First dinner notes

Wines we used for our first harvest dinner with Slow Food, at Parish Hall.

Lornet Cremant du Jura NV (1/6)

Domaine Frédéric Lornet Crémant du Jura Blanc de Blanc Arbois NV Varietal: 100% Chardonnay Viticulture & Vinification Notes: Methode traditionelle. Andrew Bell: Smoky brioche nose, roasted notes, extremely floral, tiny bubbles, elegant. After much success as a wine grower selling his fruit to a négociant for over 20 years, in 1974 Frédéric Lornet crossed over the other side and began bottling his own wine. Today, F. Lornet and his wines are at the forefront of the Jura's wine industry consistently ranking as one of the regions's best producers. Lornet's artisanal style is aimed at producing classic wines using organic and biodynamic methods both in the vineyard and in the winery. Lornet makes two sparkling Cremant du Jura, a Blanc de Blanc and a Ploussard rosé, named “L’Abbaye” for the abandoned Cistercian abbey where they are made. In Cremant du Jura A.O.C. the following varietals are permitted: Chardonnay, Savagnin, Poulsard (a.k.a. Ploussard), Pinot Noir, Trousseau In Cremant du Jura A.O.C. production guidelines are as follows: Grapes must be harvested by hand. Vinification and ageing must follow the traditional method of sparkling wine production. More specifically, the wine must undergo 2 fermentations, the second of which takes place in the bottle before being disgorged. The wine must spend a minimum of 9 months on the lees before disgorgement. For white Cremant du Jura Chardonnay must comprise at least 50% of the total cuvée. For rosé Cremant du Jura Poulsard and Pinot Noir must comprise at least 50% of the total cuvée.

Berlioz Chignin (Jacquere) 10 (2/6)

Gilles Berlioz Chignin 2010 Grape:100% Jacquère (11.5% alc.) This comes from 30 to 80 year old vines planted in clayey soil on a steep limestone hillside. It is a light, zesty wine, with surprising length and a chalky lift on the finish. For drinking now to 2014+. Location: Le Viviers, Chignin. Very windy location. Parcel called ‘Les Crays’ (very high altitude, next to Swiss border) Size of domaine: 3 hectares (sold 2.8 hectares to concentrate on producing quality wines and convert to agro-bio) Grape: 100% Jacquère – 30 to 80 yr old vines. Rootstock 3309 and uses massale selection. 7000-9000 vines per hectare. Terroir: Clay on limestone base. 40cm of soil overlying limestone base. Gradient between 20-50% on south-west facing slope. Viticulture: Practiced bio-dynamic viticulture since 2006 and certified Eco-cert (organic). Ploughs and hoes the soil. 4 to 5 bunches of grapes per vine, or 35 hectors per hectare. Debuds, but never vendanges en vert, and leaf thins towards the end of August, looking for maximum aeration of the grape bunch. Hand harvested in 2 tries. Vinification: Long 5 hours pressing with a pneumatic press. Uses minimal sulphur dioxide. Indigenous natural yeasts, no chaptalisation, and the wine is neither acidified or de-acidified. Cuve fermented at 18°C for one month. Gravity rather than pumping. Malolactic completed 100%. Racked once after malos. Stays on the fine lees until April then filtered (but never fined) and bottled according to the lunar cycle at the end of the month. 7000 bottles produced.

J.M. Rauffault Chinon blanc 09 (3/6)

