We spent last Saturday in Alsace at Domaine Stentz-Buecher for a Discovery Experience Day.  The objective of the day was to learn about all of the work in the vineyard needed to produce the best possible grapes come harvest time, and as we were to find out, there is lots to do!

After the introductions to the winery and family history by Céline, we made our way through the vineyards.  On the way, Céline showed us the different terroir, and pointed out the Hengst and Steingrubler Grand Cru vineyards slightly further up the hillside.

We arrived at the Rosenberg vineyard, home to our Pinot Gris adopted wines.  We took a few minutes to take a few pictures of our vines and to say a few words of encouragement for this year’s harvest.

Jean-Jacques, Céline’s father and founder of the winery, joined us and brought us up to speed on the work that has been carried out in the vineyard during the winter.  He explained the importance of pruning the vines and how it is done, the need to protect the vines during the colder winter months from the frost by heaping soil around the vine stocks, and the laborious task of repairing the training posts and wires.  He also showed us the plot next to our vines which was replanted 4 years ago, and will produce the first grapes this year.

The buds burst on the vines at the end of March, and since then the shoots have sprung to life.  A little slower than the last couple of years when the harvest was very early, but in line with a more normal year.  This time of year is principally taken up with de-budding, and after pruning, it is probably the most important task in controlling the yield and improving the quality of the grapes.

Jean-Jacques demonstrated how to select which shoots to keep and which to remove.  Remove any shoots that have sprout from below the head on the trunk, and remove the weaker branch from any double shoots.

Sounds easy in theory, but once we had spread out among the rows and started having a go ourselves, we quickly learnt that there are many exceptions to the rule!   To keep the growth at the same height among the vines, we are always trying to keep the growth as low as possible.  This means that sometimes we leave a shoot lower than this year’s branch, so that we can use it next year.  As with pruning you always have to think at least one year ahead!  After a few tentative tries, and clarifying questions, we gradually gained in confidence!
We then headed back to the winery, where Céline gave us a wine tasting session, starting with the delicious 2015 Riesling Ortel. We then tasted the 2017 vintage of the wine chosen for the Gourmet Odyssey Experience, the Pinot Gris Rosenberg, followed by the 2012 Pinot Noir.  Next up, a 2015 Gewurztraminer Hengst Grand Cru, followed by a surprisingly full bodied 2015 Pinot Blanc Vielles Vignes white wine.

A local caterer had prepared a delicious baeckeofe for us, and we continued the wine tasting with the  2017 Who Am I?, a blend of Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris and Riesling. Céline served a 2016 Gewürztraminer Rosenberg with cheese, and the meal ended with a tasty blueberry tart.

After lunch we had a tour of the cellar where we were introduced to what happens to the grapes once they have been harvested.  We’ll be learning more during the Harvest and Vinificiation Experience Days.

The day ended back in the vineyard, where Jean-Jacques explained the work yet to come in the vineyard between now and harvest time, and how they will monitor the grapes to choose when is the best time to start harvesting.  The next critical phase should happen within the next couple of weeks, when the vines flower.  How well this goes will set out the potential yield of the harvest, and will give the first indication of when the harvest is likely to start.  The old adage says that the harvest will be 110 days after flowering. We will be closely monitoring the vines over the coming days.

Many thanks to the Stentz-Buecher family for sharing their passion for wine-making with us.  We’ll be back again at the end of June for the next Discovery Experience Day.

Find out more about adopting vines in Alsace.

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Château Coutet is on the right bank of the Bordeaux vineyards, the kingdom of the Merlot grape varietal. The limestone terroir of Saint-Emilion produce wines that have stood the test of time, and as we climb the hillside through the vineyards, Mathieu shows us the changing soil types.

On the way, our path crosses a little robot, invented by Mathieu’s uncle. It automatically cuts the grass in a given vineyard, allowing the grass to be kept short and avoiding it being destroyed by turning the soil. Turning the soil too much can disturb the microbial life in the soil, which is the natural habitat of worms, essential to maintaining the vitality of the soil.

