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Our very own Chloë Schwartz left on June 25 for a 6 month internship at Château Haut-Rian, in Entre-Deux-Mers. Read the July 19th, August 16th and Sept 16th posts for her full adventure! This is the last part of this series.

“My one-line summary of Harvest is it was August and suddenly it was mid-October and I was tired. If this doesn’t do it for you, here’s the longer version:

One day, Pauline asked me to watch her carefully as she prepared the yeast. We got two buckets of hot water and dumped them into a large tub and added cold water until it was 35-37°C. Next, we added the packets of yeast and stirred them up with our hands, which felt amazing. After we had pumped the yeast into the cuve, Pauline announced that she had to go run some errands and left me to prepare the yeast for the next tank’s fermentation! I was honored but terrified. Fortunately, it went off without a hitch, and, going forward, I prepared a lot of yeast. For white and rosé, the type of yeast used can impart significant flavors on the final wine, but it doesn’t really matter for red. That being said, there are differences between the yeasts, such as the level of alcohol they are able to withstand before dying. The yeasts used for fermentation are all the same species (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), but have brand names ranging from the clinical (“F33”) to the confusing (“Syrah”, because that strain was discovered in the Rhône). For the whites & rosés, yeast was added a couple days after the grapes had been harvested (after the wine had been pumped through a refrigeration unit and débourbage (filtering out the must) had been performed; for the reds, activated yeast was added directly to the pump alongside the freshly arriving grapes.

And then it was time for the reds. For the reds, the two presses were wheeled away and replaced with a big scaffold we constructed to hoist the large hose from the pump up and over all of the different tanks. The winery reception for the red grapes was a real pump n dump – the grapes arrived and were pumped directly into the tank. No refrigeration was necessary.

                                           Yeast is poured into the pump with the arriving red grapes / The scaffold used to deliver the red grapes to the tanks.

The contrast between the vinification for the reds and the whites/rosés was stark. Before, there had been myriad choices, with each decision imparting distinct results on the wines’ outcomes. Without their skins, the white/rosé juice was much more sensitive, which increased the pressure and decreased the productivity. The reds were easy by comparison. Whereas we could only fill one 200 hL tank (6-7 bennes), maximum, with whites on one day of harvesting, we could do 2.5 easily on a big day of reds (the record is 15 bennes).

With the reds fermenting, we began remontage and then remontage aéré (once the density had decreased a bit) to extract color and tannins from the skins and to oxygenate the tank. Remontage was a direct pump-over from the bottom to the top of the tank, while remontage aéré involved emptying the tank into an open basin that another hose pumped from over the top of the tank. This is where the faggots came into play: each tank had one faggot installed over one of its lower openings so that grapes would not pass through the hoses. Most of the tanks came equipped with small notches so that the faggots could be attached with wire. In one tank, there were no notches, so we found a large rock to hold the faggot in place. For a couple tanks, the faggots were badly made, so when the grapes passed through they stopped up the hoses. Meanwhile, at the top of the tank, the hose was connected to either what looked like a pie dish with holes punched into it or a device that rotated as liquid was pushed through it. Both did a good job of wetting the cap, but we spent the last 5 minutes of each remontage manually spraying because apparently there is always a spot that does not get covered (which is where mold, acetic acid, and all sorts of other things you don’t want in your tank will develop). Initially, we did remontage on each tank for one hour twice a day, gradually decreasing the time until we were only doing 10 minutes daily. Due to the heat and sun, the grape skins were particularly thick and therefore hard to extract from this year, but Philippe the oenologue was impressed with our color development. Like many tasks I’ve been assigned, I first found remontage incredibly frustrating and, after a couple of days, came to enjoy its rhythm.

As the season shifted into fall, the aroma of roasting peppers and the sound of hunting season filled the air. Everyone loves to complain about the hunters. They wander through vineyards they don’t own and along public running paths, with an air of entitlement as though they’re the only ones who should be occupying this land. Considering that harvest was only halfway over, it seemed particularly foolish to go hunting in vineyards. Pascal showed Géraldine and me this video at 7:30 a.m., while we were doing levage a couple months ago. As we have stood around complaining about the hunters in the past few weeks, it has been frequently imitated.

Once one of the tanks of sémillon was nearing the end of its fermentation, we transferred it to barrels. Now, the added task of twice daily bâtonnage was mixed into the routine. It is quite the upper body workout to scrape the bottom of the barrel and stir up the fine lees and it’s really loud. However, it is a good way to work off all of the harvest croissants! Performing bâtonnage dramatically raises your internal body temperature, which is quite welcome as the days grow chillier and the massive doors to the winery remain open to release the circulating alcoholic fumes. Since we initially filled the tanks, we have already done ouillage (the refilling of tanks) thrice. Ouillage happens most frequently at the beginning – by comparison, with barrels from 2016-2017, I have done ouillage three times over the course of my entire stage. I also had the opportunity to clean some barrels recently, which involved a long metal hose attachment that had a spherical shower head in the middle that sprayed water everywhere.

Everything at the winery was put on pause for one day to harvest the nobly rotting sémillon for sweet wine. It was growing on a beautiful, organic hillside parcel that is too close to the Garonne to be considered Entre-Deux-Mers, but, if made into a sweet wine, can be classified as Cadillac. Despite the stunning views, this was truly one of the most disgusting tasks I have had in my time here. For those who are not rot experts, noble rot looks just like regular rot. The only way to tell if it’s the good kind is to really stick your nose into the bunch and inhale. Reek of vinegar? Toss. Smell like nothing? Keep. But, it’s not that simple, because often a bunch will have an area of bad rot and an area of good. So you need to let your nose really explore the entire bunch and then trim away the bad bits. And there are spores that puff out of the bunches as you squeeze them. And flies swarming around the sugary juice. All of that gets into your nose too. You glance into the buckets of everyone around you and their yields look just as gross as yours. Because we were only harvesting for one day, it was hard to get a good sense of what a prime bunch looked like. The general mantra of the day was “when in doubt, toss it out”, but we were also trying to work efficiently; it’s much slower work than a regular harvest. And the yields are lower: whereas one vine renders one bottle of regular wine on average, one vine of botrytized grapes renders merely a single glass of sweet wine (if that).

                      Remontage aéré involves emptying the tank into an open basin that another hose pumps from over the top of the tank/ botrytized                                                                                          grapes: differentiating noble rot from regular rot is a delicate operation. 

This was not the end of its grossness. When we did debourbage, which we had to use a tractor benne for because we were out of space in the winery, the wine looked like the inside of an infant’s diaper. Unfortunately, bad bunches had been harvested and there was some volatile acid. The following week, when Philippe came to taste, he was in a bad mood and snottily asked if we had machine harvested the sweet wine because he couldn’t understand how manual pickers could have let this happen. Then again, I can’t really imagine Philippe, with his boat shoes, slicked back hair, and paunch accentuated by a sports coat and brightly colored scarf collection picking grapes.

One morning, my landlord, Bernard (a different Bernard), knocked on my door and asked if I wanted to join him in ten minutes to see the mascaret, which is the (tiny) tidal wave that rolls down the Garonne. What I thought would be maybe a couple of hours turned out to be an all-day event with a local association that meets for one day annually to do this walk and see the wave. We started along the river in Verdelais (claim to fame: where Toulouse-Lautrec is buried), walking by fishing shacks, guinguettes (outdoor summer restaurants), and very orderly man-made forests, before climbing uphill to Sainte-Croix-du-Mont, a village built on top of beds of fossilized oysters. In the village, we discussed the association’s finances (everyone’s annual contribution of 5 euros helps immensely) and had an auberge espagnole (a potluck) with a lot of peanuts and bourru. Bourru is semi-fermented wine that old men here love (which explains why so many were always hanging around during harvest). You can buy it at farmers’ markets, but the real objective is to know a winemaker, so you can show up at the winery any time with your empty plastic liter bottle and fill it with the tank that meets your desired level of fermentation. (For the winemaker’s opinion: Pauline was hosting a dinner party one night and a friend of hers brought bourru as a “fun thing” and Pauline was a bit miffed, seeing as she lives next to a building full of bourru.)

After lunch, we walked to a nearby château whose owner did not seem particularly thrilled to host us. He walked us downhill, below his house, into a series of super deep caves built into the oyster walls and lined with very old barrels (they were empty; some had caved in on themselves). The caves are constantly 14ºC and super humid. Graffiti that had been scratched into the gunk along the walls in the 1800s remained perfectly intact. Then we walked back down to the river — 30ish people walking along the side of the road, following Bernard’s cousin who was waving a flag (and had been intermittently lecturing us on local history all day). It felt very dangerous. By the river, we stopped at an old church built on top of a Roman temple and renovated by an adorable retired endocrinologist who enthusiastically told us about the sarcophagi (still containing bones) used to build the church and the sheep that used to live inside of it. After his rapid-fire recounting of a few thousand years of history, he received a round of applause and then we rushed off because the mascaret was not going to wait for us. We all drove to the observation point, which had attracted an impressively large group of people. Unfortunately, it had rained a bit, and the mascaret was nothing special. There were a few surfers and kayakers who had been riding it since Bordeaux, but there wasn’t much left to ride at this point. This didn’t stop more bottles of bourru from being passed around and I found myself in a long conversation with the treasurer of the club, who had made Kosher wine in Bordeaux for 15 years.

At work, twelve hour days began to feel short, but I started falling apart. My shoulder had shooting pains. Both of my elbows started bleeding and didn’t stop for days; same with my index fingers and thumbs. I kept waiting for things to get easier and, well, I’m still waiting. Physical labor in wet, cold weather comes with its own challenges.

Once all the grapes had been picked, we began an intense cleaning process that involved a week of taking every piece of machinery apart, a lot of scrubbing, power-washing everything from the floor to the exteriors of tanks, climbing into crawl spaces that had been filled with rotting grapes and cleaning them out, and soaking everything in NaOH multiple times.

                                              Post-harvest deep cleaning of the equipment / During soutirage, gravity is used to filter out the fine lees.

One respite during this wind-down was daily tastings of each tank. Pauline said that in some years, all of the tanks have tasted almost identical, but that is not the case this year — I have often had to remind myself that I’m tasting components of adjacent parcels that will be mixed together to make one wine. It has been really fascinating to taste the evolution of these tanks; despite fermentation being over, they can really change (both for better and for worse) over a couple of days. Moreover, the conventional tanks taste quite distinct from the organic and sulfur-free tanks. Because fermentation is an inherently reductive process, reduction is a common note among many of the tanks, but usually blows off with some oxidation. The main reason for the daily tastings was to decide when to do décuvage, which is when all of the must is removed from the tanks. Extraction exists on a bell curve; after it peaks in terms of flavor, you should really décuve within the next day or so to avoid astringency and other undesirable flavors.

For décuvage, we pumped the wine into another tank, ventilated the original tank a bit, and then two people entered to clear out the must, which was pressed. Initially, we were so low on space, that we had to use the two tractor bennes, a big tub, and the picking machine to hold wine (we had run out of tanks a couple days before the end of harvest). This whole process takes hours and someone needs to stand guard near the tank in case anyone inside doesn’t feel well (it’s warm + you’re doing very physical labor for an hour + the air in the tank is full of CO2 and ethanol), to stop and start the pump, and to exchange forks for shovels. Pauline did one décuvage, but otherwise it was done entirely by men. I did not complain about the gender inequality!

The guys (or, as they’re known in French, les guys) would step over a pallet placed on top of the pump to get in and out of the tank. During harvest, this pump has a grille placed over it; but for décuvage, there is no grille as the must is too clumpy to pass through it. One night at the local bar, we heard about a nearby winemaker close to retirement who had been doing décuvage that week and fell into his pump and had to have both legs removed.

One afternoon, Pauline invited me to participate with her in the Tour de Cadillac. This is a multi-city tour to raise awareness for Cadillac’s red wine appellation, Cadillac Côtes de Bordeaux. All of the participating winemakers are paired with a local wine bar or cave and then one of the appellation members, who happens to own a vintage cadillac, drives the local journalist Benjamin Bardel, as well as some cinematographers, to each spot. There, Benjamin is met with some bloggers/influencers (who have raced the cadillac on scooters) and interviews the winemaker and the bar/store proprietor while everyone films it. Pauline and I arrived in Bordeaux and wandered down a very empty block to find our assigned bar. As it was her first time doing the Tour, she feared she had been given a bad spot, but it was actually quite nice. We had received a very specific time of 6:37 for when the cadillac would be arriving and, shockingly, it was late. When it did arrive, they parked down the block in front of a car mechanic, who immediately rushed out and wanted to talk about the cadillac with its owner. This conversation lasted longer than the official interviews. Benjamin Bardel is a fast talker who knows his camera angles. After they left, some friends of Pauline’s came and we hung out and poured for customers. An older woman stopped by and said she needed to drop her dog at home but would come back. Within minutes, she had returned and, without being invited to do so, pulled a chair up to our table. She even called out to a couple of her friends who happened to be walking across the street to sit down and join all of us. Subtle looks of surprise were exchanged at our end of the table, but we all chatted amicably and enjoyed the entertainment she provided.

                                                                    The Tour de Cadillac: local journalist Benjamin Bardel arrives in a vintage Cadillac.

In the long saga of “this winery doesn’t have enough space”, les guys spent last week breaking bottles of old, unsold Haut-Rian that had gone off and were taking up valuable space. Pauline had looked into whether it could be donated, but even in France, homeless shelters and food pantries don’t want old wine. Breaking a couple thousand bottles one-by-one was unfortunately the best solution that could be come up with. Meanwhile, the field work has started up again, with the installation of new wood and iron pickets. It’s very slow work and plentiful due to the havoc wreaked by the picking machine (or the reckless driving thereof, but I won’t name names). Like any endeavor, saving time and labor in one area only creates more in another.

Right now, the main tasks are soutirage (filtering) for the reds and collage (fining) for the whites and rosé. For soutirage, we use gravity to filter out the fine lees (the same way it’s been done for a couple hundred years) by setting up a hose at the top of what is essentially a wine-slide precariously set on top of a ladder, an A-frame scrap of metal, and a big basin. The wine slides down into the basin and is then sucked up by two other hoses and enters a different tank. Once we reach the fine lees, they are sent to another tank from which they will be collected for distillation. For collage, we use pea proteins that we circulate through the tank; they do a much better job than egg whites.

A few weeks ago, a former employee of the winery was visiting and les guys took one look at my stained pants and said, “this is Chloe. She works in the chai.”

A few weeks ago, we celebrated the 110th anniversary of the Cercle Populaire de Rions. Cercles are associative bars unique to Gascogne and were originally seen as a way to bring the Republic into your village (sans women and artists, who were not accepted until 2000 and minus talk of politics). Associative bars are also a way to offer alcohol and food at super low prices. I live literally on the other side of the wall from the Cercle in Rions and on a Friday night it is the spot to hang out (and for those wondering, there are, like, 3 places in town to choose from).