Chinon Blanc 2009 Raffault makes 500 cases per year of a rarely seen white Chinon, made from Chenin Blanc grapes. It is harvested after the reds grapes, and vinified in stainless steel tanks. The white Chinon is bottled in the Spring, at the same time as the Rose. Chinon Blanc is a unique expression of the Chenin Blanc grape. It has a soft, fresh entry, with enticing peach, pear and citrus flavors, nuanced by a gentle minerality from its limestone-chalk soil. The Chinon Blanc is excellent on its own, as an aperitif, and with cold seafood, grilled fish, and curries found in Indian and Thai dishes. CHINON Jean-Maurice Raffault’s famed Chinon estate is now run by his son Rodolphe. Chinon is located in the central Loire valley, near Tours, and is the northernmost French red wine appellation. The family has been vignerons in Chinon since 1693 and the estate now comprises 40 hectares spread over 6 communes. Raffault harvests his Cabernet Francs as late as possible and vinifies each parcel separately. Fermentation can last up to one month with daily pumping over for maximum extraction of color and flavors. The wines are then aged in Bordeaux barrels in his remarkable 54 degree cellar (caves cut into the limestone slopes) and are bottled without filtration. Raffault is one of the few Chinon producers still using oak barrels to produce stable, tannic wines with impressive structure and intensity of fruit. It's fascinating to taste the ultimate expression of the Cabernet Franc varietal in the range of styles made by this very talented winemaker. Rodolphe Raffault obtained a post graduate degree in Chemistry in Tours and then studied for the National Diploma in Oenology from the University of Dijon. After taking his degree, Rodolphe spent 2 years in Burgundy as a stagiere, followed by another stage at a Loire Co-op. In 1997, he joined his father Jean-Maurice, at the family domaine in Chinon which had by then grown to 40 hectares. He has been in charge of the vineyards and winemaking since the 2000 vintage. Rodolphe is proud to perpetuate his family’s heritage as wine-growers, which began in 1693. He is particularly motivated to continue his late father’s innovation of single-site bottling in Chinon, for example with his revival of the historic Clos des Capucins vineyard. Going forward, Rodolphe Raffault is evolving his vineyards in the direction of sustainable and organic viticulture. The Raffault specialty is the different cuvees coming from distinct sites. Raffault’s Chinons are wonderfully expressive wines which go together with a wide variety of classic French dishes but their natural fruity acidities make them fine matches for Asiatic cuisine, grilled fish, and spicy American foods. For wines with such depth and complexity, they also represent remarkable value.

Chofflet-Valdenaire Givry 09 (4/6)

Domaine Choffet-Valdenaire, Givry 09 The Chofflet-Valdenaire estate, located in the hillside hamlet of Russily, has been in their family for over 100 years. The domaine possesses very well-placed vineyards with an average age of 25 years. The estate’s Givry AOC comes from several vineyard parcels. The grapes are entirely hand-harvested and 100% destemmed. It is aged half in tank, half in two-three year casks for one year before bottling. 90 pts ~ Wine Spectator This is rich and dripping with aromas and flavors of black cherry, blackberry and spice. There's plenty of flesh to coat the tannins, and a lingering finish Chofflet-Valdenaire, Givry 2009 100% Hand harvested and de-stemmed Givry sees a minimal amount of oak giving it a fresh, bright, edge. Get your first taste of the righteous '09 vintage. February 18, 2009 WINES OF THE TIMES Those Other Burgundies By ERIC ASIMOV SO close, and yet so far away. I sometimes wonder how it feels to be a vigneron in the Côte Chalonnaise, the hilly region that extends south and slightly east of the southern tip of the Côte d’Or, the great heart of Burgundy. The Côte d’Or, of course, receives all the accolades, the fawning visits and the money. The Côte Chalonnaise receives the figurative back of the hand because, well, it just isn’t the Côte d’Or. But it isn’t Beaujolais, either — that is, a different sort of nearby region that is simply linked administratively to Burgundy. The reds are made of pinot noir, the whites of chardonnay, just as in the famed villages to the north. Yet the wines from the main villages of the Côte Chalonnaise — Bouzeron, Rully, Mercurey, Givry and Montagny — have always been considered the poor rustic relations, without the elegance, grace or delineated intensity of their betters. As in all the world’s great but stratified wine regions, it must be a bitter thing to realize that regardless of how