Tag Archives: French wine

Planet Bordeaux II: More French wine you can afford

BordeaixAnyone who says the French don ?t understand social media or the importance of cheap wine need to note the Planet Bordeaux promotion that has been going on for the past couple of years. Almost all of the wines I ?ve tasted as part of the campaign have been well made ? several even better than that ? and have cost around $10. Plus, we got to tweet about them.

Friday night ?s Twitter tasting featured six whites and two roses. The Twitter conversation was quite lively, as these things usually are, I wasn ?t able to add my curmudgeonly wisdom after the first couple; my Internet connection has been spotty for the past month or so, and it was up and down on Friday. Still, the wines were impressive ? more, after the jump:

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Planet Bordeaux Twitter tasting tonight

We ?re doing eight French wines ? six white and two rose, all costing less than $11. And who said wine prices were going up?

You can follow the tasting on Twitter at the #PlanetBordeaux hash tag or follow me at @wine_curmudgeon. (And, in one of those bits of irony that I appreciate, Moet & Chandon — yes, that Moet — follows me on Twitter now. Guess someone there needs a solid $8 bottle of wine when they're tired of all that $100 Champage.)

The event starts at 6 p.m. central. The Other Wine Guy, who recently celebrated the birth of his first granddaughter, will be on hand to help taste the wines, but he ?ll probably make me do all the tweeting.

Those of you who prefer wine reviews that are longer than 140 characters can check out the blog on Monday, when I ?ll post a more traditional account of the tasting.

Mini-reviews 41: Eurl Patrick, Fougeray de Beauclair, Chateau Massiac, House Band

Reviews of wines that don ?t need their own post, but are worth noting for one reason or another. Look for it on the final Friday of each month:

? Eurl Patrick Barri re Village 2010 ($10, purchased): I bought this wine because I didn ?t expect it to be worth drinking (I am the Wine Curmudgeon, after all). But it wasn ?t French bad ? green and tannic. Instead, it was California bad ? overripe and extracted, without tannins or acid, and made in the grocery store style.

? Fougeray de Beauclair Bourgogne 2009 ($20, purchased): Another attempt to find drinkable red Burgundy for less than $40 with mixed results. Slightly rustic (pencil lead on the front and a rough, interesting finish), but not much fruit, even for Burgundy, and a bit thin in the middle.

? Ch teau Massiac Minervois 2008 ($15, sample): Surprisingly fresh and fruity (black cherry?) red blend from southern France that includes syrah. But still dark and almost brooding; I'm not sure how it would fare with Americans used to Central Coast merlot.

? House Band White NV ($10, sample): This white blend takes full advantage of California's plethora of cheap, quality grapes and solid winemaking skills. It's dry and fruity, but not overdone in any way.

Winebits 251: Wine prices, Amazon, Champagne fraud

? Never trust the media? Lew Perdue at Wine Industry Insight must have a wonderfully dark sense of humor. On the same day last week, he posted these two links on his daily e-summary: ?U.S. wine producers reporting 'epic' 2012 harvest ? and ?End to cheap wine prices is near. ? Both, obviously, can ?t be true, but there they are. This points to the serious flaw in most of the reporting about the decline in the world grape supply. What is the demand for grapes? If demand is increasing, then prices will rise. But if demand is flat or shrinking, which could well be the case given the recession in Europe and the near-recession in China, then prices won ?t do much at all, regardless of supply. This is basic reporting, and it ?s depressing that so few people writing about the subject bother to do it.

? Amazon ?s direct shipping plan: My pal Dave McIntyre has a very even-handed assessment of Amazon ?s latest foray into the wine business ? an example of good reporting. Dave hits the high points in what Amazon is trying to do, and also notes ? which even I overlooked ? that the plan will benefit mostly smaller and mostly Napa Valley wineries, which do the most direct shipping. This may well be the key to what seems like a very limited and modest effort by Amazon ? pluck the most profitable and easiest part of the direct shipping market, and worry about the rest later.