On Friday, we finally celebrated the end of harvest by visiting a local brewery for a tour and beer + cheese tasting, curated by a local cheesemonger. I arrived 3 minutes after the designated gathering time, but was one of the last to arrive. At this point, I am quite comfortable kissing everyone I interact with on the cheek, but there is still something so funny to me about walking into a room and having the festivities literally pause so that you can go around and kiss the cheeks of the 20 other guests. And it’s not only in social settings. Mechanics arrive at the winery and cannot commence their repairs until everyone has been kissed. While at the brewery, we couldn’t help but discuss wine. At a syndicate meeting earlier this week, it was announced that de-alcoholization would be allowed, under strict guidelines (the wine cannot be over 20%, cannot have been chaptalized, etc.). Because of the sun and heat this summer, high sugar levels arrived prior to full organoleptic/phenolic maturity, resulting in a difficult choice for winemakers of when to pick. Pauline recounted the story of being carded for buying a 5kg bag of sugar at the Costco equivalent in Cadillac last summer, in case she was illegally chaptalizing.

Even with some distance, the intensity of harvest is hard to comprehend. It feels like a total blur. But it also truly feels like I made something. As I’ve watched the leaves on the vines turn yellow and drop, I’ve felt so lucky that I got to participate in this annual conversation with nature.”

Chloë Schwartz

Our very own Chloë Schwartz left on June 25 for a 6 month internship at Château Haut-Rian, in Entre-Deux-Mers. Read the July 19 and August 16 posts for the beginning of her adventure!

“Hello from Harvest 2019!

It’s sticky and loud. Not just a marathon or a sprint, but a marathon of sprints! As intense as this period is, my days here have never been so rhythmic. 

The first day of picking was done by hand. We picked sémillon for a crémant with the team + three helpers (a real French tongue twister trio): Jules, Gilles, and Jean. The rows were so long that it took two hours to get through just one. Besides crémant and vin liquoreux (which will be a mix of late harvest and botrytis grapes), everything is picked by machine. 

For those unfamiliar (as I was), the machine sits on top of the vine and goes down the row, pushing the vines through its flaps and shaking off grapes in the process; to me, it most resembles a car wash. However, there’s also a feeling of severity with the machine harvest.  We’ve seen many escargots and lizards that have gone through both the picking machine and the destemmer and come out alive but traumatized. One parcel arrived with figs interspersed among the grapes, which I plucked off the conveyor belt and ate. 

This is the only time where everybody on the team is working together regularly and, because it’s just us, it definitely brings the group together. Everyone is incredibly nice, ridiculously so when you consider the stress and exhaustion inherent in harvest. It’s a very cooperative, genial work environment; nobody is too good for any sort of task.

What we all seem to do more than anything else is CLEAN. I spend about 6 hours a day cleaning. You would think that the brilliant minds who invented machines to transport, destem, and press juicy, sticky, seeded berries would have designed them with fewer nooks and crannies. If we don’t do a thorough enough job when we clean something like the press, the remaining grape bits will mold and the wine will have faults. It’s a given.

What follows is a description of white/rosé wine production:

My day starts at around 6 a.m. I go to work in the dark, while admiring the stars that are still out. While the first benne (bin) of grapes won’t arrive for a couple of hours, there’s plenty to do beforehand. 

There are two presses; one gets cleaned at night and the other in the morning. To clean them, we first remove the pressed skins. They are left in a pile outside to be picked up by a distiller who comes almost daily. Then I suit up in rain gear (boots, jacket, pants) and alternate between power washing and hosing the exterior and interior (with a healthy dose of scrubbing as needed). I climb inside the press while it’s still dark out and emerge to find it has become day and, despite the gear, I’m inevitably colder and wetter than when I arrived.

                                       Machine harvest (except for the Crémant and Liquoreux) / gearing up to clean up / early morning tractor fixing.

Other jobs for the morning include: jumpstarting finicky tractors (an ideal task for when it’s pitch black); rinsing any tanks we will be using that day; preparing a big tub of water we rinse our hands in throughout the day (it is dégueu by the afternoon); preparing the cuvon we use as a way-station (the pressed wine lands there before being pumped to its next tank); and measuring the temperature and density of the tanks that have started fermenting (as the sugar becomes alcohol, the density decreases and the temperature increases). 

It is encouraged to taste these in-progress tanks. What’s especially cool is that each tank’s fermentation is staggered by approximately 1-2 days, so I have the opportunity to taste the evolution of (e.g.) sauvignon blanc from juice to an almost cider/blonde beer and finally to wine. The initial juice is really delicious and vinous, with depth and nuance. In terms of harvest notes so far, it’s looking like an aromatic vintage for the whites. Pascal told me this is the juiciest year he’s seen on the job, which is surprising because it was such a dry, hot summer. 

One morning, Philippe, an oenologue with a lab we use (the menu of analyses that can be done on wine or grapes is truly astounding), came for a visit.  He was driven by his sister because, as the oenologue at a few wineries deeper into the Entre-Deux-Mers, he is constantly rushing between jobs and was caught speeding on country roads a few too many times. He had really interesting comments about the developing juice, the earthy vs. mineral nature imparted on the wine depending on the yeast catalyst used, and testing phenolic maturity of red grapes by munching seeds. The seeds should be brown (no longer green) and very nutty, with a bitterness specifically located in the back of the throat.  He took a 375mL bottle of Bordeaux Blanc juice with him and left.

When the grapes arrive, we guide the tractor backwards towards the chai, consistently saying “stop” instead of “arrêt” (I find it is easier to say “stop” the way they do, with a French accent). I mark down the time, size of the benne, press being used, and parcel name. On a good day, we can do approximately 8 bennes (approximately 4 hectares picked). When everything is lined up, we unleash the grapes. They travel up a conveyor belt (so that we can pull off any big sticks or other items that may be hard for the destemmer to handle) and then get destemmed and sent to the press. This task requires multiple people: at minimum, someone to open the “back door” of the grape-mobile onto the conveyor belt, someone to fill up wheelbarrows with the discarded stems and dump them once full, someone to manage the speed at which the berries are sent to the press, and at least two people to stand next to the action and chat. If we aren’t vigilant, any of these elements can overflow, which creates unnecessary drama. It is loud and sticky and grape bits are flying everywhere.  

After the tractor departs, there’s still work to be done. Throughout the day, we are measuring levels of sugar, total acidity, and SO2 in the pressed juice and samples of grapes that are arriving for maturity tests. SO2 is added to the newly pressed juice. Pressed wine is run through a refrigeration unit. Cold wine undergoes débourbage to get rid of the gross lees (every other day someone comes and filters the juice from the bourbes; Michel says it adds a lot of texture). Yeast is prepared for the commencement of fermentation. Presses are emptied and rinsed (for white wine, we fill the presses completely; for rosé, we leave them partially empty as this results in less color, which is something we are concerned about this year). As an experiment this year, we are separating the free-running rosé juice (the goutte) from the pressed juice. 

Another activity was introduced when Géraldine announced, “je vais chercher les fagots dans le discothèque”. Say quoi?? She came back from the building fondly known as the Discotheque with a neatly wrapped bundle of sticks. It turned out it was time to make fagots in their original meaning. They will be used to filter the red wine during délestage. Like so many tasks in the winery, this one is deceptively simple. We trim/clean up sticks and then organize them into tight bundles. On a good day, with two people working, we were only able to produce four. This might also have been because of the intense conversation we found ourselves in (with two more people who weren’t making bundles): why are there so few boulangeries around here and even fewer that are good! This conversation lasted thirty minutes initially and was then brought back up at lunch and the next morning during our coffee/pastry break. This break occurs at 9 or 10a.m. (if we aren’t too busy), when we are only halfway through the morning. The pastries are worst on Mondays when only a few bakeries are open and clearly none of the good ones!

                                        Grapes arriving / color develops in the rosé as the juice is pressed / fagots used to filter the red wine during délestage.

Harvest is an act of juggling; every day, a new ball is thrown into the mix. With that new ball comes myriad things to track, on a timeline different from all the other balls. It is intense. The entire year is riding on this one month and it is easy to slip up. Some mistakes, like thinking a press had been emptied and dumping a ton of grape skins onto the floor which then needed to be shoveled and wheelbarrowed out, are only costly in time and energy.  There are decisions to be made at every turn, but it is too early to know exactly how they will affect the final product.  All we can do is take detailed notes on our every move. And this is not to mention all of the other regular activities like assembling orders or making deliveries that still happen as though it’s any other time of year. 

Around 10:30/11, the only extra person taken on for harvest arrives. Bernard is a local in his 70s with a penchant for capris. A pinch hitter of sorts, his main activities are chatting, eating lunch, and driving the tractor a couple of times. He loves bananas and hates rice. 

I am usually sent to eat between 11 and 12. Sometimes the schedule allows us to all eat together, but oftentimes our eating is staggered. Isabelle, Pauline’s mother, makes a delicious, nourishing lunch for us every day of harvest. There is always an appetizer and main course followed by cheese (usually a plate of 3-4 different ones) then fruit then coffee. And wine. And bountiful amounts of bread, which practically replaces the need for a fork, spoon, or napkin.  Dishes have ranged from rabbit braised in mushrooms to beef cooked in a corked bottle of red wine (it had no impact on the deliciousness).

After the last benne arrives between 4 and 5, we start cleaning. I have yet to master the act of hosing without getting wet, which is something I’d like to change before it gets too cold. Everyone seems to have a favorite activity in this process; personally, I am quite partial to cleaning the de-stemmer (looks cool, bigger nooks). After the machinery for reception (the conveyor belt, de-stemmer, and juice pump) is cleaned and Pauline has finished cleaning one of the presses, we move everything out of the way. Then one person attaches a jet to one of the hoses used for wine and spray everywhere while everyone else grabs raclettes (squeegees) and pushes the water/juice/berry mixture out of the chai. This activity looks choreographed; it’s the final action of the day and it’s the golden hour, one last burst of energy and camaraderie so we can go home. I am home around 7:15, which is enough time to choose approximately one priority action (dishes, a shower, dinner) and one thing for pleasure before my bed beckons and I get to do the whole thing over again. 6 days a week. 

                                                                                                 Cleaning of the destemmer, the chai and the press. 

That is not to say that there isn’t time for enjoyment! Last weekend, Tallulah (note: Chloë’s sister ) was visiting and we drove to a local castle in disrepair. When we arrived, an older gentleman was hanging out in the doorway with his dog. We walked past him and he said, “what, you think it’s free to enter?” I explained that of course we wanted to pay but did not have the nuance to explain that he looked like just another visitor.  Then he asked where I lived and I said Rions, to which he replied that he thought I was going to say Bordeaux because I had a “petit accent”.  We are a 45 minute drive from the center of Bordeaux… clearly he does not leave his village often, but I will happily take that compliment.

And what of my massal selection?  I narrowed down my sample by 75% and did maturity tests on my top 25 vines.  Last week, I went to my parcel as the sun was rising and the fog from the Garonne (the nearby river, a main ingredient in noble rot) crept up through the vines.  I picked bunches from the 10 best looking ones (+1 bunch from an adjacent parcel of younger sémillon whose clone is known, to act as a control) and we hosted a tasting over the course of the day. Number of seeds, skin texture, grapefruitiness vs. general citrus notes (Pauline was interested in this aspect because she has always found the parcel to be quite grapefruity), bitterness, and overall favorite were all requested.  Unfortunately, I do not think I will have time to thoroughly analyze the data until the vendange is over, but I look forward to it.

Last Friday, I was asked to do a favor for a winemaking couple next door to us. They had forgotten about the tour that comes every Saturday and had plans to be away for the weekend. Yes, during harvest. So I led a tour of their winery on Saturday for a group of English speakers and checked the temperature of their in-progress juice. Despite the proximity, their soil had some major differences: there were oyster fossils in one area, left behind from when this region was under water 35 million years ago, and iron in another because it had once been a Roman iron mine. Pretty cool. Later that day, my landlord knocked on my door and asked if I wanted to come see his hundred-year-old press in action (which is on the floor beneath mine). Duh. Between those two and a little time at Haut-Rian, I ended up at 3 different wineries in one day, all without leaving Rions! 

                                                                                Start of the day at Haut-Rian, and tasting for the massal selection project.

One final note – Isabelle and Michel celebrated their 36th wedding anniversary last week. Knowing they came from winemaking families (in Champagne and Alsace, respectively), I asked about the timing of their wedding with regard to harvest. Isabelle sighed and said that when they got married, harvest never started before October. Now it’s already well underway. A one month shift in a third of a century. Scary.”

Chloë Schwartz

Did you know Ric Ocasek from The Cars was somehow connected to the birth of V.O.S. Selections?

“With the passing of Ric Ocasek on Sunday, I feel that I have to shout out my tremendous debt of gratitude to him and his band, The Cars.

By 1986, I was focused on the idea of moving to France and somehow getting involved in the wine business. By hook or by crook I knew this was the move I was destined to make. I had a free airline ticket to Paris after accumulating a lot of points flying back and forth from San Francisco to New York. I had contacted Stephen Spurrier who offered me an internship (ie non-paying) at his famous Paris wine bar/shop, the Caves Madeleine. Spurrier was still enjoying his reputation as a wine superstar-bad-boy for embarrassing the French 10 years earlier at the Judgement of Paris. My Belgian girlfriend’s mom had offered me her Daihatsu, a four-door sewing-machine with wheels that had no business being on the road (so terrible they never were sold in the USA) for my use while in Europe. What I didn’t have was enough money for meager day-to-day expenses that would take me to the vineyards of France.

I came up with the idea of sub-letting my studio apartment in Greenwich Village to make a few extra dollars, enough to get me started until I could find some employment in France. So I placed an ad in the Village Voice. Nothing. I placed another ad, and this very nice, very professional woman called me up and asked if she could see the apartment. She was a broker. I knew that subletting at a profit was not kosher, so I was very worried that somehow I would get caught out and my scheme would be ruined. But when she showed up, she got right down to business. She had been hired by the musical group The Cars to find housing for the entire entourage while they made an album at nearby Electric Lady Studios on 8^th Street. The Cars were at the height of their fame (though this would prove to be their last album, Door to Door). She didn’t negotiate. She just told me what they were “willing” to pay to house one of their sound engineers—$1500/month—and that it had to be open-ended until they finished the album, which could take months. I couldn’t believe my luck as I was only paying $350/month for my rent-controlled apartment and I had no interest in returning to New York for a long while.

I was in business! My boot-strap operation had pulled itself up and I was off to France to begin an adventure that would become V.O.S. Selections.”

Victor Schwartz

Our very own Chloë Schwartz left on June 25 for a 6 month internship at Château Haut-Rian, in Entre-Deux-Mers. Read our July 19 post for the beginning of her adventure!

“Bonjour Équipe V.O.S. !

