I’ve played a lot with graffiti in the past few months and it’s always been pretty popular.  So I should probably post it here on the blog which is a tad more permanent than facebook status updates and tweets.

Sud de France launched an ad campaign with these posters that feature a model who might be eating a picnic on a dock… a picnic consisting of like 300 different products from the south of France including but not limited to an entire leg of ham.  It looks like quite a picnic and she is pretty so you worry that she is eating all that alone (although it’s good to know she’s not annorexic).

Here’s the ad as it appears on the Sud de France website:

I floated a different version of the ad with a thought bubble explaining the concerned look on her face.

Then the other day I saw this TER train:

Normally the trains in the region say “Vivre en Languedoc-Roussillon” but you can’t spell vivre without ivre.  So with one letter removed, the slogan goes from “To Live in Languedoc Roussillon” to “Drunk in the Languedoc Roussillon”.  You have to love French and the efforts of this very inspired graffiti artist.  I swear it wasn’t me.

And now the Outsiders are playing around with a new logo for our event at Vinisud.

You may have seen the images from Mai 1968 like these.  Well it’s gone from “Nous somme le pouvoir” to “Nous somme la pour boire”. 🙂

One of the best parts of the recent European Wine Bloggers Conference in Brescia, Italy is the post trips. Wine regions like Franciacorta (the primary sponsor for the event), il Soave (the region I visited on Sunday), and many others invited bloggers to tour wineries, see historical sites, and taste local food and wine. These trips tend to be very informative, offering a window into the typicity of an area’s wine, the culture that surrounds the vines, and a lot of fun memories. My Sunday trip to Soave was also notable for making me really really jealous.

Jealous of Communication Efforts

Amazing sense of style

First of all, Soave had a great sense of flair for receiving people.  They understood how to use the beauty of the land and how to play it up a little.  A lot of the time, I feel like winemakers in my region forget how beautiful the place is.  I’m reminded of a promotional trip billed as a walk in the Pic Saint Loup where we just walked a few yards in some vines in one of the valleys.  And only when several of the journalists expressed disappointment did our resourceful winemaker/guides realize they could take us up on one of the higher plateaus from which we saw the entire area.  Thankfully that trip was salvaged, but it came close to being a dud (if it weren’t for the resourcefulness of the locals).  On the other hand, Soave did everything right.  With a name like soave, it makes sense that they’d be smooth operators.

But I mean we’d visit a gorgeous vineyard overlooking the valleys below.  And then we’d be confronted with a really unique style of winemaking like the Recioto di Soave.  The tasting was held in the room where they hang all the grapes on string to dry them out before making their pasito.  It is such a stunning site.  Or later in the day, we were received in a beautiful old building in Monteforte d’Alpone with a piano in the courtyard before ascending to a tasting and lunch in the cloister of Carvaggio’s Palazzo Vescovile.  Because that’s just how they roll in Italy.

In short, Soave demonstrated an amazing sense of style and even dramatics without falling into caricature.  They didn’t try to cling to any “spaghetti and meatballs” kind of stereotypes to impress us.  (Ask me about how often I have to eat cassoulet with journalists who visit my region).

video by Ignacio Segovia

But it’s not just fine aesthetics that made me jealous.  Actually, that’s the least of the things I’m jealous of.

Increasing Visibility of Communication Efforts

What I loved most in Soave was their common sense approach to increasing visibility.  They had gone to great expense to impress us and share their amazing culture and wines with us.  So they went a little bit further and hired a video crew to film the entire trip and IMMEDIATELY put it online.  Things were going up almost instantly.  That video at the top of the page where I’m talking about soave was filmed at 10 AM and it was online before I could fill my face with risotto at lunch.  😀

When you put money into impressing journalists/bloggers, you should also think about immortalizing that effort and experience on the Internet.  That way, the small experience that went to a group of 20 journalists can now be rehashed over and over by hundreds or thousands on the Internet.