? Why we need the French: Because any culture that really cares about wine should be appreciated. Can you imagine a U.S. prosecutor calling anyone who perpetrated a wine fraud despicable? Can you even imagine a U.S. prosecutor filing a case like that? But that ?s happened with a $2.6 million fraud case in France, where a Champagne producer tried to pass plonk off as vintage bubbly. So if they want to be a little cranky about wine names, who are we to criticize?

Expensive wine 44: Jean-Marc Brocard Chablis Vau de Vey 2010

brocardThose of you who insist on drinking chardonnay that tastes like it was flavored with vanilla and a national park full of oak trees can skip this review. The rest should pay careful attention.

That ?s because this wine is chardonnay from the Chablis region of Burgundy in France that is made without oak and that takes the idea of unoaked chardonnay one step further. Regular visitors here know how much the Wine Curmudgeon appreciates white Burgundy, though Chablis sometimes gets short shrift given my preference to Montrachet.

This is not meant as a slight to Chablis, as the Brocard ($35, sample) demonstrates. This is classic Chablis — clean, crisp, green apples — at an incredible price. Everything that makes quality Chablis is here, from the minerality on the nose to the telltale acidity to the long finish. Best yet, this is a $35 wine that will age and only get better over the next couple of years as its fruit and acid blend and mellow. In this, it will demonstrate why a wine doesn ?t always need oak to get better.

Serve this chilled with a classic bistro dinner ? roast chicken, fried potatoes, garlicky green salad, and apple tart. And if you ?re starting to wonder about holiday gifts, I know at least one wine drinker who would enjoy getting a bottle.

Mini-reviews 40: Red Newt, Rene Barbier, Quincy, Steelhead

Reviews of wines that don ?t need their own post, but are worth noting for one reason or another. Look for it on the final Friday of each month:

? Red Newt Cellars Semi-Dry Riesling 2011 ($15, sample): This New York white, which I tasted as part of a Finger Lakes Twitter event, didn ?t have as much varietal character as I expected. More sweet than anything else, without enough fruit or minerality to balance the sweetness.

? Ren Barbier Mediterranean Rose NV ($5, purchased): The best of the three Rene Barbier wines (and the most difficult to find), made more like a New World rose with strawberry fruit. Highly recommended.

? Domaine du Ad le Rouz Quincy 2010 ($20, purchased): French white from the Loire is imported by the always reliable Charles Neal. Lots and lots of lemon; the wine may require a little more time in bottle to even out. Needs food, and probably seafood (boiled or grilled shrimp, steamed mussels).

? Steelhead Red 2010 ($15, sample): California blend is heavy on the cabernet sauvignon, so it needs beefy food. But it has lots of character and oomph, as well as blackberry fruit and dusty tannins.

Wine of the week: Chateau Saint-Florin 2011

Chateau Saint-FlorinWhat makes this French white blend interesting is that there doesn ?t seem to be anything interesting about it. It doesn ?t have a cute label, no one wrote glowing prose about it, and there isn ?t a hip and with it QR code. It doesn ?t come
from an especially fashionable region of France and it ?s almost impossible to find any reference to it on the Internet.

None of which matters in the least. The Saint Florin ($10, purchased) is a solid and sturdy white Bordeaux, a blend of semillon and sauvignon blanc from the Entre-Deux-Mers area within Bordeaux ? a part of France where dozens of wines like this are still made that offer value and quality. Call it an honest wine
from Jean-Marc and Catherine Jolivet, who are fourth-generation
winemakers from Soussac in Bordeaux and own another small producer
in Entre-Deux-Mers.

The Saint Florin is fresh and clean, with some grassiness, a little citrus and a sort of stony finish. Plus, it's just 12 1/2 percent alcohol, and all of this makes it a terrific food wine. I paired it with with shrimp and linguine, and I don ?t know that the result would have been all that much better with a more pricey Sancerre or a sauvignon blanc from Napa.