U
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yeah, but is it nice
Loire 2005 at the TGJP
- Thread starter pab
- Start date
yeah, but is it nice
Bill Lundstrom
Bill Lundstrom
i don't know. you tell us. you have all the answers.
maybe because they taste good??
btw, you didn't answer my question.
So many grapes in northely place ==> They produce in the AOC beetwen 50 & 65% in pétillant.
It's easy money, easy production, high yield (62 hecto/ha vs 52)... And selling dry or moelleux Montlouis, it's pretty difficult (like in Vouvray - see the very low prices in a famous estate like Huet).
Since 2009 and the death of Cossais, there is still two "artisan" in Montlouis : Frantz Saumon & Xavier Presskopf. You should try it.
Best regards
pierre-alain
robert ames
robert ames
so let's see, huet wines are cheap and chidaine has become a megaproducer of mediocracy.
apparently said with a straight face.
wow.
apparently said with a straight face.
wow.
Sigh.
Huet wines are cheap relative to what many others are selling their wines at.
Chidaine has increased his land holdings.
Yield, even taking into account vine density, pruning, etc., is at best a weak determinant of what turns up in the bottle. Prüm (Joh. Jos.) and Loosen in their old Wehlener Sonnenuhr holdings, for example. Gigou and Nicolas in Jasnieres, if we stay in France. Lapierre and Thevenet, if it has to be red. Heck, the Berlioz cousins in Savoie. And so on.
Surface area, even taking into account slope gradient, farming techniques, etc., is probably an even weaker determinant of what turns up in the bottle. Perhaps the more refined version of the argument is that estates beyond a certain size are no longer artisanal, and therefore no longer 'good' (where the definition of good includes a large artisanal component), but I think that argument begs the question.
'Quality', beyond loose and porous gradations, is context-dependent. PAB's "nice" is another's piss, and vice-versa.
Authoritative pronouncements often tell us more about the person than the object.
You're welcome.
Huet wines are cheap relative to what many others are selling their wines at.
Chidaine has increased his land holdings.
Yield, even taking into account vine density, pruning, etc., is at best a weak determinant of what turns up in the bottle. Prüm (Joh. Jos.) and Loosen in their old Wehlener Sonnenuhr holdings, for example. Gigou and Nicolas in Jasnieres, if we stay in France. Lapierre and Thevenet, if it has to be red. Heck, the Berlioz cousins in Savoie. And so on.
Surface area, even taking into account slope gradient, farming techniques, etc., is probably an even weaker determinant of what turns up in the bottle. Perhaps the more refined version of the argument is that estates beyond a certain size are no longer artisanal, and therefore no longer 'good' (where the definition of good includes a large artisanal component), but I think that argument begs the question.
'Quality', beyond loose and porous gradations, is context-dependent. PAB's "nice" is another's piss, and vice-versa.
Authoritative pronouncements often tell us more about the person than the object.
You're welcome.
robert ames
robert ames
"Chidaine has increased his land holdings."
so you rue the their buying and 'refurbishing' of the great but poorly maintained vineyards from the underperforming poniatowski?
"Authoritative pronouncements often tell us more about the person than the object."
you prove your point well.
i have yet to find any demise in quality in the wines of francoise chidaine.
peace out.
so you rue the their buying and 'refurbishing' of the great but poorly maintained vineyards from the underperforming poniatowski?
"Authoritative pronouncements often tell us more about the person than the object."
you prove your point well.
i have yet to find any demise in quality in the wines of francoise chidaine.
peace out.
robert ames
robert ames
"It was a statement of fact."
who is arguing that?
who is arguing that?
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
I was just wondering, myself, whether everyone had enough garlic to watch La Bataille des Grenouilles?
U
Unknown
Guest
don't forget fashionably unconcentrated
This strikes me more as like the indie band who actually starts to find success, make a living, and sell some albums (or downloads) only to fall out of favor with the scene hipsters who prefer their bands obscure, unknown, and poor.