We visited our adopted vines in the Peycocut vineyard situated on the limestone plateau, the best terroir in Saint-Emilion. Here we are surrounded by the prestigious wineries that have helped write the history of the Saint-Emilion wines.

De-budding is one of the most important jobs in the vineyard during spring. We have to select the shoots that we will keep on the vine. Some will produce the grape bunches for this year, and others will produce the branches for next year. This task is therefore vital in ensuring this year’s production and in safeguarding the future production.

The difficulty lies in choosing which branches to keep. Mathieu clearly explained the theory to us, and then it all came to life as we had a go ourselves, worked with him in de-budding the vines.

We then returned to the winery to enjoy tasting some of the wines, starting with the 2016 Château Belles Cimes. It’s the winery’s second wine, made from the grapes from the young vines and some of the press wine. It’s a fairly fruity wine which is ideal for the aperitif.

Lunch was served in the dining room, overlooked by the portraits of some of Mathieu’s ancestors. The 2014 Château Coutet, which is the main wine, accompanied the starter. It’s a blend of the different terroir and grape varietals, offering elegance and complexity. We then went up a notch with the 2015 Château Coutet. Blended from the same terroir and grape varietals as the 2014 vintage, the 2015 has a more evolved aromatic character, and has more power and length on the palate. Mathieu spoiled us over cheese, serving the 2014 Cuvée Demoiselle. It’s a very select wine made from the winery’s best and oldest vines that are worked using horses.

After lunch Mathieu explained the family’s commitment to organic wine-making, and we visited the vinification hall and the family cellar where the old bottles are stored. We go back in time as we imagine tasting a wine from 1953.

The day at Château Coutet drew to a close. Many thanks to Mathieu for welcoming us so warmly. We left having learnt that there is much more to wine-making that you would think.

Learn more about adopting a vine in Saint-Emilion.

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The busy day started with by introducing ourselves to one another over coffee and croissants, and enabled us to meet the winemaker, Marc Plouzeau, who had opened the doors of Château de la Bonnelière to us.

Marc gave us an overview of the 2018 harvest and vintage so far.  It’s looking to be a very good year, in terms of both quality and quantity!  The first wines that have been bottled from this year are already pleasing on the palate, whilst other wines are still ageing in the cellar.  We’ll get to taste them later on in the day.

After a quick visit of the adopted vines and a few quick souvenir photos, we split the group in two, one to go with Marc to learn about what happens in the chai, and the other group with Louise to identify the different aromas found in wine.  Of course, we then changed groups later on in the morning!

In the chai, Marc explained how the vinification process is managed at the winery.  The grapes are handled as gently as possible using gravity to transfer them into the vats, no other elements are added, how the fermentation takes place in the vats and barrels…  It’s the combination of all of these factors that make Marc’s wines unique and reflect the different vineyard plots of the left bank.

In the caveau, Louise got everyone busy scribbling away with paper and pens!  We learned how to identify the different aromas found in Chinon wines.  Young and old, everyone did well for a first attempt, even if some answers left us a little bit puzzled!!

We then headed to the winery’s cellar underneath the Chinon Fortress, where the wines are aged, and stopped in the courtyard next to the entrance.  The sun and temperature gave us a taster of the summer to shortly come, and even gave a few of us a little more colour than we would have liked!

We tasted the different red and white Chinon wines from the winery over lunch, and put our newly acquired wine tasting skills to the test.

The day finished in the cool of the cellar, where the temperatures remains a constant 12°C all year round, ideal conditions for ageing wines.  Marc explained the history of the cellar, it having been excavated to extract the stone used to build the fortress overhead.  We then set about tasting the wines that are still in the ageing process.  We were very pleasantly surprised as the tannins are already silky, and the aromas very present.  The 2018 vintage looks set to be a big hit!

Re-assured by this tasting, we left at the end of the day longing to taste the wines again when they are finished!

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The day started with a short presentation of the winery by the owner, Jean-François Chapelle. He talked about the history of his family and the path he took to convert the winery to being organic. The viewpoint from the winery over the surrounding vineyards helped us to understand the make-up of the Burgundy terroir, and their influence on the wines.