Using Local Brand Ambassadors

Futhermore… I feel like I’m buring this in the middle of an article when it’s really the most important point in here.  Soave works with local brand ambassadors to amplify their communication efforts.  That’s a fancy way to say they invite their biggest supporters to piggyback on promotional efforts for journalists.  Such a simple idea.  I wish my region did it more effectively.  Right before we arrived to the first winery, our guide let us know that a small group would be joining us.  I wasn’t sure what that meant.  But I talked to members of that second group and it turned out they’re just locals who frequently communicate on the soave brand.  Or people from other parts of Italy who are good spokespeople for soave.  So any time Soave is undergoing the expense of having a group like the EWBC in, they send an email to their best brand ambassadors and allow them to join in on the fun.  The CIVL has asked me to do this once or twice and Sud de France has as well.  I’m grateful, but I think I’m in the minority.  I really wish that I’d run into the people who contribute most to this region’s online communications.  People like Rosemary George, Graham Tiggs, Chez Loulou, Nina Izzo, Michel Smith, Louise Hurren, and so on live really nearby.  They should basically be kept abreast of everything.  Actually some of the people on that list will be at many events, but that’s only because they’ve crossed some imaginary threshold to officially be labeled press or PR people.  The marginal cost of inviting ten more people to a large tasting area is rather negligible.  Of course, if you start including seated meals and hotel rooms, the costs are totally different and you can’t always offer those to everybody.  But anyway, I’m jealous because I feel like the promotional bodies in my area don’t respect their local brand ambassadors as much as Soave does.  That’s the heart of it.  I don’t want somebody to misread this and think that I’m lamenting my personal travails.  Again, several organizations have done really remarkable things for me and opened doors into fascinating events.  But more could be done to make other brand ambassadors feel like they’re really appreciated.

And a final note: In Soave, even larger organizations like Borgo Rocca Sveva are on board with the importance of social media.  I am seeing glimmers of hope and interest from Sieur d’Arques, Anne de Joyeuse, and so on.  But the vast majority of the medium sized coops right up to the UCCOARs seem to be totally uninterested in communicating direct to consumer online.  There are obvious exceptions like Embres & Castelmaure, master communicators who are keenly watching the Internet space.  But these are exceptions.  Borgo Rocca Sveva is enormous, but they still realize that it’s possible to have unique voices online even in an organization of that size.  I wish we had co-ops with websites like Borgo Rocca Sveva’s blog.  EDIT: okay, so while fact checking (I do that occasionally) I discovered that Sieur d’Arques does have a blog? http://sieurdarques.unblog.fr/  Updated on and off since 2009 with lots of different subjects that go beyond the typical “we won an award” type of post.  How did I not know that?  Anyway. Foot in mouth. My bad. 

The region is also working strongly on communicating with consumers online.  Find il Soave on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and so on.

Franciacorta’s efforts

I should also mention Franciacorta’s colossal effort in receiving the conference. We really had a top notch experience in the Santa Giulia in Brescia. Even the hotels chosen had a lot of character. No bland, corporate moments. An entire trip full of charm and quirks. And an enormous sense of cooperation between winemakers (perhaps reminiscent of the strict military style formations in Champagne houses) I’ll probably write about all this on a separate occasion.  But let it be known that I can’t think of Soave’s hospitality without thinking of Franciacorta’s as well.  Italy on a whole was very very good to me.

The Wine is Good Too

Let’s not allow the communication efforts to overshadow the wines.  Simply put, I wouldn’t be writing about soave at all if their wines weren’t amazing.  The reason I chose this trip in the first place is because I thought I could learn a lot about the calcareous soil whites (although I did fall for a few volcanic terroir wines too).  And it was an added bonus that Soave faces a similar challenge to the Languedoc’s.  Soave is a word that was used to describe vast amounts of generic Italian white wine of forgetable quality.  And now the best winemakers in the region are trying to rebrand themselves without abandoning this once degraded name “soave”.  If they can do it, so can the Languedoc.  PS – I’m making white wine on limestone and clay soon so I wanted to steal some techniques too. ;D

Jealous of everything?

Well now, I put a question mark in there. I loved the wines we tasted, especially around lunch time (no big surprise, Ryan likes wine more with food ;D).  I loved the communication efforts.  I loved everything.  But despite all my jealousy and the tastiness of their wines, I’m still very happy in the Languedoc.  I think we have all the opportunities in the world.  It’s just a good idea to look at neighbors like Soave to see what’s being done right in other regions.

In September 2011, we did a special harvest and micro vinification with part of the Merlot, Cabernet and Syrah. It was a natural, extended whole cluster carbonic maceration.