Monday of last week (the 5th), I spent the day counting vers de la grappe (worms) in parcels of red grapes. I had visited many of these parcels just two days before, but over the weekend, véraison had occurred. After spending a month staring at lime green bunches, it felt magical to see a creep of purple arrive so quickly. 

Véraison marks the midpoint of ripening. In the past, vignerons would mark the arrival of véraison and start harvest 40-45 days later. According to Pauline, despite all of the scientific advancements to determine optimal ripeness for harvest, this timeline remains accurate. What about white grapes? The trick is to feel the bunch with your fingers. If the flesh gives a little when pressed, véraison is in progress. 

If you’re wondering about the worms – some parcels were more afflicted than others. Worm counting is harder than it sounds; you might find a hole in a grape but not a worm, or you gently pry open a perfect looking bunch and find an infestation. It requires a lot of concentration. The real blight of the summer, however, is sun damage. Not only are there sunburns on bunches and leaves, but many vines have grapes that are simply tiny due to the lack of water. Two canicules (heat waves) with no rain in between has made for a tough season. The rain that has come since has been so heavy that it doesn’t permeate the ground and can cause more harm to the vines than good. 

                                                               Vers de la grappe (worms) / véraison in progress / mandated 6am start during the canicule.

As we make our rounds through the parcels (the parcels are stretched across 5 villages: Rions, Béguey, Laroque, Capian, Cardan, & Soulignac), it is impossible not to notice the vast amount of public works projects happening in the area. There are crates of granite stacked along the roads. In fact, France is currently in the middle of a granite shortage because of municipal elections scheduled for later this year! All over France, incumbents are racing to put granite on their roadsides and complete a litany of public works projects before the elections. Last week, 3 new stop signs were installed along the route I take to work (a 7 minute walk). 

During the recent canicule, we were legally mandated to start work at 6 a.m. One morning, I was tasked with replacing the sulphur in the serpentines on top of the cuves. The (diluted) sulphur acts as a protective barrier for the wine while also enabling the wine to expand/contract in the tank. Just when I thought I was done, I was taken to a room full of tanks known as the Discotheque (in its former life, the building was a Discotheque; Pascal used to party there). Unlike the main room of tanks, which is naturally cool and has a catwalk, the Discotheque is not air conditioned and each tank has to be mounted individually by ladder (in this case with a bucket, beaker of sulphur, and wrench in hand). The tops of these tanks were steeply angled and had no guardrail, just a rope to hold on to. When I screwed off the serpentine to replace the sulphur on the tank I had decided was least scary, wine started overflowing everywhere (a stagiaire’s worst nightmare). In the heat, the wine had expanded, big time. I managed to screw the top back on just as I heard the bells strike noon. Ah lunch! When I returned an hour later, I was joined by Géraldine, the winemaker. Noticing how dirty the tops of the tanks were, we added a hose and sponge to the list of items hoisted up. So to repeat: it’s 100° (or more, since heat rises and we were on top of the tanks) and I’m standing on an angled surface, high off the ground and am expected to wet said surface and scrub it clean. Géraldine and I traded off between scrubbing the tops and removing buckets of wine from the bottoms of the tanks to prevent more overflow. 

The rest of the week was spent cleaning tanks in an even hotter un-air-conditioned room. Climbing in and out of cuves is impossible to do gracefully and resulted in some bruising. NaOH (which is used to dissolve tartrates) burned a hole in my boots and polka-dotted my t-shirts (the dissolved tartrates turn black in the presence of NaOH). 

                                                                            Sampling for the right blend / the cleaning of the tanks can be dangerous!

Finally, on the last day of the canicule, I got to participate in a non-physical task. A client had requested a Bordeaux blend that could be sold in supermarkets and we sat down with 8 tank samples to figure out the blend. First we tasted through the different samples, which included 1 tank of press wine and 2 that had seen oak. Tasting them as ingredients was hard! In one of the samples, Pauline noted a unique spiciness that I did not initially pick up on, but was noticeably present when added to the final blend. After we had shared notes on the initial samples, we chose favorites and created 6 blends of the same samples with different ratios. After we had figured out our preferred blend, we made a couple sample bottles so the customer could taste it. Note that our “preferred blend” was not necessarily our personal favorite, but chosen with the customer in mind. We blended a wine that would meet French supermarket shopper’s expectations of a Bordeaux.

While I had tried to write my notes in French, one of the samples was remarkably “savory” and I did not have a French word to describe that quality. This led to a long conversation on the topic because Pauline had heard the word but wasn’t sure exactly how it was used. The other night, at a dinner with a winemaking couple, the topic came up again. Fortunately, Pauline has mastered the concept and the two of us explained it in French. Then someone asked how I would describe the taste of the Muscat grape in English and I said grapey, which they loved. The real highlight of the evening, however, came at the end of the meal while we were drinking whiskey and discussing distillation. Sitting in Bordeaux, surrounded by locals, I was the one who reminded everyone of the difference between how Cognac and Armagnac are distilled. Needless to say, they were very impressed.  

Until next time!

Chloë”

Last month, 14 VOS team members signed up for the Plastic-Free July challenge, a global contest designed to encourage millions of people to refuse single-use plastic and be part of the solution to plastic pollution. A small change with an ambitious goal: protecting our oceans and wildlife, using less natural resources, fighting climate crisis and contributing to cleaner streets and communities. Here are some of their experiences. We hope they inspire you to take the challenge, whether this month or in November! To help you during your journey, go to the bottom of this post to download our 30 days of tips.
Register here: http://www.plasticfreejuly.org

Rebekah Kennedy
Did you inspire somebody else to take the challenge?
Yes, five friends. 
Plastic-free must-have?
Rubbermaid containers. I have them in different sizes, and they are perfect for bringing my lunch and snacks to work.
Was it easier than you thought?
Yes!

Steven Beckler
Achievement you are the most proud of?
That my wife yesterday said, “I feel guilty if I do not take enough reusable bags to the store”.  
Plastic-free must-have?
My stainless steel thermos that starts as a coffee container and moves to water container in the middle of the day.
Was it easier than you thought?
Yes, it just takes a bit more effort to reprogram yourself when most stores and restaurants haven’t given it much thought. Constant “no bag”, “no fork”, “no knife” and “no napkin, please!”

Jason Albaum
Achievement you are the most proud of?
As someone who had been drinking four cups of coffee a day, I took this opportunity to also switch from purchasing coffee to making it and bringing it each morning – I’m down to 2 cups a day. At first I complained about having one more thing to carry; but the Hydro Flask fits in my bag. I thought it would not stay hot, yet the flask keeps it hot all morning!
Plastic-free must-have?
My Hydro Flask! I don’t see it as an inconvenience anymore. I use it everyday and it has become an essential part of my routine.
Was it easier than you thought?
Yes. Once I made the commitment, I had no more minor excuses. It has also helped me beginning to scale down senseless purchases and waste in other areas.

Jazmen Greene
Achievement you are the most proud of?
Leaving the plastic bags behind – they are pretty wasteful. If I could chug along without them, I did. It wasn’t a perfect July, but I used far less than I normally do. It felt good!
Did you inspire somebody else to take the challenge?
My mother got on board with me. It made it easier to leave plastic behind. She stopped forgetting to use her reusable shopping bag —and now she prefers it!
Plastic-free must-have?
Glass containers for lunch. That’s a must. It’s better for the planet, and just better all around.
Any “weird” moment to share?
Putting fruit in my purse, I was sometimes left with “eau de fruit”! – or whatever else I had in there. At least I know what I ate the day before! And I wasn’t wasteful:)
What will you be working on in August?
I’m not sure yet, but I will be more conscious than I was before.
Was it easier than you thought?
Yes. I don’t use as much plastic as I thought I did, but it made me more aware of my consumption.

Victor Schwartz
Favorite plastic-free tip?
Library books! It’s actually a plastic-free/move-your-legs-exercise-your-brain-save-the-trees tip! I try to find books at the library rather than buying them new, but if have to, I support my local bookstores. I make a point to not order from Amazon: their packaging is so wasteful!

Joanna Dorsey, administrative assistant.
Plastic-free must-have?
The wooden utensils that were a Christmas gift from our shipping company.
Did you inspire somebody else to take the challenge?
We decided to go plastic free in my house.
What will you be working on in August?
Encouraging others to go plastic free -starting with a plastic free BBQ at our house this weekend.
Was it easier than you thought?
It was quite hard because I use a lot of hair products and body creams that come in plastic containers. I think the best thing to do when transitioning to plastic-free is to take small but deliberate steps that work for you. I’m also repurposing to reduce waste: my shea butter containers are perfect to hold paper clips or rubber bands, and my coconut oil jars can be used to carry lunch items.

John Grosso, Long Island sales
Plastic-free must-have?
My 20 oz. Yeti cup. It keeps my homemade iced tea cold throughout the day, even in the heat! I also carry a thermos for coffee, should I need a pick me up. I make my own lunch – the best way to avoid prepackaged food – and I transport it in a glass container.
Was it easier than you thought?
Yes, you just need to remember to bring with you everything you need. Planning ahead is key. I’m more cognizant now of the plastic I’m using.

To help you during your journey, click here: Plastic Free Challenge – V.O.S. Selections 30 days of tips

Our very own Chloë Schwartz left on June 25 for a 6 month internship at Château Haut-Rian, in Entre-Deux-Mers. After a few days in Paris and a long, hot, and epic train ride during which the air-conditioning broke, transforming the usually civilized TGV into a slightly less pleasant experience, she arrived in Rions. This small medieval village, population 1565 at the latest census, now gloriously boasts 1566 inhabitants and one New-Yorker.

“Greetings from the Entre-Deux-Mers, where it is very hot (90°…although it drops to the high 50s at night ) and very dry. I have spent most mornings over the last two weeks watering (arroser) the same young parcel of Petit Verdot and Cabernet Sauvignon (after the vines are two years old, watering is no longer allowed, except for that released by the field workers wink wink…). 

The tractor runs out of water after about 2 rows, so there is a 1:1 ratio of time spent watering and time spent waiting for the tractor’s return from the small reservoir back at the winery. Today, Pascal had just returned with the tractor and we had completed 1 row, when he announced it was 11:50am and we had to stop because he must have lunch at noon. He had to drive the tractor back to the winery by passing through the row we would have watered, but the 5 extra minutes it would have taken to water were no match for a 12pm lunch. 

Earlier in the week, I attended the réunion du syndicat, or appellation meeting, for the Entre-Deux-Mers, where everyone was talking about watering their young vines. Other topics discussed included a terroir study currently underway, whether it was allowable for a young person to take charge of the appellation Instagram (unclear, as he is not a full member of the promotion committee because nobody wants to give up their seat), the value of attending Vinexpo (also unclear), a glossy 20-second video that the appellation had produced advertising …nothing (clearly the promotion committee needs some young blood), and surprisingly little interest in the genealogy of old sémillon vines (an issue raised by Pauline – note: Pauline Lapierre, owner/winemaker at Château Haut-Rian), who is the only female member and one of three members under 50). It was exactly the way I imagined an appellation meeting would be, down to the man sleeping in front of me and the man next to me making side comments that everyone could hear. At the (of course) wine tasting afterwards, the subject of Bordeaux Bashing came up. The vignerons are frustrated because while they are technically in the same Bordeaux as the big châteaux, they feel closer to a winegrower in the Loire and feel that the dislike they receive is unwarranted.

          Pascal, behind the wheel, waters one row of young vines while Chloë, behind the tractor, waters the other one / the legendary Réunion du                                                                                  Syndicat / épamprage (pulling the lower level shoots off of the vines).

I’ve spent a lot of time this week hand-labeling bottles. One of Haut-Rian’s new customers is the #3 Pétanque player in the world, who uses his celebrity(?) to sell wine on the side. However, his clients will only buy wine if there is some sort of medallion on the bottle, and I had the pleasure of affixing the stickers (macarons), which came from a contest in Japan (and instead of coming in a roll or in groups of 6 or 12, came on little pieces of paper grouped by 5). Haut-Rian does not have an in-house bottling set up; a contractor comes to the winery and does it once a month or so. Last time this happened, they ran out of labels. I affixed three different labels to 8 pallets-worth of wine going to Texas and Germany this week. At one point, while carefully placing a “bee friendly” sticker, I noticed a dead bee lying on the floor. 

Besides the more robotic activities, I am working on a massal selection project on a plot of 90-year-old sémillon vines.  In a 22-row section, I have selected 100 vines to track over the coming months. I’m measuring everything from the width of the root and the number of shattered berries (coulure) to taste and vine shape. From the 100, approximately 10 will be selected and replanted. From there, the 10 will be studied and winnowed down to determine the best. 

     Counting the number of shattered berries (coulure) to select plants of old-vines Sémillon for a massal selection project / topping off the tanks /                                                                                                               grasshopper cooling off in a vine.

Currently there is one organic plot and Pauline plans to convert everything to organic in the coming years, as the writing is on the wall and the government is banning more and more herbicides and pesticides. Her biggest customer in France actually requested that she convert. She insists it has nothing to do with this exchange she heard at a wine store she was shopping at in Paris:

Person A: Should we get a Bordeaux?
Person B: No, that’s full of pesticides. Let’s get a Burgundy.

Harvest is predicted to begin (latest) the first week of September. First, they will hand-pick sémillon for a crémant they are making for the first time; then they will pick by machine for white, then rosé, and finally red. 

There is no work here that is not physical on some level, although épamprage (pulling the lower level shoots off of the vines) last week was a different kind of sore from the work in the cellar. The hoses (tuyaux) used to pump wine are incredibly heavy to pull around! The other day I spent over an hour squeegeeing tartrates out of a tank, which was both steamy and exhausting. It turned out that NaOH (Sodium hydroxide) does a better job at removing them than me, but the extent to which I needed to clean the tank had gotten lost in translation. 

Yesterday, we carried buckets (seaux) full of Bordeaux Blanc via ladder up to the catwalk and poured it into the tops of tanks. How much wine is wasted via sloshing?

             90+ year old vines of Sémillon that will be used for a massal selection project / carrying up buckets of Bordeaux Blanc to top off the tanks.

I have to say that my new coworkers are incredibly nice – and much quieter than a New York squad!, and I have been warmly welcomed, despite my thick American accent. 

If you’ve read this far, thank you so much! I could say so much more about life at a small winery (company bbq this week!) and in a small village, but I’ll save it for a subsequent message!

Cheers,
Chloë”

Photo courtesy of Aaron Thorp

We had not one but three (!) great meals at Origano Cibo e Vino, the charming restaurant owned by the Marangelli family in Minervino di Lecce, Puglia. Their bread is memorable, made with a 125 year old mother, and the chef graciously accepted to send us the recipe of their equally delicious Focaccia Pugliese. It is best enjoyed with a glass of Menhir Salento Pietra Rosato, a blend of Primitivo and Susumaniello with notes of orange blossom and white flowers. The combination will take you straight to Southern Puglia!

