Monday 2nd May - Provence!

I left Bordeaux on the late flight to Marseille … great views of the Côte d’Azur as we flew in along the Mediterranean coastline.

I picked up a hire car and drove east into the beautiful hills of Provence towards Brignolles. The sunset lit the distant hills beautifully and the warm air carried the typical aromas of lavender and Provencal herbs.

I arrived late and managed to find a little restaurant where I had a taste of Jonny Depp's 2009 Chateau Miraval 100% Rolle (the local name for Vermentino). It was very good indeed – but expensive – and I can assure you my 2009 Vent de Folie Vermentino beats it hands down.

Up at the crack of dawn again and soon winding down through the hills towards St.Tropez. It was quite cool this morning and I had heard it had been rather cold the last 10 days in comparison to the heat wave in Bordeaux. It was startlingly evident in the vineyard where the new shoots were a third of the size of those in Saint Emilion!

I stopped a stone’s throw before St.Tropez at my destination of Ramatuelle which lies just inside the prestigious vineyard commune of St.Tropez.

The cooperative is very small and friendly and gets overshadowed by the bigger coops and posh Domaines in the area but they have some great rose! I tasted through the vats and once I was happy I loaded the awaiting tanker.

I was taking the wine safely up to the Breban family bottling facility back in Brignolles with whom Tony has been working with for many, many years. On arrival, I met Laurent who was as energetic as ever and as I walked towards the winery, sisters and cousins popped out here and there to say bonjour!

The tanker was unloaded and then I went up and up the stairs until I reached what seemed like rose heaven! The tasting room was jam packed and in every direction I looked there were hundreds of bottles of beautiful salmon pink rose so typical of the region!

We tasted some lovely 2010's in bottle before tasting some 2009 sparkling that the Brebans are famous for. The P.S. tasted great, as did a little 7% alc fizzy Muscat.

A quick tour of the winery and bottling plant and a good ten minutes spent with Laurent admiring his new addition to the bottling line; a top-of-the-range screw-cap machine!

Back to Bordeaux tonight as I need to be in Pomerol first thing tomorrow!

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Eel Day in Bordeaux, Sat 30th April

Up first thing as a busy day ahead starting with the Lamproie Fete in Sainte Terre. Lamproie are a type of eel and a very traditional and expensive Bordeaux dish. The Lamproie are only fished at this time of year and are cooked in a thick red wine sauce - using Bordeaux wine of course! The Lamproie are sold live and are extremely ugly creatures but they taste divine.



The French, as always, need no excuse to put on a party and eel day was perfect! There were brass bands, a huge marquee with 300 people having lunch, local food stalls, antiques fair, bars and a car boot sale! We could of stayed all day but we had a lunch invitation at Chateau Mangot in St.Emilion.

Today was also the 'portes ouverts' in St.Emilion where all the Chateaux open their doors and welcome visitors. The lunch was for 100 guests and we sat down to eat in the magnificent cellar looking out onto vineyards. The menu was matched superbly with various vintages of Chateau Mangot including asparagus and duck with the 2008 and the sauté de boeuf and the 2005 although the 2002 was excellent with the brebis cheese.

Dinner was eel now excellently disguised in the red wine sauce and it went beautifully with the recently bottled 2009 Grand Chai Montagne Saint Emilion.

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International Wine Challenge, London

Last week I stayed on in London to judge wines at the IWC competition at the Barbican centre. The competition is a huge affair with many of the top MW’s, winemakers and wine writers involved.

On arrival everyone is split into groups of 5 each with a team leader and allocated two tasting tables on which flights of blind tastings are waiting. Once the first flight is finished we switch to the second table whilst the previous table is cleared down and another flight is set up and then it’s back to the first table, this carries on all day.

The flights are very varied and can be white, red, rose, sparkling, sweet or fortified from any country. The previous week the preliminary rounds had already been completed so this was the important tasting where all wines were potential medal winners!

I tasted some very impressive wines over the 3 days with South African dry white blends, northern Rhone Syrah and Australian Shiraz being very memorable. After each long day the evening Coopers Aussie ale was much welcomed!

I also managed to go to a shop tasting in Hersham where Tony and JMS were presenting Chai vs New World. All the wines were very good and the competition was very close, but I think the chai just won!

It started with 2008 sparkling rose from leading UK bubbles maker Ridgeview Estate then:

1. Laithwaite Sauvignon Blanc 2010
vs Viña Tarapacá Sauvignon Blanc 2010
2. La Part du Boucher
vs Hickinbottom Shiraz Cabernet 2009
3. Le Grand Chai Sauternes 2006
vs Westend Estate Three Bridges Boytritis 2006

Thursday was spent at Head office for a giant Midi tasting with Tony and buyers Becca and Kat in the tasting room.

In the afternoon I headed out to Abingdon to pay a visit to Will Laithwaites’ new brewery, Loose Cannon. After all the week’s wine a beer tasting was extremely enjoyable, cheers!

Will has a great set up and making some cracking ales. On entering the brewery I was overwhelmed with the aromas of the fresh hops that were being soaked for today’s brew. I tried the Abingdon Bridge bitter from yesterday’s brew which is superbly aromatic and a lovely full flavour. I left Will finishing off his brew and hitched a lift to Henley with Caleb in the keg van delivering to great little real ale pubs along the way!

After all that work we thoroughly deserved a pint and Caleb of course knew all the pubs where we could get a good pint of Loose Cannon!

Friday it was back to Bordeaux and to the Chai where Denis was waiting with a beaming smile. Nice to see the knife, the beret and the saucisson all back in the right place!

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