The experimental fermentation

Natural means nothing added.  We counted on wild yeasts and used no sulfites.

Extended means that I let the maceration run for about six weeks.  That’s a long time.  Especially for a carbonic.

Whole cluster means I left the grapes on the stems.

Carbonic maceration means the tank was completely sealed throughout the maceration so there was virtually no oxygen.  The chemical reactions during fermentation result in totally different flavors when there is no oxygen in the environment.  Lots of candy like, bubblegummy flavors (often associated with beaujolais nouveau).

Harvest

I previously posted about harvesting the grapes for this micro vinification experiment.

Decuvage

After the six weeks were up, we opened the tank and checked on the grapes.  I really had no idea what to expect.

It smelled great and looked like most of the grapes had stayed intact.

We drained juice from the bottom of the tank and took density measurements to see how much sugar was left.  It turns out that we had almost finished fermentation on the free running juice.  It was at .999 the density of water.  Almost! Tasted great.  This was definitely killer wine.  The grapes also tasted delicious.  I froze some for use in cooking recipes later this winter.

Once we drained all the free running juice, it was time to tip the tank over and scoop out all the remaining grapes into a vertical wooden press.  So many of the grapes were still intact, the entire fermentation happening INSIDE the grape.  When I would reach in with the bucket, I would hear lots of popping noises as my fingers pressed into the grapes.  It was like wine-scented bubble wrap. PS somebody should make wine scented bubble wrap.

I pressed the grapes.  This juice was slightly sweeter/denser.  It’s clear the fermentation stuck.  Such is life.  I guess I’m supposed to restart it with a tete de cuve (when you make a little bit of the juice ferment and then double it in size after a day and double it in size again after another day and so on until you get the whole container).  But the amount of juice we got is pathetically small (maybe 2 hectoliters / not even a barrel).  So a tete de cuve on this would be like a glass of wine.  And then the next day a bottle.  And then maybe a jug.  😀

We’ll see.

All the photos of our decuvage

 

Volem Dire al Pais is a video series that aired at the Université de la Vigne et du Vin in 2011 in Ferrals-les-Corbieres. The video series is embedded below. This is one post in an ongoing series about the Universite de la Vigne et du Vin.

One of the coolest things about the Université de la Vigne et du Vin was a series of videos they presented throughout the day called “Volem dire al pais”. The occitan title is a nice nod to the fact that this conference is about local farmers. Occitan dominated these vines for a long time, much longer than French or Anglicized slang, a constant theme for the conference.

Sometimes, conferences like this get a little high brow and far-removed from the winemakers. These videos served as a healthy dose of local wisdom injected into the conference between every set of speakers. A really clever way to help give a well-paced message from lots of locals in between the more academic presentations.

And there are a few good laughs too. 😀

[iframe http://www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/xm1j45 480 360]
Volèm dire al País, l’intégrale des 5 volets par onziemetoile

In September 2011, we did a special harvest and micro vinification with part of the Merlot, Cabernet and Syrah. Two of the WWOOFers (volunteers learning about farming) staying at O’Vineyards spent a couple days hand-harvesting grapes for a small project of mine.

Harvesting O’Blivion

We brought the harvest in and did a natural, whole-cluster extended carbonic maceration in a small stainless steel tank I have. No sulfites added. No yeast added. No air. No nothing. We just put a bunch of grapes in an airtight container and sealed the lid for six weeks. And the results are impressive!

The codename for the cuve has been O’Blivion because the WWOOFers were Cronenberg fans and we watched Videodrome a couple nights before starting this project. (There’s a character in Videodrome named Brian O’Blivion.)

It was a late harvest and it had its complications. At that point, we were already seeing a lot of shriveling and a bit of rot too so we had to be pretty selective in the hand harvest. Only picking the best grape bunches that seemed least affected by the adverse conditions of late harvesting, we managed to get about 5 hectoliters (500 liters) of grapes.

Photos of harvest

Help and credit

We should give a shout out to Matt and Erica, the WWOOFers who contributed so much to this little tank of wine. And Laurent and Alexandra from Tonton Marcel also helped out on the day they were at O’Vineyards.  A lot of the photos above were taken by them.

