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| May 8, 2008 |
The Saussignac appellation in the western part of the Bergerac vineyard (24 Dordogne, Aquitaine) seems to be pioneering organic (bio) vineyards - interesting for an appellation which has only recently been revitalised. Saussignac wines are sweet dessert wines made from Semillon grapes subject to botrytis “noble rot”.
However on 8 May 2008 you could indulge in a full day ramble of about 5 miles around the 5 organic vIneyards with the opportunity to taste on the way! Take a picnic lunch and it could be a wonderful day - accompanied by winemakers and finishing at Chateau Haut-Garrigue aka Wild Earth Vineyards run by an Irish couple, Sean and Caroline Feely:-
Saussignac Dessert Wine Seduction 2006 The saussignac botrytis dessert wine is truly a labour of love. The yield from a hectare of Saussignac is about 25% of the yield the same hectare would deliver of dry white. Unfortunately the price is never 4 times but fools like us continue to make it because it is truly exquisite. The grapes are hand-picked (sometimes individually) and deliver up a juice that is golden and heavenly. Once fermented a complex set of aromas develop… I’ll let our tasters give us an inkling of the future… Tasting Notes June 2007: Golden and unctuous. Honey, passion fruit and a hint of almond on the nose. Notes of honeysuckle and orange blossom. Apricot and passion fruit the palate with an intense, long finish. Our tasters also wrote ‘Outstanding’ & ‘this is a €100 a bottle wine’
For more info on the walk see www.hautgarrigue.com
| May 18, 2008 |
Pauillac (33 Gironde, Aquitaine) celebrates a wonderful pairing - Spring Lamb and claret - well the wines of the commune of Pauillac AC - a small village and port in the Medoc which also has the distinction of hosting 3 of the 5 “first growths” in the 1855 classification of Bordeaux wines - Chateaux Lafite, Latour and Mouton-Rothschild! I somehow doubt if the celebrations will include liberal samples of these elixirs!!
The event takes place on Sunday 18 May 2008 and includes a banquet, sheep dog demos, “meet the sheep”, sheep shearing, a Spring market, boat trips, an art exhibition and a chance to buy a beret!
Lamb is a specialty of the area, as there are marshy areas near the river which are totally unsuitable for vines, but excellent for rearing saltmarsh lamb. It makes Pauillac quite a contradiction and rather more lively than much of the Medoc - especially as there is the incongruity of an industrial port and oil terminal juxtaposed with some of the most valuable and celebrated vineyards on the planet.
For more info see www.pauillac-medoc.com
Regular readers will be aware the the Lot Valley in the South West of France features frequently in these pages - in many ways the essence of “deepest France”, it is less crowded than the Dordogne to the north and yet offers a wide variety of landscapes, pretty villages, great cuisine - and is home to the often under-rated Malbec-based wines of Cahors. Hence an essential recent purchase has been the revised edition of Helen Martin’s Book Lot: Travels Through a Limestone Landscape in SouthWest France
Helen has kindly allowed us to print an extract of the section on Cahors and its wines…….
Lot: Travels Through a Limestone Landscape in SouthWest France
Chapter 8 The Lot Valley: West of Cahors
Below Cahors, the valley of the Lot belongs to the vignerons and the vineyards of the black wine of Cahors, châteaux-country in fact, but in times gone by it also belonged to the bishops of Cahors, who worked and played but mostly – in that great Christian tradition – fought along its banks.
Downstream of Luzech, the really wild cliffs you see to the east of Cahors become a thing of the past, replaced by gentler, graceful slopes, albeit with a certain grandeur to them, that, even though they may end in cliffs, are less formidable and are called cévennes. The river idles its way through the countryside in deep loops, or cingles, and was used as a major artery for transporting goods from the thirteenth century.