Focaccia con pomodorini e origano – makes 4 (10 to 12-inch) focacce

. 200 g mother yeast (alternatively, use 3gr Fleishmans Active Dry yeast or Saf-Instant Red dried yeast. Works fine!)
. 450 g Senatore Cappelli durum wheat re-milled semolina (semola rimacinata di grano duro)
. 250 g flour type 0 (can be found in Italian shops)
. 100 g potatoes
. 700 g warm water
. 80 g olive oil
. 20 g salt
. 5 g sugar
. cherry tomatoes as required
. 4 teaspoons dried oregano

Directions:

Put the mother yeast, the durum and the flour into a bowl and start kneading, (if using dry yeast, mix 350g of warm water, 3g dry yeast and 5g sugar in a small bowl and wait for it to start bubbling, then add to the flours). You can use a kneader, a mixer or knead by hand. When the dough becomes hard and irregular, leave it to rest for 40 minutes.

In the meantime boil the potatoes for about 40 minutes. Leave the potatoes to cool, then peel and mash them with a potato masher.

After these 40 minutes add the potatoes and the rest of the water (350 gr) to the dough. You should add the water slowly and gradually. Add the salt and at the end the olive oil. Then knead the dough and be careful not to warm it up too much.

When the dough is ready, put it into a food container and leave it to rest for two hours.

After this time, divide the dough into 450 g pieces (or 4 equal pieces if you used the dry yeast) and leave them to rise for the entire night in the fridge at 6 degrees Celsius (42.8F).

The day after, remove the pieces of dough from the fridge and leave them at room temperature for 2 hours. Stretch the dough with your hands and put them in greased baking dish/es. Use plenty of oil to stretch and grease the baking dish. Cut in half the cherry tomatoes and put them on the focaccia by pressing them down a little. Sprinkle with coarse salt and put the baking dish/es into the oven. Cook at 210 degrees for about 25 minutes. At the end of cooking, sprinkle with dried oregano. Enjoy!

VOS team left New York barely a few minutes into Thursday, to arrive in Beirut after a 4 hour layover in Istanbul and shortly before the day was over. We reached our apartments on Armenia Street, in the hip and lively neighborhood of Mar Mikhaël, and quickly put our luggage down to properly greet Lebanon (and Friday) with a taste of local beer. It was almost midnight but everybody was out and enjoying a balmy evening.

A few hours later, after a quick breakfast/café au lait on the terrace of Bar Tartine, we took the Beirut–Damascus “highway” to the village of Ammiq, where Domaine des Tourelles vineyards are located. The Syrian refugee camps encountered on the way were a sobering reminder of the effects of Civil War in neighboring Syria – close to a 1 million Syrian refugees are currently in Lebanon, whose total population is just over 4 million.

The mostly dry-farmed Domaine des Tourelles vineyards are in between the Lebanon (left pic) and Anti-Lebanon mountains – right pic, with Syria and the Damascus plain to the East.

Faouzi Issa, owner and winemaker, was waiting for us there. That’s how much he loves his vineyards!

And we LOVED being there:) Faouzi talked about organic farming, the drought challenge of 2015 – which destroyed 70% of the harvest and prompted him to install drip irrigation, only to be used if such conditions occurred again, his love of Cinsault – “the Pinot Noir of the Bekaa”- and how it was perfectly suited to the hot and dry climate of the Bekaa Valley.

We then drove to the winery, smack in the middle of the town of Chtaura (30 miles South East of Beirut) and impossible to guess from the outside.  We saw the grapes being sorted for the Arak production, and tasted several tank samples – Viognier, Chardonnay and Muscat – destined to be used in the Bekaa Blanc and Marquis des Beys cuvées.

Mr Brun’s old office, where he would relax during harvest, has been left intact and is Faouzi’s favorite room – and a glimpse into the past.

That’s where part of the anise seeds bags are kept – in 2015, Faouzi started to grow his own anise out of Deir el Ahmar, a village in the district of Baalbek.

The Arak production has been continuous since 1868, and the traditional copper alembics are still used for the (triple) distillation, made from estate grapes. The Arak is then aged one to 5 years in old clay jars. It was extremely difficult to extend the production, as new clay jars were needed, and very few people still practiced the craft. Faouzi was able to convince an older gentleman, who was in his early seventies and happened to be the producer for the Le Brun jars, to restart his production and teach his skills to a new generation.  

The distillation process is overseen by Michel Baaklini, who has been with Domaine des Tourelles for over 26 years.

We then tasted several barrel samples for the reds: the Cinsault 2017, which Faouzi says is their best vintage to date, elegant yet powerful with lovely notes of cherry, an on-the-spot blending of what will be the 2016 Syrah du Liban – silky and classic – and another blend from four barrels that will be the Marquis des Beys 2016: savory, spicy, powerful. Another winner was the tank sample of Tempranillo, which will go into the Bekaa Rosé: a gorgeous juice full of pomegranate, guava and strawberry. We’re ready to jump on this cuvée as soon as it arrives, even in the dead of winter!

On the way back, Faouzi showed us the work-in-progress for a Maison d’Hôtes. After this great tour, we were ready for lunch! The table was set by the hundred year old tilleul (linden tree), under which all important things are discussed.

Christiane, Faouzi’s sister, was the host of this feast, that ended with a taste of Oranjaline, the fabulous Triple Sec liquor they produce from up to ten different citrus fruit.

That was the end of lunch, but just the beginning of our trip! Over the next few days, we would discover the Cedars of God in Bsharri, visit the spectacular Jeita Grotto, enjoy a leisurely lunch in the water at Jammal, a quaint restaurant in Batroun, admire the extraordinary ruins of Baalbek, with their enigmatic megalithic stones, and savor some great cocktails in Beirut.

A heartfelt thanks to Domaine des Tourelles and their team for the wonderful memories!

“The 100-mile drive from Les Riceys to Pouilly-Sur-Loire is one of the most beautiful in France, over the rolling farmland of the Morvan. It follows the Kimmeridgian belt and in fact goes right through Chablis (we waved as we drove past Jean-Pierre Grossot). The terroir connection of these wines, Côte des Bar – Chablis – Pouilly-Fumé, is evident. Terroir trumps variety.

Covering a wide range of a region really informs a lot as to trends and challenges. One thing we saw on this trip from Champagne through the Loire is the fungus known as Esca. The fungus gets inside of a root and kills it. Besides a labor intensive “root canal” the only other solution is pulling out the entire root and replanting—a heartbreak when you have a beautiful old vine. Esca is particularly prevalent among Sauvignon Blanc so it is a bigger problem in the eastern Loire. Another recent issue is due to global climate change. Vineyards that were never frost prone are now getting damaged by late-season freezes. Windmills can be a solution though they are very expensive and not mobile. A positive trend is the move towards larger barrels, especially the 400 liter size. This allows the wine to be less oak-impacted than smaller barriques but still benefit from barrel-aging.

JEAN PABIOT

Alain Pabiot, son of Jean, calls his estate Domaine des Fines Caillottes to distinguish themselves from all the other Pabiot cousins in town making wine. Pouilly-Sur-Loire is a wine town and nothing but; there isn’t even a café. It is surrounded by the vineyards that flank the Loire River and contain four distinct types of limestone: Bavois, Kimmeridgian, Villiers and Caillottes. These vineyards lie almost directly across the Loire from Sancerre but the wines have a very different character due to the differences in exposure and soil. We arrived just before the flowering, which was consistent across our entire trip. The vignerons were a bit on edge because along with the imminent expectation of flowers, there was also the expectation of some rough weather, which could hurt the crop before it even has a chance. Floraison is one of the very critical periods in a vineyard.

Alain’s son Jérôme is becoming an important factor in the operation, so we were glad to have him along on our vineyard tour. They don’t want green, vegetal wines, so they work hard in the vineyard to achieve balanced ripeness through leaf-pulling and shoot-training. Depending on what the vintage brings them, they may pull leaves on one side of the plant to bring in more sunshine or the opposite side to reduce exposure and slow down ripening. The latest challenge brought about by climate change is severe frost damage in parcels that have traditionally never been affected. To counter this they have bought seven wind machines (made in Seattle) at $55,000 a pop. They are very effective with each machine covering around 5 hectares. They avoid frost in two ways: drying the grapes and bringing warmer air down to the level of the fruit. They kick in automatically at 35 degrees.

In their very tidy cellar, dug under a number of houses in town, we started by tasting a 2017 Pouilly-Sur-Loire made of 100% Chasselas. The vines are 100 years old and the wine was fruity and charming with a vein of minerality running through its center. Delightful.

Next was their mainstay, the 2017 Pouilly-Fumé. This is a bold expression of Sauvignon Blanc, ripe but perfectly balanced. The 2017 exhibits tropical aromas, with top notes of pineapple. A warm vintage but there is no lack of freshness in this wine.

The 2016 Pouilly-Fumé, also from a warm vintage, showed mineral and floral aromas, with a palate more on the tree fruits like peach and apricot. The fruit was more in the background than with the 2017 and was more complex, most likely due to a year of additional bottle age.

The Cuvée Prestige has been replaced with a wine they are calling Kiméride in the 2015 vintage. The name derives from the fact that the grapes for this cuvée come exclusively from parcels of Kimmeridgian soils. This wine is even bigger, broader and more powerful than their normale bottling. It also has a stronger sense of acidity. Pabiot explained that was due to the fact that this wine has higher tartaric acidity even though it actually has lower overall acidity than the regular bottling. The wine is delicious and is clearly built to age. A fascinating and complex expression of Loire Sauvignon Blanc.

The 2015 Cuvée Séduction was an experimental idea of Jérôme’s. It takes Loire SB in another direction but is very successful for what it is. The wine is left on its lees in barrel and exhibits a leesy character in aroma and flavor. There is a roundness and creaminess about the wine which at first turned me off but then grew on me. The wine is not at all about the primary fruit but rather the complexity and secondary qualities that are locked up in Sauvignon Blanc. The jury is out.

JEAN-PAUL PICARD

We crossed over the river in a northwesterly direction to head to the hamlet of Bué in the appellation of Sancerre. Sancerre gets knocked, or lauded, for its diversity of soil types. Certainly from a commercial perspective, they are the big players in the area and everyone wants to knock them back a few notches. There are 300 vignerons in Sancerre with 150 putting wine into bottle. Picard is one of my oldest suppliers so the welcome is always warm. Young Mickaël Picard now runs the domaine, but I started 28 years ago with his father Jean-Paul, still extremely fit as he climbed their cherry tree to grab handfuls for our guests. He is always light-hearted with a constant smile. Noëlle, Jean-Paul’s wife, has run things at the winery as well as been involved in local politics. She has been the mayor of Bué for the past 10 years. Noëlle is the backbone of the operation.

The difference between Jean-Paul and Mickaël represents the difference in generations of winemakers, father being mostly self-taught, the son more broadly schooled, trained and traveled. Mickaël brings a serious rigor to his work, combined with a deep connection to his terroir. He uses indigenous yeasts for his wines, which he explains makes the wine take longer to develop.

We immediately drove over to the Loire River where Captain Sylvain and his dog Nale greeted us on the boat he built by hand. The entire Picard family were our wonderful hosts and led us through a tasting of their wines. Mickaël bought and planted vines in Menetou Salon a number of years ago so we started with a very fresh 2017 Menetou Salon Blanc. Mickaël uses the same clone of Sauvignon Blanc in Menetou as he does in Sancerre. Due to the fact that these were rather young vines the wine was very direct and simply tasty.

“We began at Orly Airport and drove east, covering a large backwards “C” of mostly Kimmeridgian limestone vineyards in Champagne and the Loire Valley. We traversed over 1600 miles and visited 17 wineries.

Champagne impresses with its wide range of terroirs, styles, wine types and domaine sizes. Most wineries make a variety of wines, creating different blends and quality levels. Despite this wide diversity, many people—both trade and consumers—tend to lump all Champagne into a single category. This is an error; it misses out on the significant nuances of these brilliant wines and diminishes the importance of terroir in the region. My guess as to why: it is in the interest of the Grands Marques to downplay terroir and to promote House Image/Style. These large operations need to gobble up fruit from all across the interesting micro-climates of Champagne in order to produce the 100s of thousands of cases each year they need to supply their vast supply chain. This mentality is in direct contrast to the single estates we work with that connect directly with their terroir and try to express it in each cuvée.

BARON-FUENTE

Our first stop was in the Marne Valley, where they were celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the important battle of the Marne: the decisive allied victory which helped bring WWI to a close.

Baron Fuente owns 50 HA and buys another 100HA worth of grapes. This is a good-sized operation, producing 150,000 cases of Champagne/year. Ignace Baron runs the operation. His mother, Dolores Fuente, is of Spanish origin. He is the 3rd generation winemaker of Baron Fuente. His mother came from Spain and met Gabriel Baron. They married in 1961 and created the estate in 1967.
The Chante-Manche vineyard is 100% chardonnay. 8600 vines/HA dense Chablis training goes into their Blanc de Blancs.Champagne must be hand-harvested by appellation rules.
Pinot Meunier starts its development later which is good for this area as that way there is less risk of frost damage. Also, PM takes less time to ripen. It’s the Merlot of Champagne, though it oxidizes easily.
Here they employ sur lattes 36 to 96 months. By law, just 15 months is required.
In gyro-pallette there are 504 btls/cage, each bottle disgorged manually. A good worker can do 2500 bottles per hour; that is less than 1.5 seconds per bottle!

We tasted a wide range of wines, here are the standouts:

Brut Tradition is 70% PM, 30% Chard, 2 years sur lattes. Very Meunier, big forward fruit.
Extra Brut Grande Reserve with its low dosage was a standout for its balance and complexity. 3 years sur lattes, 60% PM, 40% Chardonnay.
Brut Grande Reserve has a dosage of 9 grams/litre is an easier drinking version of the Extra Brut. While the Extra Brut stands out in complexity this wine excels in fresh fruit.
Millesime 2009 is a terrific vintage Champagne. Disgorged last November, 45% Chardonnay, 40% PM and 15% PN. Balanced and complex with long, flavors of brioche.
Grand Cru, a very harmonious Champagne noted for its roundness and range of flavors.
These are well made, accessible wines, if a bit rustic. PM is the important grape here and it works well. They do best when they stick to this grape in a blended wine.
7, called such because it rests on the lees for 7 years. It is the domaine’s top wine and deservedly so. An elegant wine with notes of brioche, it is a wonderful combination of power and finesse. Disgorged last October.

CLAUDE CAZALS

We were all taken aback when we met the ebulliently charming Delphine Cazals in front of her house in the Côtes des Blancs; she seemed to be equally excited to meet us as well. Actually, her house is attached to the winery and we literally walked through what looked like a secret door of her kitchen into her winery. Very convenient for dinner parties I imagine, when another bottle is needed quickly.