Normally, this is the time of year when the whole vineyard goes dormant.  The leaves change color and fall off as the green vines turn into wood.  But this year we’re seeing a lot of unusual behavior in the Syrah vines where many plants are actually growing new leaves!

How vines usually behave

This is a picture of a row of Merlot vines just a few hundred yards away from the Syrah.  You can see that these vines are already dormant.  They have lost almost all their leaves and have hardened to wood.  Although there are a couple traces of green on one of the plants in the far left of the photo, most of the vines are ready to be pruned.

In the detail below, you really see that the vines have hardened to wood and that there is no new growth.

The Syrah’s Unusual Green Growth

Compare that detail of the Merlot to this close up from the Syrah:

Lots of green growth! New buds!  And it’s not  just that the wood hardens progressively and hasn’t reached the ends of the branches yet.  Normally, those are newly grown leaves.  In the photo below, you see the clear juxtaposition of a new green bud on a hardened wooden branch.  Highly unusual stuff!

And these young buds aren’t isolated to a plant here and there.  The whole parcel is showing new leaves as displayed in the photo below.

More photos of the vines in november

Why a November spring?

You’re probably wondering why this is happening.  I know I was.

The Chamber of Agriculture supplied a simple answer a couple weeks ago: it doesn’t feel like winter yet!   The temperatures have been so mild.  Yesterday was balmy 18 degrees outside.  We opened all the doors and windows.  As a result of the temperature, sunshine and so on, the vines think they have enough energy to start growing new leaves again.   I’ve heard that grapevines in Florida give two crops a year for this very reason.  There is no winter season there!

In nature, this would benefit them because they could continue to grow through an indian summer.  However we need them to take a break and build up their reserves for next spring!

What will we do?

Just wait.  In all likelihood the winter temperatures will set in and the vines will take the hint and fall asleep.  It’s just an interesting phenomenon and we’ll only know how it affects next year’s crop a year from now.  🙂

2011 has been a very strang vintage and the viticultural anomalies are continuing even after harvest.  This is normally the most predictable time of year.  Once you harvest the grapes, the leaves all turn fall colors and they fall off.  The stems all harden into sturdy wood.  And then you prune back before the next spring.  But this year, some of the syrah vines got confused and started growing new green growth in October/November!

I attended the Université de la Vigne et du Vin in Ferrals-les-Corbieres, a small village in the heart of Languedoc wine country.  This post is a summary of my day.  A full pdf of the event program can be downloaded.

In brief

It was pretty cool.  The Uni is a real home-grown event where some very motivated people in the region (namely Nadine Franjus-Adenis) have organized a conference that addresses issues facing contemporary viticulture.

Being local, the conference has a lot of personality and is a bit quirky (which you know I am a fan of).  The organizers interrupt speakers every time they use anglicisms.  There’s a lot of occitan thrown around between presentations.  The whole event is clearly taking place in the Languedoc.

And it also feels a lot less pretentious than other more International events.  And the speakers are easily as good here as the ones I see at larger conferences (Wine Futures comes to mind).  You don’t need to be a big wine celebrity to be thought-provoking. Which is funny because the theme was actually about being a big wine celebrity.

2011’s theme – Riche et Celebre

The theme was “Riche et Celebre?”, a playful choice because virtually all of us in the wine business know how impractical it is to think that all winemakers could become rich and famous.

Louise Hurren’s summary on facebook is very accurate:

Essentially, it was about the importance, for wines and wineries, of being known, of having an identity. In French, the process of being first “connu” and then “reconnu”… there was a lot of talk about the need to work together as a group and have a collective identity. Lot of debate about whether to promote under the banner of terroir, of cepage, of appellation, of brand (eg. Sud de France)… and so on.

People presented on a variety of subjects linked to the theme of notoriety.  There were a number of things I disagreed with, but that’s healthy for a real exchange of ideas.  I hate those conferences where everybody agrees.

Actual speaker synopsis

I started writing these up and some of them got very long so I’ll give them their own posts.  Follow the link to read my thoughts on any particular speaker.

