a gorgeous cave it could almost be a Hollywood movie set.

Madame Cazeneuve is involved in many local events designed to raise the awareness of female winemakers and chefs. On my visit I realized that today, perhaps more than ever before, women are really thriving as the heads of wineries and the Bordeaux version of "celebrity chefs," a surprising number of whom are female. Viva la France.

For information on the wines, visit Chateau Paloumey and the official Bordeaux web site.

A Visit to Chateau La Lagune

Bonjour," says English-speaking Jerome Juhe, part of the winemaking team at Chateau La Lagune. Handsome and compact with dark hair and electrifying enthusiasm for his company's wine, he guides me through the remarkably modern and clean winemaking facilities, of which he is clearly proud.

Looking at this spacious, almost futuristic winery, I find incredible juxtaposition between what I see and the romance of its history, which was created in the 17th century by the aristocratic Seguineau family. Researching the Chateau's early years brings images familiar to anyone who might have seen the film Dangerous Liaisons or any film set in the sophisticated, aristocratic world of France during the 17th and 18th centuries. By all accounts, the first generation of the Seguineau family made a success of the Chateau, but it was ultimately acquired by Jouffrey Piston who is credited with building the winery up to the point it was included as a Troisieme Cru in the 1855 Bordeaux classification.

Cycles of good and bad times occurred for the next century. By the time George Brunet, an agricultural engineer, bought the Chateau in 1958, it had fallen on rough times. Brunet replanted the vineyard and set the tone for the success it is enjoying today under the Frey family.

On the tour, Jerome Juhe shows me not one sorting table, but three, so that only the ripest, most perfect grapes make the cut. The first sorting table vibrates, with the perforated belt eliminating all small residual plant matter and so forth. The grape bunches next move to a second four-meter table where six people remove grapes that are less than perfect. After de-stemming, six more workers make a final meticulous selection.

Even before the grapes roll onto the sorting table, Jerome tells me, workers have been carefully trained to cut only the most perfect grapes. Many of the pickers (around 140) have been faithful to La Lagune for generations, and arrive at harvest as family units. The job is difficult. The picking team cuts grapes by hand, placing them in small, perforated crates so as not to bruise them. At times, they may need to go through the vineyard in several waves to pick grapes at optimum ripeness.

"They are paid well," says Jerome, adding that the workers enjoy the traditional feast that most vineyard workers enjoy during the harvest. At mid-day, workers feast on a variety of hearty meals that may include plum pork sausages, lamb, and stews, sometimes washed down with hearty red wine.

Treating workers well, I discover, helps the quality of the grapes. Repeat pickers know the vineyard and know to choose the ripest grapes. By serving lunch, Chateaux lets the workers know they care. This also gives the pickers a sense of solidarity.

Once the grapes are selected and de-stemmed, they are lightly crushed and ready to go into the vats by gravity flow, without using pumps. Two stainless steel arms with a four percent gradient slowly feed the 72 temperature-controlled stainless steel vats, arranged in an arc. The large number of vats, of varying sizes, means that separate lots from different plots can be fermented separately, facilitating the fine-tuning of the final blend.

Jerome is well pleased to show off the new vat room (operational since 2004) with a surface area of over 2,000 meters. Quite a site, these gleaming silver vats — so pristine one can almost see their own reflection — and the tan hardwood floors. Architect Patrick Baggio won the competition to design this state-of-the-art room, with its timbered ceiling with exposed poplar beams. It's difficult to describe the sensation of standing in this room at Chateau LaLune.

You can understand why virtually all wine rooms, regardless of their modernity or condition, feel good. It is the room where magic is made. Alchemy. The allure of turning grapes into wine. The beauty of this room, with all its high-tech touches, combined with the faint but still-there aroma of musk, raises your endorphins and just makes you feel good - and thirsty for a bottle of their award-winning wine.

Fermentation, Jerome now explains, is slow and gentle. The aim is to make the most of the grapes to maintain finesse, elegance, and balance. Extraction is maximized by pumping over a short period twice a day. This is the process of moving the heavy solids from the bottom of the vat to the top, thus breaking the thick cap that forms.

In some years, pre-fermentation maceration is carried out. Yeast is indigenous. Alcoholic fermentation lasts four to six days, pumping over both with and without oxygen. Post-fermentation vatting takes place at 30 degrees for six days, and then the juice is pressed and run off in separate lots.

From 2003 to today, Chateau La Lagune started using 55 percent new barrels from the best oak-producing regions to barrel-age their wines, which gives the wines structure as well as complexity and toasty, vanilla overtones. Now the Chateau uses medium-toasted barrels (degrees of toasting, or charring, the interior of the wine barrel is an important factor for winemakers who want to achieve a certain style), but may evolve toward medium plus in the future. The remaining 45 percent of the wine is aged in barrels that have been used for one previous vintage.

Barrel aging lasts 15-18 months, with the glass bungs on top for the first six months and topping up several times a week; then the barrels are turned with the bung on the side. The wine is racked every three months, and fined with egg whites before bottling.

I'm a bit incredulous when we peer into the bottling room. It is such a small and simple operation. Several young women run the labeling machine. At the end, a man gently puts the wine into cedar-scented wood boxes with the Chateau La Lagune insignia. Without much of a stretch, one can well imagine a similar type of operation before the machine age.

The tasting room is gorgeous and modern, yet with ancient touches. The walls are limestone brick, and art is somewhat Mediterranean in theme. The two bottles of wine sitting on the table grab my attention at once. We taste a 2004 and 2005, both excellent but quite young with at least ten years of bottle aging in their future. Yet already, the wine has good red fruit and hints of violet, lavender, lilac, plum, smoke, and vanilla that will develop into a fine wine for a celebratory occasion that has yet to occur.

Salute!

For more information, visit the information site of Bordeaux.