much commitment one brings to the soil, the grape and the winemaking, respect will always be elusive. But no matter how vast a chasm separates the Côte Chalonnaise from the Côte d’Or, it is still Burgundy after all, and the spillover potential is alluring. The hope always beckons that for appreciably less money the villages of the Côte Chalonnaise will offer a satisfying glimpse of Burgundy’s gorgeous sunlight. This hasn’t always been the case. In his book “The Wines of Burgundy” (University of California Press, 2008), Clive Coates calls the Côte Chalonnaise “a well-known forgotten area,” suggesting that while people in the wine trade acknowledge that the region is worth investigating, few merchants have actually taken the trouble to explore what the Côte Chalonnaise has to offer. For many years Americans have effectively not had access to some of the region’s best producers. Yet things are indeed changing for the better. As in so many other regions all over the world, the viticulture and cellar work in the Côte Chalonnaise have improved tremendously in the last 20 years. A new generation has taken over, one that has traveled widely and understands that quality is paramount in a global business. And more importers are seriously exploring the Côte Chalonnaise and making some of the better producers more widely available. The tasting panel recently sampled 25 reds from Rully, Mercurey and Givry, the leading Côte Chalonnaise villages for pinot noir. Eighteen were from the 2005 vintage and seven from 2006. Florence Fabricant and I were joined for the tasting by Michael Madrigale, the sommelier at Bar Boulud, and Chris Goodhart, who oversees wine programs at Keith McNally’s restaurants. We were all impressed with the wines, though a few cautionary notes were sounded as well. I was the most enthusiastic, finding the wines pretty, seductive and aromatic. I was struck by how much better they were than even 10 years ago. Nobody disagreed with me. But Michael and Chris, who deal directly with the public every day, both felt that these wines were more likely to appeal to people who already know and love Burgundy. For inexperienced wine drinkers, or for those who preferred New World pinot noir, they felt, these might not be the most appropriate wines. “It’s a factor of fruit,” Michael said. “You always want a little fruit as a buffer, and with some of these you don’t have a lot of fruit.” Indeed, the wines are leaner and more taut than many New World pinot noirs, which are generally fleshier with more sweetness and body. In general, the beauty of Burgundy is its combination of light-bodied grace and intensity. The trick in the Côte Chalonnaise, where the growing season is slightly cooler than in the Côte d’Or, is to make sure the grapes ripen fully and to keep grape yields low to maximize intensity. Certainly our top wines don’t lack fruit. The ’05 Rully En Guesnes from Vincent Dureuil-Janthial, our No. 1, had lovely, complex flavors of berries, earth and minerals, while our No. 2, the ’05 Givry Clos de la Servoisine from Jean-Marc Joblot, had beautiful fruit and floral aromas and great balance. Our No. 3, the 2006 Clos des Myglands from Joseph Faiveley, has been a favorite of mine for years. This wine is a little closed now, typical for a young Faiveley, and it’s sturdier than the Rully or Givry, as is typical of Mercurey, but its pretty violet, berry and earth tones should open beautifully in the next few years. These three wines, $37, $47 and $40 respectively, are not cheap. But they are on the high end for the Côte Chalonnaise, and they do represent good values for Burgundy buyers. “A lot of people who were buying $80 or $90 bottles are now buying $40 or $50 bottles,” Chris said. Our No. 4 wine, a 2005 Givry from Chofflet-Valdenaire, was light, delicate and balanced, and, at $24, it was our best value. It was gentler than some of the other wines, with a lively acidity, and I really liked it. But I could see that if one preferred bigger, more sumptuous wines this might seem a bit thin. The best wines of the Côte Chalonnaise are not always easy to find. Some of the top producers, like Faiveley and Jean-Marc Joblot, had two wines each among our top 10. But we couldn’t find bottles from other leading names. I can assure you that Mercurey from Michel Juillot and Domaine Menand, Givry from François Lumpp, and Bourgogne rouge from A.& P. de Villaine are all excellent choices. In the future, as more people taste these wines and recognize their quality, I hope they will become easier to find. Soon enough, people may no longer speak wistfully about what the Côte Chalonnaise is not, but instead speak enthusiastically about what it has become. (E. Asimov, NYT)