Jacky Rigaux, Université de Bourgogne –
Terroir is the best way to promote French wines

Christophe Juarez, France, ton vin est dans le rouge –
Adapting to the modern wine world

Jacques Berthomeau, Ministry of Agriculture & Blogger –
Share your stories and use the Internet

Francois Druel, web consultant –
The Internet is cool

Christine Ontivero, PR –
What Press Agents do

Michel Smith, Jouranlist/Blogger and Winemaker –
How to communicate with journalists

Panel Discussion: Individual versus Collective Identity

• moderated by Hervé Hannin, director of Institut des Hautes Etudes de la Vigne et du Vin
• Jacques Berthomeau, as above
• Elodie Le Drean, filiere vin Sud de France Developpement
• Jerome Villaret, delegue general CIVL
• Xavier de Volontat, vigneron independant & President AOC Corbieres
• Frantz Venes, Chateau Massamier la Mignarde

Volem Dire al Pais – short film interview series with Michel Cano conducting interviews and film/editing by Alexandre Pachoutinsky

Wine tasting with Frederic Senechal from L’Auberge du Vieux Puits (Gilles Goujon three michelin starred restaurant)

coverage of l’Universite de la Vigne et du Vin

Other articles about the event:

• Berthomeau wrote
• Michel Smith wrote

Photos of Universite de la Vigne et du Vin

 

I had the pleasure of hearing Jacky Rigaux speak at the Université de la Vigne et du Vin in 2011 in Ferrals les Corbieres.  This is a synopsis of his lecture and my reaction to what he’s saying.  This is one post in an ongoing series about the Universite de la Vigne et du Vin.

Jacky Rigaux, Université de Bourgogne – Terroir is the best way to promote French wines.

A rather professorly lecture that reminded me of my political science days at Tulane University.  The main message was that France can only maintain/increase wine sales by focusing on terroir.  Rigaux drew a clear line between “vin de technologie” and “vin de lieu”.  Other dichotomies included “mineralité” vs “sucrosité”.  And finally “culture” vs. “business”.  And the speech concludes with the notion that wine should be marketed to illuminated niche markets.  He has this beautiful notion of a multitude of niches creating islands of resistance against homogenized, industrial wine.

I felt the presentation was engaging and full of good quotes and anecdotes (“Cepage is a first name, but terroir is the family name”), but it was slightly reductionist.  I tend to overcomplicate things and I shy away from people who try to explain things too simply.  😀  In Jacky’s view, industrial wine and the notion of blind tasting were sort of invented in the 1970’s, mostly by the new world.  As Berthomeau would point out later in the day, the French have mass produced wine, sold it by brand, and deviated from terroir since long before the 70’s.  And actually, Rigaux himself concedes that Bordeaux’s chateau denomination has been promoting personal brand over geographical origin for quite some time.  (He’s from Burgundy so he can’t help but slam Bordeaux at least once in his speech. :D)

Another thing that bothered me a bit was that the pairings of culture and business are not mutually exclusive.  You can create a wine that preserves and champions culture all while doing great business.  I know that Rigaux is smart enough to realize that.  But he really seems to believe that we should favor terroir to the detriment of everything else, and I’m not sure that’s our only option.  I think terroir/lieu/place is unavoidable and can stand above everything else.  It’s not terroir vs. technique.  It should be technique services terroir.  Similarly business can serve terroir and wine style (minerality/sucrosity) can serve terroir.  It’s never an either/or issue.  It’s usually an issue of the relationship between all these parts.  And ultimately, I’d even say that good wine is an end in and of itself.  And it’s impossible to create a single monolithic standard for what makes wine good.  It’s about context and enjoyment, points which would come up later in the day!

random ideas:

• blind tasting is part of the scientific method’s effect on winemaking
• cepage est un prenom, le nom de famille c’est le terroir
• does Bordeaux’s classification system count as terroir or branding?
• The largest Aussie producer has more hectares of vines than ALL of Burgundy
• is it silly to fuss over terroir when most French drink wine out of ridiculous, unsuitable glasses that hide all the wine’s traits?

see also:

• Rigaux’s books on Amazon
• Business Week 2001 article – Wine WarSavvy New World marketers are devastating the French wine industry

Vindicateur published an interesting interview with a bunch of youngsters.  I’m the jerk who answers all the questions in English. 😀

Which youngsters?