We then made our way to the Les Crais and Clos des Cornières vineyards to meet our adopted vines, the first planted with Chardonnay, the second with Pinot Noir vines. We learnt about the vegetative life cycle of the vines and the work necessary to nurture them from when they wake up after winter to harvest time.

We were accompanied by Jean-François, and Yannick, the Technical Director of the vines and cellar.  Between the harvest and December, the winemaker’s time is mainly taken up with the vinification of the vintage that has just been harvested.  But then from December to March, they are very busy in the vineyards, pruning each and every vine manually.  The cut branches are then pulled away from the vines and either crushed in the rows or burned, usually by a different team than those who pruned.  It’s a tough job that takes around 4 months, and must be finished by around mid-March, the time when the first buds start to burst, and the vines spring back to life.

The vines shoots and branches grow quickly at this time of the year, some 30 or more centimetres in a month.  It’s therefore important to manage the growth.  This is also done manually for the most part by de-budding or removing some of the leaves, which also improves the air flow around the vines.

It’s the de-budding that keeps the team busy at the moment.  This task enables the quantity of fruit produced by the vines to be reduced, and thus improve the concentration and aromatic qualities of the remaining grapes.  Reducing the yield helps the grapes to reach optimum maturity, and also helps to increase the life expectancy of the vine plants in the long term.

We’ll be able to see the result of this spring work in September when we reach harvest time.

After this full morning, we returned to the winery for the aperitif and lunch, served with some of the winery’s wines.  A Santenay Saint Jean white wine to start with, followed by a red Burgundy, Santenay Clos des Cornières, and Santenay La Comme Premier Cru.  We compared the wines and enjoyed the fine Burgundy dishes.

In the afternoon, we visited the fermentation hall and cellar for a little insight into the wine-making side of things, something that we will learn more about during the Vinification Experience Days.

We hope that everyone had a good time, and we look forward to welcoming another group soon to Santenay!

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What are the principal conclusions of the report?

The first and most important is that humans are directly responsible for the decline in nature, with an average of around 25% of animals and plant being threatened.  The rate of destruction is alarming, and is tens to hundreds of times higher than the average over the past 10 million years.  

Among the main causes of the extinction of the species are the changing uses of the sea and land (e.g. deforestation), the exploitation of certain species (e.g. overfishing), climatic change, pollution, and invasive species introduced by man in unsuitable habitats which then threaten the natural biodiversity (e.g. ragweed).

How will we be affected in the short term?

The report warns that most of nature’s contribution will not be completely replaceable.  For example more than ¾ of the world’s crops rely on pollinisation by animals.  Foods such as fruit, vegetables, coffee and chocolate could quickly become in short supply if the animals that pollinate the plants become extinct.  And it’s not just food, many medicines rely on plants that are at risk of disappearing.  

Another worry is that the number of conflicts linked to natural resources is already very high, some 2500 happening at the moment.  This number will increase as the world population increases, putting even more pressure on the natural resources available.

What can we do now?

The good news is that we can reverse the trend.  To do so we need change and positive actions on a local and global scale.  We can use more sustainable agricultural methods, and enforce quotas on resources used on a global scale, for example by ending subsidies for intensive farming, fishing, deforestation, or the mining of fossil fuels.

On a local level, we can all make an impact by the choices we make to move around, heat our homes, and feed ourselves.  For example reducing the amount of meat and fish that we eat and by choosing producers that respect biodiversity.

How are we concerned at Gourmet Odyssey?

Gourmet Odyssey only works with organically certified producers.  It’s a choice that we made when creating the company 10 years ago, convinced that we could also help support agriculture on a human scale which preserves the environment and biodiversity.  Our partner, Château Coutet is a good example, a family run winery which has preserved the biodiversity in its vineyards for more than 400 years, having never used chemical products in the vineyards at the winery.

When choosing presents for friends and family, or activities for corporate events, we can make our choice by limiting our impact on the environment and helping to support the producers who fight to preserve the living.

More information on the criteria used to select Gourmet Odyssey’s partners.

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