Cazals is a small family operation; Delphine’s mother lives in the Château inside the Clos de Cazals. Her grandfather was Catalan, hence the name, same as the renowned cellist, Pablo Casals (pronounce the “s”). This RM owns 10HA and produces 5-6 thousand cases/year. Delphine’s father was a very talented tinkerer and invented the gyropalette in 1969, which has now become the accepted standard for riddling bottles in Champagne. The Clos Cazals is the largest of the 21 clos in Champagne at 3.7 HA. It was planted in 1957, years after Olivier Cazals bought the house from United Nations Founder and Nobel Peace Prize winner Léon Bourgeois. However, it was Delphine who noticed that this walled-in vineyard was consistently their best, obtaining a full degree higher than their other parcels, so she petitioned the Comité to have this vineyard designated a clos and won the right for her 1995 vintage. She was especially proud because no one else in the family supported her efforts. The Clos Cazals is divided in two parts with the oldest vines in the Clos Cazals and the younger vines—about 25 years of age—in the Chapelle du Clos, a parcel which surrounds an ancient chapel on their property.

The Cuvée Vive is all from 2011 though not marked on the label. 3g dosage means it is an Extra Brut and is a blend of fruit from Oger plus some young vines’ fruit from the Clos. This vibrant wine is 100% Grand Cru and represents the second level of their Champagnes.

We then tasted a Millesime 2009, a beautiful wine from a great year for Champagne. Yeasty notes mixed with flowers and pear—supremely elegant. The wine was disgorged just last July, so it spent a significant amount of time sur lattes. It is round and flavorful with a very long finish. 7g dosage. There are only 80 cases left in her stock. A vintage must be declared during the tirage (sur lattes period); 2011 will not be a declared vintage. Delphine says that she is searching for the differences in her cuvées, that she is not trying to create a uniform house style like the Grande Marques. However, I must say that there is a definite connection amongst her wines. Their vibrant, pure fruit that is a clear expression of the Côte des Blancs. The wines are accessible yet still show layers of complex flavors so they work on many levels of pleasure, both visceral and cerebral.

We then tasted a few back vintages of her Clos wines, all made Extra Brut. She only produces about 250 cases/year of this cuvée. We were wowed by each wine, though each was as different as the vintages which produced them.

The 2006 Clos Cazals had 5g of dosage and exhibited a palate of flavors that was both honeyed-rich and ephemeral, light as a feather with a finish that went on forever. 10% of this cuvée was raised in barrel.

The 2005 was a warmer year and exhibited broader, more powerful flavors if not as complex as the 2006. It received a Gold Medal at Vinilies, a prestigious, winemaker-judged competition. The dosage was lower than the 2006, around 3g, which kept the wine lively on the palate. It is a wine that grows in the glass.

The vintage of 2003 was marked by extreme weather conditions in France: exceedingly hot and dry. This wine exhibits very ripe fruit, as one would expect for the vintage, but due to the old vines, it is clean with good balancing acidity. Because of the ripeness of the fruit, the dosage was kept to a low 2.5 g/l.

BENOIT LAHAYE

When we arrived in the small town of Bouzy, Benoît Lahaye suggested we drive straight to his vineyards. This is the focus of 99% of his efforts so it only made sense to start here. Lahaye is all about seeking out and expressing the terroir of each cuvée. The first thing you notice when walking among his vines is how vibrant and alive they look; the leaves gleam and shoots stand tall. These are very healthy plants being very well tended. Benoît showed us how to identify Pinot Meunier by the white leaves at the top of the vine tendrils. His vineyards are filled with old vines planted by his family, generations back. His father planted the vineyard we were walking in 66 years ago by massal selection, so that all of the grape varieties are mixed and interplanted. Benoît employs Chablis pruning with three canes. He noted that the soils in Bouzy are compact, making it difficult to plant. Of course, as this village is 100% Grand Cru, the effort is well worth it.

Benoît is a man who never stops working; he needs to as the operation is virtually a one man show. We were grateful that he squeezed us into his busy day, as he was scheduled to spray a natural treatment that evening. Champagne is wet and rain is his #1 challenge, one of the reasons it is so difficult, and rare, to work organically in Champagne. Over the course of April, May and June, he may need to spray up to 16 times, and each time lasts around 6 hours to cover all of his vineyards. Tonight he will start at 6PM and finish at midnight. Benoit showed us the two treatments: infusions, like teas. The first one was made from long aged fresh nettles, which smelled something like the sewer on a mid-summer day. The other was made from a blend of dried chamomile, nettles and something called reine des prés (meadowsweet). We actually drank the latter, and it was delicious. He blends these two together and sprays his vines to protect them. When you see this kind of hard work up close, you can appreciate the cost and challenges of working biodynamically.

We returned to his beautiful, simple, tasting room/ aging cellar to review his lineup. We noticed some amphorae which he had mixed feelings about. He said they worked much better for certain wines than others.

Brut Nature is 90% Pinot Noir and 10% Chardonnay all grown on chalk soils. Base wine is from vintages 2012, 2013 and 2014. Lahaye has always worked with indigenous yeasts, but now he is working smarter and more sure-footed by making a yeast “mother” (think of bread) 2 weeks before the harvest from a select parcel of his vines. He adds this mother to the fermentation (all of his fermentations take place in barrel now). The wines rest in barrel until the following July at which point reserve wines are added and the wine is prepared for tirage (sur lattes). The Brut Nature is a bold wine, with big Pinot Noir fruit and great acidity. There is so much fruit that you do not at all miss the dosage. This is the brilliance of organic farming: earlier and organoleptically ripe/mature fruit that is perfectly balanced. Throughout this trip we kept hearing about the challenges of global warming; it seems that organic farming has some of the answers to the current problems for vignerons.

Blanc de Noirs is another bold expression of pure Pinot Noir fruit. The low dosage of 3-4g attests to the ripeness and balance of the fruit at Lahaye’s vineyard.

Blanc de Blancs is a new cuvée for Lahaye as he decided to no longer make the Naturessence (one of my favorites). He took this decision from a sense of “terroir purity”; it struck him as wrong to blend terroirs. This Blanc de Blancs is made in the same style as his other wines, broad and powerful yet with pure fruit delineation. He makes this wine without any additional sulfites from a vineyard in Voipreux, on the very limits of the Côte des Blancs between Vertus and Mesnil-sur-Oger. The clay soils give this wine its power and style, so Lahaye has truly achieved his goal of a pure terroir wine. The base wines were from 2014 and 2015.

Violaine is one of Lahaye’s micro-production beauties. 2014 base wines and zero dosage and no sulfur. It is a 50/50 blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir from the chalky, rocky soils of Tauxières, where there isn’t any topsoil—just rock. Not surprisingly this is an intense, dense, mineral-driven wine that takes some time to open in the glass. He finds that without the addition of sulfur, the wines exhibit more purity.

Jardin de la Grosse Pierre is the other gem he produces in ridiculously small quantities, just 100 cases per year. The name is apt as the wine does come from a “garden” interplanted with numerous ancient varietals, many no longer found, against a base of Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier and Chardonnay. He officially declares the following varietals but he discretely mentions that there are others no longer allowed by the INAO: Arbanne, Chasselas, Gros Plant, Petit Meslier, Pinot Blanc and Teinturier. The mousse is fine and persistent, the flavors complex and the finish never-ending.

The 2007 Extra Brut was recently disgorged and comes from a southwest exposition single parcel, Le Mont Tauxières. It is interplanted in the ancient way with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. A very expressive wine with layers and layers of complex flavors going from mushroom, forest floor, a bit of pine leading to pine-lemon notes. A very long finish. Fascinating.

The 2002 Blanc de Noirs was an interesting trip. The presence of red-berry fruit was so forceful that if you closed your eyes you would think that you were drinking a red wine. Delicious.

Next up was his Rosé de Macération from the 2015 vintage. Lahaye likes how the amphorae interact with his Rosé Champagnes. Half of this wine was raised in amphorae, the other half in barrel. Lahaye employs whole-cluster fermentation. The wine comes from a single parcel called Le Julien which is not particularly good for red wines but perfect for Rosé. The wine is lighter in color than when he raised 100% of the wine in barrel, with an emphasis on the savory characteristics. Very vinous, as is typical of the Rosé from Lahaye.

And finally, we got to taste three vintages of his still red Bouzy Rouge. He always makes a very serious rendition of this wine and it was a treat to taste back-to-back-to-back vintages, the 2014, 2015, and the 2016, which he handled in a very different way. First, we tasted the 2016 which is not yet in bottle. It was fermented in amphorae and was simply gorgeous as it jumped out of the glass with juicy red-berry flavors. Succulent and round, open-knit structure. 100% destemmed. 2016 was the first year he used amphorae for this cuvée and it was a real success; Lahaye feels he will continue in this mode for his still red. He was extremely happy with the results, as were we. The 2014 and 2015 were more classically structured, dense and dark wines that are lovely today but will certainly benefit with time.

BERNARD TORNAY

It was really nice for winemaker/owner Rudy Hutasse to open the winery for us on a Sunday, Mother’s Day in France. Rudy is married to Nathalie Tornay, who is very involved with the operations of the winery. Rudy made wine for 17 years at Laurent Perrier, so he brings a very high level of professionalism and consistency to the task of crafting Champagne. He loves showing off his “toys” in the winery and makes the most of them, making a number of micro-cuvées. The Tornay winery produces 3 Grand Cru cuvées and 7 1er Cru wines from their 22 HA of vines. Like everyone we met in Champagne, except for Benoît Lahaye, he sells off a portion of his crop each year. This is good for both quality and cash flow. He makes about 8,000 cases per year and holds back 20% of his wines each year for Reserve wines.

It was a pleasure to taste the Carte d’Or here, a wine we have stocked for years, a blend of Grand Cru and 1er Cru vineyards. It is 70% Pinot Noir and 30% Chardonnay with 8g dosage. This wine is a clear representation of the house style: accessible fruit, clean, bold flavors with an emphasis on Pinot Noir.

The Reserve Champagne comes from the 2006 vintage and the longer age shows beautifully in the wine, with rich, brioche flavors, medium finish. Well crafted.

We jumped to another quality level with the Millésime 2008, which received one of my highest scores at this tasting. Turns out the judges at Vinalies agreed, giving this wine a Silver Medal. 50/50 Pinot Noir/Chardonnay, the wine has excellent balance and a long finish. The wine rested sur lattes for 9 years, developing an incredible flavor profile.

The Palais des Dames was the winner of the day, just nosing out the 2008. Makes sense as this was Mother’s Day after all. An equal mix of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir from Bouzy and Ambonnay (the town next to Bouzy), this wine is a blend of 2005, ‘06, ‘07 and ‘08.

We finished the day with a brilliant 2002 Vintage. This Champagne won a Gold Medal at Vinalies and had all the great qualities of an aged wine.

ALEXANDRE BONNET

From Tornay we took the long, 100 mile drive south to the Côte des Bar in the Aube Department. We made a lunch stop at the ancient town of Troyes and visited the Cathedral where Joan of Arc stopped with Charles, future king of France, on their way to Reims for his coronation. Quite a beautiful, Gothic pile of rocks.

We met winemaker Alain Pailley at the winery in Les Riceys, one of the most important villages of the Côte des Bar. Here they have the unusual appellation for a still Rosé, of which Bonnet is the largest producer. Alain is super fit, a marathon trekker (200km at a clip), and has been the winemaker at Bonnet since 1985, defining the house style of minerality, power, and purity of character. He vinifies plot-by-plot and prefers low-temperature fermentation. He eschews oak in order to bring forth the pure aromas and distinctiveness of each plot, which a barrel may hide. The region is more prone to frost than in the north, so the best vineyards, like Bonnet’s, are on the hillsides high above the Laignes River. The Bar was traditionally colder than the Côte des Blancs but now it swings back and forth with global climate change. This year, the vineyards are a week ahead of normal and they expect to harvest early. Since 2000, five harvests have started in August; previously it was un-heard of to start before mid-September. Instead of the typical 100 days from flower to harvest, they seem to be successful with 90 days. This was a story we heard repeated throughout our trip, both in Champagne and the Loire. The vignerons can accomplish this through better vineyard management and it seems to be working. Pailley employs a process called HVE, Haut Valeur Environmental, a system that takes the entire ecosystem of the vineyard into account including the areas around it. The idea is to reinvigorate the entire region, not just the vineyards, and to lower the overall carbon footprint. Champagne is a leader of HVE but we did see domaines in the Loire also following this practice.

The region has an interesting history since it is geographically separate from the rest of Champagne, actually much closer to Chablis with the same vein of Kimmeridgian limestone in its soils. Though Troyes was the historic capital of the Champagne region, it was excluded from the appellation at the turn of the last century. This led to bloody riots in 1910 in which wineries were burned down and a thousand citizens died when the army was called out. This happened in spite of the fact that the Champagne houses in the north were buying plenty of grapes in this region to put into their sparkling wines. In 1927 the Côte des Bar finally became accepted as part of the Champagne region.

We drove to the La Forêt vineyard, which contains the oldest Pinot Noir vines on the estate, used for their Rosé de Riceys and the Blanc de Noirs old vines. The vines root down a full 26 feet here. We all gathered around a picnic table in front of a “cadole” to taste through the Champagnes. A “cadole” is a traditional stone hut that was built for vineyard workers. You find these kinds of small structures in vineyard regions throughout Europe. What made this structure so interesting is that it was built like a Trulli, the beehive stone structures that are found throughout Puglia.

We tasted through a dozen of their cuvées (and we had even more at dinner that night in the charming vaulted basement of Le Marius Hotel). In general, Pailley likes a generous 8-10 g of dosage in his wines, giving them an ease and accessibility with rounded fruit flavors balanced by a pure minerality. For me the standouts were:

Harmonie – a 50/50 Pinot Blanc/Chardonnay blend that makes for a delightful aperitif; fruity but dry and fresh.

Noir Extra Brut – 50% from the 2013 vintage and the rest reserve wines. Only 3-4 g dosage. This is a parcel selection of best Pinot Noir vines. Low sulfites.

Grande Réserve Brut – 85% PN, 15% Chardonnay. Big and balanced.

Millésime 2010 – an exceptional wine that had 5 years of tirage, and was disgorged in 2016. There was terrific energy to this wine with a long finish. Elegant.

Noir Extra Brut Rosé – old vines Pinot Noir with just 3g dosage, it had the perfect balance of fruit. Also a great package.

Rosé de Riceys 2014 – this is a rosé that benefits from time but right now this wine is perfection.

We tasted some wonderful wines out of Magnum that evening, but I was too busy playing snooker with Alain after we broke into the hotel’s bar to write any notes!”