• Laure Goy (1986, Les Terres Promises)
• Nina Izzo (1989, Lost in Wine)
• Pauline Boët (1986, Eyes Wine Open)
• Lolita Sene (1987, J’aime ton wine)
• Jérémie Bertrand (1988, World Wild Wine)
  
• Ryan O’Connell (1985)
• Christian Penneau (1985, Vinblog)
• Eva Robineau (1986, Oenos)
• Paloma Ezcurra (1986, Wine in Paris)
• Guillaume Bodin (1986, La Clef des Terroirs) <— really cool film project

Antonin asked us all the same questions and curated our answers very diligently.   But I’m a narcissist and want you to hear all my answers. ;D

The unabridged interview

[Question biographique] : En quelle année êtes-vous né(e) ? Quelle est votre activité actuelle (en rapport avec le vin) ? Quel site Internet souhaitez-vous voir lié à votre nom dans cet entretien ?

I was born in 1985.  Since 2005, I’ve been making wine at O’Vineyards in the Languedoc and I do a fair amount of blogging about my region and wine in general.  //ovineyards.com http://love-that-languedoc.com

– A quoi devrait ressembler le vin dans 10 ou 20 ans ?

November 10th, 2011 is Languedoc Day.  Show that you’re participating with a free registration on the LanguedocDay event page.

What is Languedoc Day?

Languedoc Day is an opportunity for lots of people to discover or learn about one of the largest winemaking regions on the planet.  This beautiful stretch of land on the Mediterranean coast of the south of France produces more wine than the entire United States.  We produce more wine than all of Australia too!  Just in this one region!

While a lot of that wine has historically been bottled in bulk under vin de pays names that aren’t always recognizable (big brands like Fat Bastard, Red Bicyclette, and Arrogant Frog all come from here), more and more of our wines are being bottled under the controlled standards of the French Appellation system.  And LanguedocDay is an opportunity for consumers to familiarize themselves with these Languedoc appellations.

What do you do on Languedoc Day?

Think Languedoc. Talk Languedoc. Drink Languedoc.  And not necessarily in that order.

If you drink some Languedoc wine, you’re already doing your part!

Then think about telling your friends.  Invite some people over to share the wine with.  Or throw a picture of the bottle on facebook, twitter, youtube, or whatever websites you like.  Let people know that you’re drinking Languedoc.  And if you add “#languedocday” without the quotes, it will be easy for us to see your participation!

Which brings us to the last way to participate: reading about who else is enjoying Languedoc Day. Follow the conversation on Twitter to see who else is talking up my favorite wine region. Just follow this link:  #LanguedocDay

Personally, I’ll be attending the Université du Vin in Corbieres, a beautiful mountainous region in the Languedoc.  A lot of French winos will be meeting up to talk about different contemporary wine topics around the subject of notoriety.  I think Languedoc Day is a perfect example of how we can try to build notoriety for the region!

Can I drink O’Vineyards on Languedoc Day?

You can drink O’Vineyards any day that ends in Y. 🙂

Unfortunately, my wines aren’t present in the US for the 2011 Languedoc Day celebration.  But there are lots of delicious Languedoc wines you can get your hands on instead so cheer up and bottoms up!

Languedoc Day appellations

Here are some wine appellations from the Languedoc that you might be able to find at a wine shop or Whole Foods near you.

• Faugeres
• Saint Chinian
• Fitou
• Corbieres
• Minervois
• La Clape
• Limoux
• Malepere
• Cabardes
• Coteaux du Languedoc

Who decides it’s Languedoc Day?

The CIVL (Conseil Interprofessionnel des Vins du Languedoc) is a interprofessional group that represents the AOC/AOPs of the Languedoc.  That means that everybody who produces appellation wines pays some dues to the CIVL, and the CIVL then uses that money to promote the entire region’s appellations.

In an attempt to increase the renown of our appellations in the US, the CIVL hire an American marketing group called the Benson Marketing Group to represent our products.  This group has teamed up with Rick Bakas, who successfully nurtured Cabernet Day, to create a Languedoc Day.  In short, this is a unilateral marketing effort.  A lot of people gripe about this saying you can’t just decide it’s Languedoc Day without some consensus.  My view is that you absolutely can.  If you have energy and resources to spend on promoting the Languedoc, then promote the Languedoc already!  No need to sit around making sure the date is okay with everybody.  Just steam forward!  Full speed ahead!