Along its banks grow the vines, and it was mostly the wine from these vineyards which used to be sailed downstream to the Garonne and Bordeaux and from thence to the world. The wine of Cahors may have had its ups and down in more recent times, but the Romans were making wine here in the third century and it had something of a reputation even then, so this river trade is very ancient. Finally, though, and in spite of the efforts of competitive Bordeaux wine-makers, it was phylloxera which put paid to the wine, and thus the trade, in the 1880s. By the time it had revived again, there were better means of transport. But even when the river was at the height of its usefulness, transportation was not always guaranteed. You would be surprised to know how many times the Lot froze right over in winter; the end of the eighteenth century was a particularly critical time – in 1766 it was frozen solid for two and a half months.
In the early nineteenth century, on a river much improved with the passage of time by locks and aids to navigation, 300,000 tonnes of freight was carried down it each year, including an astonishing 90 million bottles of wine – three times the number produced today. However, just as it was phylloxera that killed the river’s wine trade, so it was the coming of the railway that killed the river as a serious form of transport. In more recent years, though, it is coming to life again as leisure craft ply their way up and down, no doubt bringing new problems of pollution.
The villages along this western stretch of the river, unsurprisingly enough, are notable for their wine-producers’ houses – usually big and square with bolets or pigeonniers and sometimes both. You will notice, also, the use of decorative brickwork, the bricks being produced along the valley. Read more on this…
Information on domestic flights in France is not easy to come by, one reason being that Air France has such a dominant position in France and already have flights on most internal routes.
Plus the French market is not as competitive. The French Railway system between major cities is both fast and competitive, especially if starting from Paris.
I have only been able to uncover a couple of airlines which offer domestic flights in France:-
www.easyjet.com - Toulouse to Lyon, Paris, Nice to Paris; Lyon to Biarritz, Bordeaux; Biarritz to Paris
Www.twinjet.net
Toulouse to Metz/Nancy, Mulhouse, Brest; Marseille to Metz/Nancy, Mulhouse; Paris - Perigueux, Cherbourg
www.airlinair.fr Brest, Bordeaux, Agen, Lyon, Poitiers, Brive, Beziers etc
You can try sites like www.expedia.fr but even a price comparison site like http://www.baisse-de-prix.com/voyages.php seems to offer little new – it looks like Air France have cornered the market with little opportunity for discounting.
It looks exactly like the Café du Port on the quai Deschamps; it’s uncanny, as if they’ve brought the tiles and the brass fitments over piece by piece. You look out of the window expecting to see the Garonne, and instead you’re on Park Lane
The Telegraph (11 April 08) recommends some places to eat authentic French cuisine in the UK - the above description is about a new eatery in London’s Park Lane called Bord’eaux (which translates as “waterside”)
A meal at a decent French restaurant in the UK might just provide a cheaper alternative to a trip to France this year, bearing in mind the disastrous Euro exchange rate (currently £1=€1.20 at the Post Office).
The Cafe du Port in Bordeaux is on the right bank of the river and overlooks the port area with impressive views of the sweeping curve of the Garonne and Napoleon’s stone bridge (Pont de Pierre). Fish is their speciality.
Another option in Bordeaux is la Tupina “authentic southwest” in rue porte de la Monnaie (see map) which was recommended by Rick Stein in his Rick Stein’s French Odyssey series
See our customised Google Map of Bordeaux
Other recommendations from the Telegraph article for eating French in the UK:-
The Great House, Market Place, Lavenham in Suffolk - an attractive small medieval village in the middlle of East Anglia- “A striking medieval English building houses a romantic room serving classic Gallic cuisine. Try the hearty pavé of beef in a rich red-wine sauce with beef marrow”
French Living in Nottingham, which also featured in our article on where to eat Cassoulet. This endearing rustic bistro is decked out with checked tablecloths and serves onglet à l’échalote, using a typically French cut of beef with a sauce of shallots and veal stock, sautéed potatoes and seasoned vegetables
Restaurant Bosquet in Kenilworth,Warwickshire which focuses on the gastronomy of SW France The chef Bernard Lignier’s south-western French roots add character to this little restaurant in a terrace. Much of the menu has modern touches, but the starter of quail with Puy lentils and foie gras could not be more classically French. Their wine list features a good selection of the wines of Southwest France - Madiran, Cahors and Jurancon.
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