Victor Schwartz

“We had a 6:30AM departure from San Francisco to catch a flight to San Luis Obispo, locally known as Slo. This was our gateway to Paso Robles (just call it Pass-oh because they mangle the last word into Robils which no right-minded person wants to say). We arrived to the first hot day of the trip, and this is one of the warmest viticultural areas we were visiting. Paso is the last part of California, heading south, in which the mountains run north-south, effecting a solid barrier to the cool Pacific breezes and keeping the internal hillsides rather warm. As you go south of Paso, the coastline hangs a Ralph and the mountain ranges start running east-west, allowing the cool ocean winds to funnel into the valleys. Though near each other, you could not have more diametric weather conditions than between Paso and the Santa Barbara-area vineyards.

McPrice Myers is a solid man making solid wines. We drove straight up to his vineyard which he is very proud of and started with a 2014 Blanc de Blancs. Only 3g of dosage and if the blistering heat and dust weren’t enough, this wine ripped out any remaining mucous from my tongue. The rest of the group appreciated this wine more than I did and liked the fact that he went for such a daring style. I dare you to drink a bottle.

But the vineyard is gorgeous; at 2,000 feet above sea level, this is one of the highest vineyards of the region. Mac likes to use whole cluster fermentations and he varies the amount in his various bottlings, of which he makes many. Mac is ambitious and many times he hits the mark. I would say this was easily the best group of wines of his I’ve tasted, trading in a lot of what I found overly sweet into savory characteristics. He and his wines are maturing.

The 2016 Terres Blanches is made with 38% Viognier but it surprisingly doesn’t take over the wine. It is really a lovely white. Then we had a 2017 Clairette from tank, lively young and round. It will be blended into the 2017 Terres Blanches with the Grenache Blanc, subbing in for the Viognier. Yay! Then a 2017 Viognier, big and fat and more fat, what you would expect from this grape in this location.

To the reds. 2017 Grenache from a single vineyard raised in a concrete fermenter (he is very proud of his new toy installed just last year). Concrete is a very useful fermentation tool in these hot climes as it is good for maintaining steady temperatures. Then a 2017 Grenache from the Paper Street vineyard. This was destemmed and raised in a puncheon, high toned with cocoa notes. Over the course of a long tasting, this vineyard proved to be one of the best. The next wine, from the Shadow Canyon vineyard, was 50/50 whole cluster and was the most complete of the red Grenaches. The Syrah from Luna Mata was a monster of tannins with equal fruit. Certainly an interesting wine for blending. The 2017s will be bottled in 2019, so all of these were babies.

The 2017 Syrah from Shadow Canyon shared a lot of the characteristics of the Grenache; aromatic and full. Next was a wine he calls La Turkey (La Turque, get it?) It is Shadow Canyon Syrah co-fermented with Larner vineyard Viognier. All the wines go through malo but the acidities were good.

From bottle we tasted 2015 High on the Hog, 2016 Pound for Pound, 2016 Right Hand Man (really brilliant especially for the money) and 2016 Bull by the Horns. I found that all of these wines hit their mark, were clear expressions of Paso and their respective varieties, had very accessible fruit and structure and enough acidity to keep the wines moving along your palate. Mac is definitely on to some very interesting wines in the near future.

From McPrice we drove down to Lompoc (pronounced Lom-poke) which is in the Santa Barbara region of cool wine valleys. We had set aside the next day for our visit to Sine Qua Non. We had some time in the morning so we visited Greg Brewer of Brewer Clifton. I won’t go into the soap opera but Clifton is out and Brewer makes these wines for KJ now. Greg is a brilliant winemaker and it was very instructive to taste what he is doing. He was one of the pioneers and his bright savory style of winemaking has become more typical of the region. He has nothing but praise for another pioneer of the region, Manfred Krankl, who planted grapes in sites which everyone else said could never get ripe. Greg mentioned that only Manfred picked as late as he did, end October into November. Peter Hunken followed Manfred’s lead and also planted grapes on a forsaken hillside which is on the edge of full ripening and produces brilliant wines. These are cool, cool hillsides, which may be a bit counter-intuitive for how far south you are. Don’t forget that the Pacific Ocean runs north to south with the Japan current hitting Alaska and only then coming down the California coast. Even in July you can’t get into the water in San Francisco; it is bone-chilling.

Our visit to Sine Qua Non brought us through gorgeous rolling hills 2 hours south of Lompoc, near Ventura. Last time I was here he was planting his home vineyards and building his winery and home. It is all quite impressive and very few get to visit, though many ask. The winery reminded me of an ancient temple in modern-form. You come up to a three-story twin waterfall with exotic desert plantings surrounding a shallow pool. Elaine Krankl came running out to meet us with a big smile and hugs, then her son August, whom I had met when he and his twin brother were three. August, now 25, works at the winery, pulled in when Manfred had a bad motorcycle accident three years ago. His twin works for a monumental artist in Brooklyn (of course). We walked up to the main building and the door creaked open and Manfred slowly emerged. It was a bit dramatic for me because I hadn’t seen him since his accident, not knowing what to expect. He walks with a severe limp and needs a cane, his hair has gone completely gray but he still stands up tall and is as charming as ever.

He didn’t hesitate to take us on a tour of his vineyard, much of it planted on own-rootstock (i.e., not grafted). When Manfred planted his own vineyards, he had the chance to really let his vinous creativity run wild, planting Tempranillo, Mourvedre, Touriga Nacional, Petit Manseng, Petite Syrah and even Graciano. There may be others I missed.

Manfred does not come across as a know it all, just the opposite. He loves to experiment, which for him is more akin to playing and creating. He is essentially an artist using winemaking as his medium. Sounds corny, but he is so disarming about it that you don’t feel put off, but rather pulled in by his charm and superb taste. He tries new things and doesn’t hesitate to say when it doesn’t work: he bought concrete eggs but says he doesn’t much care for them (he uses them just for his white wines), he is also experimenting with clay amphorae and 1,000 Litre Clay Hippos which he re-designed with legs to more easily access the spout — smart.

After we tasted the Deux Grenouilles white wine (named for the Deux Chevaux car on the label), he did not have any other finished wines for us to taste out of bottle (all sold) but he was very generous with a large range of barrel samples. He makes numerous separate lots from which to build his wines (he speaks about it in the video we filmed). He numbers each lot in order that he does not know the provenance, which might bias his judgment. He forces himself to be completely honest and lets the wines create themselves with his guidance. He mentioned how he will tinker with the blend, which may take him in different directions and cause him to backtrack. Fascinating to hear. He loves having a very varied palette from which to create.

With lunch, we tasted a home-vineyard 2016 Grenache from barrel; the 2015 #6 Grenache from an old Gamba 700-litre barrel that had been blended with 25% Mourvedre, all from the Eleven Confessions Vineyard; 2016 Mourvedre from the Molly Aida vineyard that had just the most gorgeous aromatics, an amazing example of this variety; 2015 Graciano that was raised for a year in a demi-muid, it ripens very late and is noted for its high acid, his had a lovely suave texture with notes of cocoa; 2016 Touriga Nacional, a real big boy showing notes of fig and black fruits; own-rooted Syrah co-fermented with Petit Manseng filling in for the more typical Viognier component, an awesome wine that was at once aromatic and deeply fruited, lifted yet dense; a Syrah from his Eleven Confessions Vineyard co-fermented with destemmed Viognier; and a Petit Syrah raised in new oak barrels from the Third Twin Vineyard up in Los Alamos that is supposed to be a most spectacular site, according to Peter Hunken.

It is hard to describe the feeling of pride I felt to be at the table and working with such a talented person for all these years. Manfred, never shy, is rather humble in the face of the great challenge of winemaking and the extraordinary luck (his words) that he has had in life attempting to make wine, never thinking it would become his vocation (he thought he would remain a restaurateur and winemaking would be a nice hobby). He takes this humility to the winemaking process, stripping his mind/ palate naked and working with what the vineyard gives him. It is important to him to stay honest, and he succeeds, taking nothing for granted. Since not many people get to taste his wines, there is much naysaying and jealousy for his tremendous success, but when you do experience his wines, you find all the elements of greatness: proper ripeness of fruit, tension, lift, complexity and length. Terroir might be a bit of a stretch but in his wines there are certainly qualities of the cool, long ripening season of the hills north of Santa Barbara. Manfred certainly respects European terroir, as he drinks a lot of European wines and travels quite a bit, but he is rather skeptical about the notion of terroir in California. His wines are a unique expression, ultimately his expression.

We drove back to Lompoc and luckily could walk to dinner at Peter Hunken and Amy Christine’s house (Black Sheep Finds). Lompoc is a charming town of small houses that feels kind of cozy. You wouldn’t know it was an important wine center for the region with many of the best wineries located in the “Wine Ghetto” (that is literally what the sign says). They made us a wonderful vegetarian dinner and we drank well of their wines: Champagne and a magnum of 1998 Quintarelli. We were thirsty. The next morning we went to the Ghetto and visited the compact space that is Black Sheep Finds; but first we drove out to their pride, the Joy Fantastic Vineyard, which they planted from scratch in 2014. Driving up to the vineyard, you pass the Sashi Moorman/ Raj Parr vineyard for their Domaine de la Côte wines. You spot the Joy Fantastic Vineyard from quite far because it is a stunning site way up on the hill, much higher than the Côte Vineyard, which offers many advantages. Like many talented visionaries we met on this trip, they were warned not to plant up this high because “they would never get their fruit ripe.” Well they did and it did (get ripe, that is). Peter and Amy have been buying fruit up until now and still need to do so as their new vineyard comes on line, but from what we tasted, there are some very exciting wines in store from their Joy Fantastic Vineyard (Amy is a big Prince fan).

Back in the Ghetto, we tasted their 2016 Chardonnay which is just the third leaf from the JF vineyard. The aromatics were absolutely delightful; though the palate thinned out, you could sense the potential for the Chardonnay off this site.

The 2016 Holus Bolus Roussanne is from the famed Bien Nacido Vineyard; year in year out, this wine is a star. The fruit used to go to Qupe. This is a cool site for Roussanne which is perfect. The wine is made a bit backwards, fermented in wood and aged in concrete but the results are brilliant, with fresh fruit flavors and a terrific texture. We tasted the 2017 from tank and it is even richer than the 2016.

Amy and Peter Pinot Noir 2014 is a wine we have in stock but it was good to taste it again. It is a fruit forward PN that is easy to love. We then tasted the 2016 JF Pinot Noir that was bottled last August. Again one could see the amazing potential of this vineyard. More texture and complexity than the Amy and Peter.

I hate to say how much I love this wine: the Presqu’ile Vineyard Syrah. Hate to say because 2017 will be the last year they can buy fruit here. The 2016 has lovely, spicy aromatics with a definite note of black pepper that runs straight through the blackberry fruit to the finish line. Just 13.5% alcohol.

The 2016 Franc de Pied Syrah is, as is typical, more tuned up than the above. This is an own-rooted vineyard with more intensity and tension in the wine, more savory qualities. The wine just needs to relax a bit. Finally we tasted the 2016 JF Syrah, bottled last August. Again, it shows all the depth and aromatics that their home vineyard promises.

We are very fortunate to be working with Peter and Amy at the very beginning of the winemaking journey that is Black Sheep Finds. They are two extremely talented people that are doing all the right things, which will soon bear fruit. The bottlings we have are excellent, and the future wines will be even better.”

Victor Schwartz

“We covered a lot of ground from the Willamette to the Santa Ynez hills and much in between, with a terrific group of buyers (Oceana, Agern, Vintry Fine Wines and Corkbuzz). As much as we think we know about these terrific winemakers, we learned so much more from visiting their vineyards and having the opportunity to peek into the future with them.

These are all personal wines; they directly emanate from the character of the vintner. I would daresay that in attitude and practice, our portfolio of American winemakers takes a very European approach, which I find very exciting and promising.

After an early AM drive to the Portland airport we flew down to San Francisco and drove up to Sonoma to visit Scott Rich of Talisman. He makes wines in an industrial park, something that seems to be quite common these days. When Manfred Krankl did this 30 years ago it was considered outré. Now it is quite common; we saw at least three of these wine “ghettos” on our trip.

Scott produces 2500-3000 cases of vineyard-specific wines each year at Talisman. Interesting enough, he made the first sparkling wines for Tony Soter when Tony moved to Oregon. Scott was the winemaker at Etude in California with Tony Soter so his Pinot Noir chops are first rate. Scott is 100%Chickahominy Indian, a Virginia tribe dating back to Jamestown (they saved the settlers through some tough winters.) Scott works as ecologically as possible but in some surprising ways. For instance, he eschews capsules because their creation, shipping and use contributes heavily to pollution. He is dedicated to reducing the carbon footprint so he uses domestic glass, old-fashioned cold-glue labels and unbleached kraft-paper boxes using only vegetable dyes; his operation is solar-powered.

His wines aren’t bad either. He typically uses around 25% whole cluster and is rather hands-off in his winemaking. His elevage is very long, which he feels reduces the oak imprint, though new oak is around 67%. All of these vineyard sites sang clearly through each wine.

Gunsalus 2013 is a vineyard in the Green Valley which overlaps the Russian River and Sonoma Coast. He calls this warm region the banana belt. Its grapes are the first to ripen, and produces mouth-filling Pinots with ample fruit and spice; long and flavorful.

Red Dog 2013 is from Sonoma Mountain, higher elevation and from the northern end of the Sonoma Valley; it produces more focused wines than Gunsalus. Not as round but a more iron, iodine nose, more spice and structure. This harvests 2-3 weeks later than Gunsalus. It was bottled last July 15. Then we tasted a 2007 Red Dog but exclusively from the Dijon Clone and a Red Dog from the Pommard Clone. This made for a very cool comparison. The Dijon was more evolved and leathery; the Pommard fresher and meatier with more bass notes.

Weir 2013 – Yorkville Highlands are in Mendocino County, and are northerly and cool; the wines show a direct correlation to their terroir (as do all of his wines). A bit lighter than the above wines but much more complexe. Lacey aromatics, a delight to drink and think about.

The 2013 Adastra was just so much eucalyptus. I find these the most forward bottlings and most obvious. Not necessarily a bad thing. We also tasted a 2013 Adastra “Méthode Valise”; a cute name for cuttings that were brought back from DRC. He does this wine 100% whole cluster. This was a solid monolith of Pinot fruit that needs a lot of time.

The Starscape 2014 from Russian River was a new vineyard for me. This is in the Adastra category of pleasing but not very complex. All on the pleasure as was a 2009 Adastra which was chewy with a saline note.

We tasted some older wines which were evolving slowly and quite beautifully. A Wildcat Mountain 2009 from Los Carneros, a Weir 2009 and a Carneros 2001 which he called Kathy’s Cuvée made from the Swan Clone.

Scott is a thoughtful winemaker who equally understands the pleasure to be derived from each site. He gets the yin and yang right.