Dom Jean David, Seguret CDR 09 (5/6)

"I put the afternoon sun's fierce glow at my back as I pedaled uphill to Domaine Jean David near Séguret, who caught my attention with their "vin biologique" sign, and I wondered what I'd find. After all, good terroir and organically grown grapes only take you so far, and I'd never heard of the domaine, knew no rep. As it happens, I'd stumbled into a domaine committed to using indigenous yeasts only, rejecting all stabilizers and enzymes, fermenting without mechanical temperature control, and bottling with a minimum of sulfur — and in the case of one bottling, none at all. In other words, the Davids (yes, they are a family-run domaine) pursue a natural winemaking regime, although they don't advertise it as such. Mme Marine David greeted me and took me through a tasting. She explained that the Davids ferment and age their wines solely in cement. If a barrel helps tame a red wine's tannins, a cement tank is apt to emphasize them, and the tannins in the traditionally made reds are certainly untamed. They resolve at their own pace and are expressed differently in each wine. (The Davids could inoculate with a lab yeast that's designed to smooth the tannins, but obviously they do not.) Soils here are primarily argilo-calcaire, clay with limestone. 2009 Côtes du Rhône: This young wine is strongly tannic and to my taste needs time, although it already shows fresh raspberries, good structure, and decent acidity. Vine age averages 30 years and it's a blend of 50% grenache and 25% each carignan and syrah. 2008 Séguret Côtes du Rhône Villages: The medium-bodied Séguret is a step up from the above CdR, as it shows better acidity, more complexity, and a greater sense of soil, with garrigue and licorice aspects. The average age of the vines is 50 years and while more grenache is used (68%) the Davids blend in a wider array of grapes: syrah, cinsault, counoise, and mourvèdre. Jean David in Seguret – or how not to meet a wine maker Jean David has been organic as long as anyone down here in Provence. From a family of vignerons just under the ridiculously picturesque village of Seguret, he makes a wide range of wine for which I should have allowed a good couple of hours. It was just before a crazy weekend down here, with major wine gigs in three villages. The Hospices at Gigondas was doing a tasting of the 2009 vintage. Then there was a big wine market at Cairanne. Finally, the village of Rasteau was running its second EcriVin voyageur at which I’d been asked to »animate » a discussion of six travel writers about their take on wine and travel. So, my phone kept ringing as Jean was pouring. I was just grabbing of snippets of sensations, the antithesis of what wine is all about. It shows disrespect. Jean is a marvelous fellow with a wonderful face, especially when the late afternoon sun does to its contours what it does out in the vines. So, I’ll be back, without my phone next time. Wines tasted (with Emmanuel Imbert of Dvins, in Lyon): Rousanne 2009 Vin de Table (rich and fruity); le Rose de Janot (made from half a dozen varieties, very floral; 2008 Seguret rouge (« the mildew was a brothel, but the organic products are getting better » – again, made from many varieties and rich and generous for that year); 2007 Seguret rouge (although opened a few days earlier, it had a delicate nose, delightfully mouth filling. I had to leave before the end of the tasting." Some quotes « What’s the main thing? That my family has been working these vines for three generations. After that comes the terroir and the rest. » « I let the young vines do what they want to do, don’t hold them back too much. It’s like people. You have to let the young ones express themselves. I put the grapes into the Cotes du Rhone, not the Seguret. » « I don’t like technology. I prefer to be instinctive, and to observe. We are never sheltered from all the things that can happen. We have to leave a bit to chance. It’s pretentious to think that we can master everything.

Belingard Monbazillac 07 dessert wine (6/6)

The wines of Monbazillac were brought to fame by Dutch traders who not only found religious ties with the Protestant communities of the area, but also a reliable supply of sweet wines at better prices than anywhere else. Unlike Sauternes, there are no intersecting rivers to create the freak set of conditions that favours the development of botrytis. Instead Monbazillac is blessed with a micro-climate conducive to morning fogs and warm autumnal sunshine. Chateau Belingard is located in the village of Pomport, just south of Bergerac, sitting on the limestone plateau that dominates the valley of the Dordogne. This excellent Sauternes styled sweet white is produced from a blend of 90% Semillon, 5% Sauvignon and 5% Muscadelle harvested manually over several selective ‘tries’, or passes whereby only botrytis effected grapes are selected. Bright straw colour with pale gold edges and pale straw hue. The nose displays strong botrytis lift with aromas of honeyed apricots, peach, spice and tropical fruits. Rich, luscious, mouthfilling palate flavours of honey, apricots, tropical fruits and spice. An almost creamy like texture is combined with a perfect acid balance that keeps the wine fresh.Clean, dry finish, with long aftertaste of honey, apricots and spice. The Vineyards are situated on hillsides south of Bergerac in one of the most prestigious towns of the Monbazillac appellation, at altitude of 170 metres, on clayey limestone and the calcareous subsoil of Castillon. Chateau Belingard is made from a blend of Sémillon (90%), Sauvignon (5%) and Muscadelle (5%). Winemaking Process Over-matured grapes concentrated by the Noble Rot (the Botrytis Cinerea fungus) are picked, in October to the beginning of November. The grapes are pressed gradually so as to enable the extraction of the best wine drained from the vat. The must is then fermented at a controlled temperature of approximately 20°C. When the alcohol-residual sugar balance has been reached, fermentation is stopped by cold sulphating to master the sulphur content. After six months in a vat for clarification, the wine is run off into oak 225-litre barrels. After being kept in wood for a period of 12 to 18 months, the wine takes on its fullness, with the aromas thus revealed. A gentle fining process is carried out just before bottling. Preservation 8 to 10 years. Tasting At a temperature of 7-8°C, it is ideal as an aperitif in winter before the fire, with foie gras, white meats, blue cheese (Roquefort) and desserts with red fruits. Features It has a full nose with a blend of honey, wax, candied fruits and aromas that are characteristic of botrytis. The wine is powerful, while maintaining a touch of acidity for a light effect and a superb compromise between fat and finesse. Vintage: 2006/07 Colour: White Dessert Variety: Semillon Producer: Chateau Belingard Origin: Bordeaux, France Style: Dessert Wines When to Drink: Wines to Drink Now Bottle Size: 75cl Bin Number: 465