The idea that you can't be an artisan at that scale is just daft. The quality lies in the hands of the farmer and producer not in the scale. And comparing Chidaine's pettilant to the oceans of cheap Loire bubbly is a bit ridiculous, no?
The idea that you can't be an artisan at that scale is just daft. The quality lies in the hands of the farmer and producer not in the scale. And comparing Chidaine's pettilant to the oceans of cheap Loire bubbly is a bit ridiculous, no?
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
Alas, the actual phrase is "to beggar the question".
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
During our Loire visit, Michel Auge told us that, back when the church was the biggest landowner, four hectares was the amount of land leased to each peasant family, being considered the area that an average family could handle on their own.
Claude Courtois told us that the French tax code has a big jump in rates and red tape for landholdings above four hectares, surely not a coincidence. Which is why he has four hectares under his name, and each of his two sons has four. The authorities, seeing through his ruse, were insisting that each property have a separate vinification facility, which they were in the process of (somewhat redundantly) building.
Courtois also told us that he didn't think a winemaker could have more than four hectares without resorting to hired help, so four was the limit beyond which he could no longer say that "he made the wine himself". This came off not so much as a statement of fact but as a moral judgment. Though, presumably, 12 hectares is still OK if you have two more families helping according to the same philosophy (though his sons didn't seem to me to be merely yes men). He spoke derisively of one well-known winemaker (not Chidaine) who has 80 hectares, saying, with disgust, that the guy never gets his hands dirty.
I did get a general sense, from people's comments in the region (but not from trying the wines) that Chidaine was moving away from the artisan model to the "no longer gets his hands dirty" model.
It's reasonable to suppose that scale is inversely proportional to the artisanal spirit, almost tautologically so. But where the inflection points occur must vary much.
Claude Courtois told us that the French tax code has a big jump in rates and red tape for landholdings above four hectares, surely not a coincidence. Which is why he has four hectares under his name, and each of his two sons has four. The authorities, seeing through his ruse, were insisting that each property have a separate vinification facility, which they were in the process of (somewhat redundantly) building.
Courtois also told us that he didn't think a winemaker could have more than four hectares without resorting to hired help, so four was the limit beyond which he could no longer say that "he made the wine himself". This came off not so much as a statement of fact but as a moral judgment. Though, presumably, 12 hectares is still OK if you have two more families helping according to the same philosophy (though his sons didn't seem to me to be merely yes men). He spoke derisively of one well-known winemaker (not Chidaine) who has 80 hectares, saying, with disgust, that the guy never gets his hands dirty.
I did get a general sense, from people's comments in the region (but not from trying the wines) that Chidaine was moving away from the artisan model to the "no longer gets his hands dirty" model.
It's reasonable to suppose that scale is inversely proportional to the artisanal spirit, almost tautologically so. But where the inflection points occur must vary much.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
I love it, now having employees is selling out. This thread keeps getting better.
Some of the most brilliant, innovative models of permaculture style agricultural systems I've seen are friends that row crop 200 acres and put out an "artisinal" product. Some of the worst and most exploitative I've seen are sub 2 acre organic growers who are working their land to death.
It is about the skill and vision of the grower/vigneron that determines at what scale they continue to put out an artisan product.
Thanks Brian for keeping the facts ahead of romance.
Like you say the most advanced and knowledgable growers (in term of sustainability) I have met, grow cereals at quite large scale in Germany. Nobody gives a shit. Wheat is cheap and not sexy...
Pab mentionned brillantly the price factor.
It is acceptable to grow 15 ha and still be an artisan BUT the wines have to be expensive. Of course. And from ridiculous yields. Of course.
Expensive and rare (therefore artisanal) : the mamels of BoBoitude.
Could this be some kind of Patek Philippe syndroma applied to wine?
Like Sarkosi said : what kinda person are you if you don't have a Rollex when you turn 50...