We drove an hour up north to Healdsburg to visit Davis Family Vineyards. Guy was off at a big charity event in the south, so the young and passionate Cooper Davis showed us around. The “front yard” of his house is surrounded by Zinfandel vines planted in 1896 which Guy brought back to life when he bought the property. He is very proud of these vines, as you can imagine. We went over to the winery to taste their lineup starting with a Rose de Noir sparkling. 2017 marks the winery’s 20^th anniversary. Gorgeous aromatics, clean light Pinot Noir fruit from the Green Valley, a very cool vineyard. We also tasted a 2015 Rose de Noir with 26 months tirage, not surprisingly fatter than the 2017.

The 2016 Cuvée Luke was done all in stainless steel without malo. Very tasty with a strong note of the 17% Viognier in the blend.

The 2015 Pinot Noir RRV is their flagship blend from four primary vineyards. This is classic, forward, dark fruits, slightly cinnamon, Russian River Pinot Noir. A total crowd pleaser of deliciousness done right. 100% native yeasts.

We skipped over the other PN cuvées (his choice not ours) and went directly to the 2015 Campbell Ranch, my favorite PN in his lineup. 900 ft elevation, brilliant tension in the wine, high-toned and complex, long. 8-9 months in barrel, 20% new oak. They age the barrel wood themselves for three years to ensure the staves are properly seasoned.

Of course, the 2015 Old Vines Zinfandel from 122-year-old vines was brilliant. Duh! It is a challenge to harvest this vineyard, as clusters can fully ripen 4-6 weeks apart so they need to do 6 passes. Bright yet deep blueberry fruit blended from various micro-fermented cuvées. The acidity is brilliant, not at all heavy and a reasonable 13.6 to 14.1% alcohol.

The 2014 Soul Patch Syrah is co-fermented with Viognier. Very pretty if a bit closed on the fruit side. Needs time to open.

The wines are normally left to age one year in bottle after their elevage in barrel. The corks were pretty cool, being made from sugar cane husks; zero cork taint problems. They started this program with their 2015s.

The Davis wines have a very open, pleasing style in the best sense. These are smartly made wines that should have a lot of fans.

That night we ate at a brilliant new restaurant in Healdsburg named Valette for the chef, Dustin Valette. Alex Crangle of Balo Vineyards joined us. I causally threw this visit into the mix and it turned out to be one of the most exciting and dynamic interchanges of the trip! Alex is a very cool guy, having been a beer maker before turning to wine; also interested and deeply knowledgeable about many subjects, including koshi. This wasn’t a formal tasting but we did drink quite a variety, starting with three mind-bending ciders (one made with hops that was a perfect crossover for beer drinkers) and the best Pét-Nat that anyone at the table ever tasted. When asked why 99% of the Pét-Nats are so bad and dirty, Alex just said: “that’s because they don’t know what the hell they are doing!” Of course his white Pinot Noir (very rare) was brilliant as was his red. Everyone at the table was hanging onto his every word, quite the rock star.

Woody Hambrecht of Alysian had to jump on an airplane, however he got his new winemaker, Joe Ryan, to meet us at his home in the mountains above Dry Creek to taste with us the next morning. We just drove and drove higher and higher with the house numbers literally going up and down – Rebekah jumping out of the car to figure out our next move – but we carried on and at nearly the top of the mountain we found our Shangri-La. What a beautiful spot. Joe pointed out that the mountain folk want their own AVA, separate from the valley Dry Creek vintners and from what we saw and tasted it makes perfect sense. It was also interesting because from our high perch we could look across the valley to Spring Mountain where we were headed that afternoon.

We tasted in Woody’s kitchen and the first wine that Joe showed us was the 2017 Alysian Sauvignon Blanc. As it turns out it was pure delight. This is the third vintage of this wine and they got it right. No coincidence that Woody brought on some proper talent with Joe Ryan, having been the winemaker at Flowers and Porter Creek. I was quite happy that Woody made this important move. The wine is made on native ferment, and he created a delicious balanced wine in a very warm year. This is the Musqué clone of Sauvignon Blanc, noted for making some of the best SBs in CA. The grapes come from these high-elevation vineyards (1200 feet).

Next came the 2017 Floodgate Rose. In the hands of the talented Joe Ryan, the wine was a perfect example of high-quality California Rosé. The fruit comes from the Yorkville Highlands, 50% Carignan, 35% Old Vines Zinfandel, 10% Syrah and 5% Grenache; whole cluster pressed, stainless-steel fermented, aged on the lees.

The 2014 Alysian Chardonnay is made in 35% new French oak barrels but the malo is stopped. Good thing. This wine was classic, big-fruited Cal Chard that just touches the electric fence of fruit salad but stays the course with enough acidity to keep it in line.

The 2016 Floodgate PN is a winner as it has been in the past. The provenance is the Sonoma Coast: bold, straightforward, delicious Pinot Noir and amazing value.

The final Pinot was the Alysian Rochioli Allen. There is a reason that Rochioli has the reputation that it enjoys: I have never had anything less than brilliant from this vineyard, truly a special spot for Pinot Noir. Our guests commented how much they enjoyed this bottling because it was more elegant and complex than wines made by other well-known producers from that vineyard. Woody’s grandfather, still living on the estate, was an early investor/supporter of Rochioli so they will always get fruit from this very special vineyard.

The last wine we tasted before visiting these amazing vineyards was a 2015 Syrah co-fermented on 20% Viognier. Viognier plays an important role in these co-ferments adding lift and aromatics as well as setting color in the Syrah. Great acidity, which is never a problem on these mountain vineyards; they never need to adjust their wines.

Then down the mountain and over to Napa and up Spring Mountain. These back-country mountain vineyards are so interesting; they are completely rural and quiet, belying the image of northern California as a touristic hootenanny. The feeling was more akin to driving the back roads of French or Italian wine country and visiting winemakers/ farmers who are a natural extension of the land they tend. We arrived at Smith Madrone to a crystal clear, but cool, blue sky and a very warm, enthusiastic reception from the Smith Brothers, Bonnie and Julie Ann, dogs and – big surprise – Stu’s son Sam. I had never met Charlie Smith but he is cut from the exact same piece of rugged cloth as his brother Stu, down to his stylish hirsute jowls, ticks and jokes. Charlie took us thorough a quick and to–the–point tasting in their barn of a winery while Stu cooked up the buffalo burgers from an animal he shot.

The Smith Madrone wines don’t mince words, they get right to point. Growing grapes up at this elevation gives their wines a perfect tension and balance that allows them to do a minimal amount to get delicious wines into the bottle.

The 2015 Chardonnay is barrel-fermented in 75-80% new oak. Big but fresh. Charlie believes that their hillside fruit eats up new oak so he is not afraid to use a lot of it. I don’t disagree. The used barrels go to the Cabernet program. He does “lots of bâtonnage” about twice/week.

The Cabernet is their most important wine, making 1200-2500 cases depending upon the vintage. Growing grapes up here is a lot more variable then on the valley floor. The 2014 is blended with 8% Cab Franc and 7% Merlot (proportions vary by vintage). Charlie is very proud of his Cab Franc, pointing out how expensive it has become to purchase. He also was forthright (as he is about everything) that the 13.9% alcohol on the label is dead accurate, unlike a lot of wineries who fudge it by up to a whole degree. Their Cab is elegant, balanced with beautifully managed tannins. Gorgeous berry fruit. Managing tannins is very important to the Smith brothers, and they accomplish this in the way they press and fine. He likens his Cabs to St Estèphe, which I thought was the perfect Bordeaux analogy; taught but elegant, dense with fruit but not flamboyant or loud.

The 2012 Cook’s Flat is not a wine I taste every day. The name refers to George Cook, the first owner of the property, deeded by President Chester A. Arthur in 1885. Cook’s Flat was the local old-timers’ name for the eight-acre plateau-like vineyard block which was replanted in 1972, a year after the Smiths re-planted this abandoned mountain property. It is the best of their best, a blend in 2012 of 58% Cabernet Sauvignon, 25% Cabernet Franc and 17% Merlot. Compared to their normale bottling, it is broader and darker with great power and length. This is a winery selection.

A great way to finish the tasting was with their 2015 Riesling. Charlie pointed out there used to be a lot more of it in Napa and that they have been believers in this varietal from the get-go. It is 7g/L rs, just a notch over dry (which would be 3.5g/L). Structure drives this wine, which can age easily 20 years.

The tasting seemed to be just a small part of their plans for our visit, because we had to get to our long and leisurely lunch overlooking the valley before getting to the main event: skeet shooting and target practice. These guys love their guns and it was a blast (excuse me) to pick up the old M16 and shoot at targets while another group picked up a shotgun; Charlie winged out biodegradable orange clay pigeons over their steep vineyards for the skeet-shooters. There were quite a few good shots in the group (not me, but I did finally manage to hit the target).

I can honestly say I never had a winery visit like at Smith Madrone; these guys and their wines, their attitudes, cannot be replicated. There is something special that drove them up this mountain, an iconoclastic, curmudgeonly mentality that informed the rightness of planting up here when everyone else said they were crazy. The results speak for themselves.

We had a long drive to the SF Airport, which included a spectacular approach to the Golden Gate Bridge, and a delicious meal at Wursthall in San Mateo. This is J. Kenji López-Alt’s paean to a German beer hall and the saying is most definitely correct, great wine requires a lot of good beer.”

Victor Schwartz

“We covered a lot of ground in just a few days with some VOS team members and a terrific group of buyers (Oceana, Agern, Vintry Fine Wines and Corkbuzz). As much as we think we know about these terrific winemakers, we learn so much more from visiting their vineyards and having the opportunity to peek into the future with them.

These are all personal wines that are a direct emanation of the character of the vintner. I would daresay that in attitude and practice, our portfolio of American winemakers takes a very European approach, which I find very exciting and promising.

After an early morning flight to Portland, we drove 2 hours to the very southern edge of the Willamette Valley to Junction City, not far from Eugene. Antiquum Farms is one of the highest elevation vineyards in the appellation and appears to sit alone as you don’t see any other vineyards near them (though there are a few).

Antiquum Farm is well-named as it feels like a self-contained farm operation with chickens running through the vineyards, separate pens for the male and female sheep, some gorgeous dogs of different types, another area where the geese live and procreate and of course draft horses for plowing the vineyards. The Dungeness crab we ate as appetizers before dinner were caught by his father and his son; the lamb we had for dinner was from the property and all the buildings were designed and mostly built by owner Stephen Hagen. His son Juel, only in the 6th grade, is very much a part of things: he came with us to visit the vineyards and is working on a project to raise squab and quail for local restaurants.

This is much more than just a winery, it is an entire ecosystem!

They have 21 acres planted and will plant another 8 in 2 years as well as building a winery. Stephen employs a unique vinicultural approach he calls intensive rotational grazing in which animals are allowed to live in the vineyard. This starts with a flock of sheep, Katahdin/Dorper crosses, followed by chickens and geese, all contributing to the ecosystem of the vineyard. Over the years this vineyard, at the very limit of viticulture in the Willamette Valley, is completely self-sustaining, requiring no outside inputs.

Because of the combination of high elevation, warm days, cold nights and an entirely self-sustaining ecosystem, this farm has developed its own, unique terroir (there is a reason that top wineries like Antica Terra source fruit from Stephen). He considers himself a farmer first.

Stephen is all about focus and what he focuses on is growing great Pinot Noir. He make three: Juel, named for his son, is his first wine (the wines begin at such a high quality that you can’t call this wine entry-level); Passiflora, which is akin to his 1er Cru and Luxuria, his top wine. All of these wines are grown on a single sloping hillside and each parcel seems to have its own characteristics. These wines are inky dark, with deep fruit characteristics and yet the acidity is bracing and fresh, almost citrus in style. So much about this farm and its wine is iconoclastic and seems to behave within its own world. So for instance the Luxuria parcel is actually lower down on the slope yet it produces the best grapes and is the last to be picked.

He also make two white wines from Pinot Gris that is grown around the tasting room. The Daisy Pinot Gris 2017, named for his daughter, is a delicious and fresh rendition, as its name would imply. The use of 50% neutral barrels adds a surprising texture to this wine that elevates it and adds a complexity not normally found in this style of Pinot Gris from Oregon. The Aurosa Pinot Gris is in a world of its own. This was the first wine of Stephen’s I tasted when first introduced to Antiquum last year and it blew me away. The grapes are raised as if for red wine, with the clusters getting more sun exposure with thicker skins giving more phenolic interest to the wines. An extended maceration pulls even more complexity from the grapes. The 2016 was light copper colored but the 2017 was even lighter, more onion-skin, due to a shorter skin contact; just as rich and complex but with less color, more in line with the style Stephen is seeking.

We were joined at dinner by Leah Jorgensen and her fiancé Asa. We got to try all of her wines as well. The rose is quite light in color but delicious as well, though we are only getting a tiny quantity for our market. Her reds are always impressive and we tasted a pure Gamay, a new wine for us.

The next morning we made the long 2-hr drive back up north to Roots, a much nicer winery then I would have been led to expect. The tasting room was totally Chris, complete with a Crosley turntable and psychedelic vinyl from the 60s – 80s.

I think he picked out the right tunes because all the wines showed exceptionally well. We tasted 4 terrific sparklings under the Art Brut label: Melon de Bourgogne, Brut (PN/Chard), Blanc de Blancs and Blanc de Noir. All really good, with the Melon showing the most personality, it was Chris Berg in a bottle. (There is lots of talk about sparkling wines in Oregon these days). Then a crew of lovely, balanced Rieslings including a total fun cuvée from the Columbia Gorge region (kept hearing about this wine region on the trip, expect to see more good wines from there), then onto the really interesting stuff, his Pinot Noirs.

He feels his Apolloni is his most easygoing and right for by-the-glass. Leroy always has great fruit intensity. The Roots Estate was the most complex by far of these three, coming from red, iron-rich soils. Then came Saffron Fields, Pinot love in a bottle. I have seen other bottlings from this vineyard, but Chris’s is the best I have tasted. It was singing. Sheboygandy is fat and fun, sexy and delicious. We were happy to try his 2016 Crosshairs as it is such a great value. Wow, what a delicious wine. At just $208 on deal, this wine offers a lot to the market.

We tasted a few more very interesting wines: Yamhill Springs 2016, self-rooted vines from the top of the ridge — high-toned, crunchy and tense. Saffron Fields 2016, dense but closed. A new wine is the Cluster F$#% 2016 sourced from 4 vineyards. It was deeply flavorful, perfumed and complex. It will be one of his most expensive offerings but well worth it.

Chris said he had been pulling back on his extractions since 2012 and I think it shows in the freshness and expression of these wines.

It was a hop, skip and a jump to see David Autrey in his vineyards at Westrey, but we may have driven a thousand miles for the difference in temperament. Where Chris is chill and gives the sense that details don’t really matter, that winemaking is just a matter of going with the flow, David seems to know what every single vine is doing and why. He isn’t a control freak as much as a vinous savant. He is incredibly knowledgeable about Burgundy and the Willamette, having made wines in both places. He uses his knowledge to produce terroir-driven wines from each of his vineyard sources.

We tasted with David both in his vineyard and at dinner. We started with his Pinot Gris, steely and clean after an odd note blew off. At dinner we drank a 2001 Pinot Gris which was delicious. He wanted to make the point that Oregon Pinot Gris can age despite what many “experts” say.

His Chards were superb, coming from 40-year-old vines, first a normale then a Reserve. The Reserve is 40 months on its lees, no bâtonnage (he has learned his lesson from the Burgundians), long fermentation for 6-9 months! Then the Oracle Chardonnay (I never tasted this wine) was off the charts superb; no new oak, just dense, savory fruit with great acidity, as close to White Burgundy as Oregon can achieve. These three wines make a very strong case for the uniqueness and high quality that Oregon Chardonnay can offer the market.

His Pinot Noirs only see 15% new wood in their elevage. His 2014 basic PN had straightforward strawberry fruit, bright and fresh if a bit linear. Lovely. The Oracle 2012 was smack dab delicious, dense and fresh, loads of fruit with terrific balance. No surprise, this is his home vineyard and is always a standout. The 2014 Cuvée 22 is certainly dense but tight. From ungrafted vines, something we saw a lot of on this trip both in Oregon and California. These cuvées are from the oldest vines on his property. We also tasted the Cuvée 23 from 2015, surprisingly not as tight as the 2014, but still showing toasty oak.

I was having too much of a good time at dinner at Nick’s in McMinnville to take notes, but he brought out some older wines and they were beauties. David’s wines are built to last and evolve beautifully. Both Roots and Westrey craft beautiful wines, I’d say Chris’s are more visceral and immediate, while David’s are more cerebral and classic, like the people who make them.”

Victor Schwartz

“I started V.O.S. Selections out of pure selfishness. After a taste of the post-college adult world of banking, I was driven to do something for myself. If I was going to work hard for the rest of my life I wanted to work with something I cared about, something I felt a passion for, something tangible – certainly not commercial loans, stocks and bonds. Where was the joy in that? I started V.O.S. for self- fulfillment, to discover, to self-educate, to dig deeper into things I loved. If you told me that 30 years later I would be leading a band of two dozen similarly-minded believers, I would have told you that you have had enough for the night and time to go home. This was my life-fulfilling-party. Why would anyone else want to join? More on that later, read on. 

Everyone should have at least one lightbulb moment. Mine occurred while I was working in the straightjacketed world of 1980s commercial banking. I did everything I was supposed to do: Ivy League education, a spot in a good commercial loan training program at Union Bank, wore a suit and tie, and ran a credit department making decisions on car loans in a satellite office way out by the Oakland Airport on Hegenberger Road. I had a share in a sailboat in the San Francisco Marina. I even drove a Volvo! The most radical thing I did after college was to move to San Francisco instead of to New York like 99.9% of my peers from Cornell.

So why was I miserable, why was I getting into trouble, why didn’t I get the plum postings when they knew I was smart enough, after I had aced Loan Analysis Training? I guess I wasn’t enough like them; I was from New Jersey, I had a sense of humor, and I wore flashy ties. (I was actually called into my superior’s office one day to discuss that very issue). Difference is NOT an appreciated trait in banking. I got more excited about bringing a client to a cool new restaurant opening in the Haight than about closing a multi-million dollar deal with the strip mall real estate developer with the shiny white shoes and deep orange tan. Clearly, I was in the wrong business.

I was bored with banking and decided to apply to business school. I aced the GMATs, I was ready to apply and continue along the fabled route to happiness and prosperity. But my girlfriend asked, “After B- School, what will you do? Will you be happy doing exactly the same things that have made you miserable? You’re merely postponing making a hard decision about your future, so why not make it now?

So I did.
I quit.

I grew up around an intense culinary culture at home. My parents had been stationed in Germany after WWII, and became enamored of the food and wine they encountered there. By the time they settled down in New Jersey with their five boys, my mom’s passionate side came out in the form of fearlessness in the kitchen and an interesting wine collection stashed around the basement. My happiest times as a kid were cooking and being a cellar rat, selecting wines for dinner, which the whole family shared. Sometimes I liked the wines, sometimes not, but I always tasted everything.

So back to my epiphany at the bank. I realized that the best way to make myself happy was to pursue a career that included my love for the world of food and business. Wine! It suddenly became obvious. Another early lightbulb moment was when I had the idea of starting a mail-order catalogue of quality, small-production California wines in 1984. Absolutely no one was doing anything of the sort at that time. On visits home in the early 80s, I did a little market research in New York. The selection of California wines consisted largely of 3 liter jugs of Gallo and Inglenook, and a couple of shelves of known labels. There were even faux Euro names like “Hearty Burgundy”.

That California wine catalogue was a great idea, right? I researched my way out of it once I studied the interstate shipping laws and saw only obstacles; I did not yet have the mindset of an entrepreneur to see the possibilities. I was still shackled by a banking mentality: No loan!

I had taken evening classes while working at the bank at a small professional cooking school called Tante Marie’s, which gave me formal skills. With a partner, I set up a catering company called Deluxe and delivered great sandwiches to the up and coming Ice House District, home to hip advertising agencies, Zoetrope studios, media firms etc… It was great fun and hard work. We went to the market early in the morning, got great ingredients, went home, made sandwiches and then drove around delivering delicious, handmade food out of a wicker basket. Lots of work, little money but damn, at least I wasn’t working in a bank and it was my company. One of our regular clients was San Francisco Magazine and they asked my partner if she knew any cool single men for their “Most Eligible Bachelors of San Francisco” issue. (Eligible straight men in 1984 SF were as rare as hen’s teeth). She suggested me, ridiculous given the impecunious schlub I was at the time (others in that issue were Marty Balin, Chris Isaak and Ken Friedman).

Victor Owen Schwartz, 26, Caterer, “both solicited and unsolicited.” Studying French, in order to eventually work for a négociant in France, brokering wines in Burgundy or Bordeaux. A photographer also, he shoots “anything but people. I like objects I can control.”

My interest in combining my love for food and creating a business stayed with me. I ended up moving to New York a couple of years later. Everyone I met in the wine trade told me retail was where I had to start. At Astor Wines and Liquors I worked with a great group, stock-monkeys like myself, slashing open boxes, roaming the floors, cracking jokes; keeping ourselves busy. But wine was the thing, our binding reason for working there. The best part was the opportunity to taste a lot of different wines; that was the real paycheck. The lightbulb-moment this time came during one of our basement tastings, while we discussed the wines we had just tried. It occurred to me that we agreed about overall quality and relative value of the wines we tasted about 99% of the time. This ran counter to what I understood was a very subjective business run by elites of taste. By contrast, this was very democratic. I was also learning that by tasting many wines from a region, one could understand what made them reflective of that place and what made them good, interesting and worth buying. I started to think that perhaps I could select wines for importation, just as I was selecting wines for the clients that walked into the store.

I kicked around NYC for a while: bartending, managing Life Café (later the backdrop for Rent) in the East Village, did some catering gigs and threw popup parties… but I was still searching. During this time I was studying French as I still had the desire to get involved with wine. Finally, in 1986, I decided it was time. If I could get over to France I would have to construct a real bootstrap operation that would rely more on resources than money. I wrote a letter to Steven Spurrier asking him for a job at his Paris wine bar. I loved his renegade status after the Judgment of Paris and also the cheeky quality of a Brit with a wine business in the heart of Paris – he had both a wine bar and a bookstore on a lovely mews near the Madeleine. Amazingly, he wrote back to me and offered me a job at his wine bar, but said if I was seriously interested in the wine business, I should be out in the vineyards. Everything was starting to fall into place. I had a free airline ticket to Paris (bought with points) and I sublet my Greenwich Village studio to a sound engineer for The Cars, who were cutting a record on 8th Street. The difference between my rent and the rent I was charging gave me just enough to get started. I went to Paris, visited Spurrier’s bookshop, trying to figure out where I should go to begin my “real” wine education. I knew there were interesting opportunities in less-travelled appellations. I thought these “country wines” should be my focus as, from what I had tasted, they offered delicious, undiscovered values. And then another epiphany, the book on the Rhône from John Livingstone-Learmonth and Melvyn Master just kind of fell into my hands as if it were meant to be. The book was filled with great stories of small Rhône winemakers whom I knew were not imported in the US. Eureka, this made perfect sense, I would go to the Southern Rhône!

I had to first go up to Brussels to see my girlfriend’s family and to pick up the very old car that was so generously offered to me for this adventure. The level of generosity all across Europe and in the wine business in particular is something which still amazes me and which was a powerful engine for my success; there is no way I could have accomplished anything if people had not given me a chance. This human spirit is something I had never experienced in the corporate world and which I have never taken for granted. It did not matter that the car turned a six hour drive into twelve, I was so excited I could have ridden a bicycle. 

My plan was to stay just outside of Avignon to save money, so I found a room in a small residential hotel just across the Rhône River in Villeneuve-les-Avignon. The owners were very accommodating to my financial needs so to save money they kept moving me to various rooms as they needed them. At one point I had a very modest one underneath the stairs. I had called ahead from Brussels and was given a contact at the Rhône Comité, Françoise Borel, a young woman who thankfully spoke perfect English. Françoise was my go-to guide and she was very generous with her time. Although I was a nobody she took me seriously as did all the winemakers I was visiting. Their confidence gave me confidence. I was a bit shocked at how generous they were, giving me lots of samples to take back to the States. Using the Livingstone-Learmonth/ Master book I visited a number of wineries every day. I spent time at the Université du Vin in the small town of Suze la Rousse where I was able to connect with both winemakers and students. 

And though I had studied French, my real language education took place on the streets and in the cellars of France. Locating a winery took a lot of effort in pre-GPS times. Seeking the town of Violes, a lovely little village in the heart of Cotes du Rhône vineyards on the Ouveze River, I asked an elderly woman for directions. I repeated the name in the very best French I could muster, pronouncing the town’s name leaving off the final “s” as I thought was proper French. It may have been proper French in Paris but she had no idea what I was talking about no matter how many times I repeated the name. Finally I wrote it down and her eyes lit up as she said, “Oh of course, you mean Vee-oh-less! It’s just the next town over, maybe 3km away.” Language also has terroir. 

I learned a lot during my stay in France but the most important lesson was that wine is ultimately a reflection of the people, not of the dirt, the vine or the barrel. This made a big impression on me as my experience with wine to this point was just a tasty liquid that came out of a bottle. The truth of this lesson has stayed with me through my 30 years working with wineries all over the planet: terroir begins with people. 

Returning to New York in mid-1987, I started thinking about which wineries I wanted to represent. My philosophy was gelling in terms of the kinds of wines I wanted to bring to the market. I respected the integrity of small family farms where they did everything from growing the grapes to putting the cork into the bottle. These were people who respected the soil they tilled and the culture that created their wines. They didn’t use terms like Organic or Natural; their traditional and healthy methods did not require a seal of approval. I intended to bring maximum value to the market by working directly, selling wines from the cellars to the stores and restaurants in New York without many layers of middlemen. I knew from the get-go that for me to make a business of this passion I was going to have to offer more in terms of quality and value than the big guys. I would have to take risks by bringing wines to the market from unexplored regions. I named my company with my initials; I put my name out there as a mark of quality and integrity. 

I contacted people I knew in the trade to see if they might be interested in my concept and stores like Astor Wines gave me very nice opening orders across the board. I initially planned to broker the wines through an established importer and though I had thought it might be the fastest way to fulfill my initial orders, I didn’t find a good fit. 1987 became 1988 and the clock was ticking, my customers were asking about the wines they ordered and I needed to figure out a way to get them here. I set up a warehouse account at Western Carriers (who until then did mostly national warehousing only), obtained a distributor’s license in New Jersey, and I met Phil Stafford, who was starting USA Wine Imports and who offered to clear my wines in New York. Then, another stroke of great luck struck. I was at the old International Wine Center on 55th Street when I learned that they were having a Rhône Tasting for the Press and Trade in February. I still had plenty of samples so I entered my wines. It was not technically kosher because the wines were not yet in the market, but such is the essence of a bootstrap operation. Like in a movie, my wines were favorites at the tasting and received top honors in articles from Terry Robards (Wine Spectator) Robert Schoolsky (Newsday), Barbara Ensrud (Daily News) and Richard Nalley. 

Any doubts about the viability of my entry into the business were dispelled and I got to work borrowing enough money to bring in my first container from France, which arrived in the disastrously hot summer of 1988. Most of my container survived but the experience made me an early proponent of temperature controlled shipping and storage (the “experts” at the shipping companies told me no one did this, except maybe Kermit Lynch, sometimes). During the next 8 formative years, I was able to take month-long trips through the unbeaten paths of France, learning the terroir of each region. I got my first fax machine in 1990 which was great except maybe only half of my suppliers had one; much of my business was conducted via telephone and FedEx. All sales materials were created on a typewriter and copies made at the local copy shop on MacDougal St, where the Kenyan owner and I got to know each other well. I got my first computer around 1992, and I thought it would last me 10 years. I created a newsletter with wine highlights and recipes, always working to incorporate the food culture into the wine culture. Orders at Western were either faxed or called in to Gloria, who still works there; my mom did the billing. I ran the business out of my studio apartment until I got married in 1993 and my wife kicked me out of the house, which helped my business grow. 

Despite the bare-bones operation, I discovered and brought to the market many gems such as Jean-Paul Picard from Sancerre, Domaine le Galantin from Bandol, Henri Clerc from Puligny, and Jean-Pierre Grossot from Chablis (in many cases I am working with the next generation). Others I launched in the market include Perrot-Minot, Chandon de Briailles, Thierry Puzelat, and Larmandier Bernier. By leading with my nose, prioritizing the authenticity and quality of the product over commercial consideration, V.O.S. Selections has been out front in many regions and categories. If the wine or spirit is great, if it speaks to an authentic culture and terroir, and if the people behind it are genuine, it belongs in the V.O.S. Portfolio. V.O.S. was a very early proponent of wines of the Loire, Argentina, Organic/Biodynamic viticulture, Jura, Hungary, Greece, Craft Spirits, Sake, Rosés, Grower Champagne etc… I developed the idea of a portfolio-based company, ie the quality of the products drives the growth of the company. “We import great wines before they get great press.” The spirit of discovering the undiscovered is the guiding principle and underlying strength of V.O.S. Selections to this day. 

In closing Chapter 1 of the first 30 years, I must return to the importance of the V.O.S. team to the success of the entire operation. As the company has grown from me to us, there has been an inevitable evolution in personnel and abilities, technologies and even office space. Some of you have been with V.O.S. for 10 years or more; many of you have met our producers, and had the opportunity to visit their wineries. All of you have brought something important to the team – skills, ideas, experience, appreciation, loyalty, personality (lots of personality). We have made a leap of faith together, that we could and would succeed in a highly competitive environment with the highest level of quality and integrity. For this I am enormously grateful, and look forward to the next 30 years of V.O.S. Selections.”

Victor Schwartz