Press release from InterLoire (English version below):

C’est sous la neige que le salon des Vins de Loire a ouvert ses portes lundi. Cette première journée du salon, habituellement jour clé, a été coupé d’environ 700 visiteurs. Les autres jours n’ont pas rattrapé ce retard. Le salon qui ferme ces portes, ce soir, annonce d’ores et déjà une baisse de fréquentation qui devrait être comprise entre 15 et 20% [I think we can take that as a 20% reduction in visitor numbers.....at least - Chris]. Les conditions climatiques délicates, les conditions de circulations difficiles, ont surtout affecté les acheteurs CHR (café-hôtel-restaurant) du grand-ouest ainsi qu’un petit nombre d’acheteurs étrangers de proximité (Belgique et Angleterre) qui fréquentent fidèlement le salon [sorry, not convinced by this - Chris].

Cette édition reste néanmoins marquée par la qualité des contacts et la grande fidélité des acheteurs traditionnels des vins de Loire.

Plus structurellement, pour Christian Groll, directeur du Parc des Expositions d’Angers, « le salon du haut de ces 27 ans est entré dans un régime de croisière qu’il faut bousculer. Faire peau neuve en intégrant une logique tournée autour de la valorisation et de la découverte en replaçant le vin, le millésime et la dégustation au coeur du salon ». Pierre Aguilas, Président du Salon des Vins de Loire, souhaite que « la filière viticole se donne les moyens de fédérer toutes les énergies pour que ce rendez-vous annuel reste LE rendez-vous des vins de Loire ».

Quoi qu’il en soit, la côte d’amour de ce salon est intacte [Clair de Lune PR agency and InterLoire obviously not big followers of Winedoctor - Chris]. Pour Julien Chazot, propriétaire d’un bar à vin à Lyon et visiteur inconditionnel : « j’aime venir à Angers, c’est mon rendez-vous Loire de l’année, l’occasion de rencontrer les vignerons et de suivre l’évolution qualitative des appellations. Le plus du salon : sa convivialité ! »

Le Salon des Vins de Loire ferme ses portes ce soir et vous donne rendez-vous les 4,5 et 6 février 2013 avec une édition qui promet quelques nouveautés. [Oh well, that's one thing; it looks like we have dates for 2013 in the bag. Will Clair de Lune/InterLoire get the website finished by then, I wonder? - Chris]

Version in English released later in the day:

Snow was falling when the Loire Valley Wine Trade Fair opened on Monday. The first – and
traditionally key – day of the event suffered a year-on-year shortfall of about 700 visitors,
and the other days did not offset this slow start. The fair, which ended tonight, has already
announced a drop in attendance of between 15% and 20%. The adverse weather and
tough travel conditions primarily affected Horeca-channel buyers in western France, but
also a small number of loyal foreign buyers from nearby countries (Belgium and the United
Kingdom).

However, this year’s edition will be remembered for the quality of business contacts and
the loyalty of Loire-wine buyers from the “traditional” segment (Horeca and wine stores).

From a structural perspective, Christian Groll, director of the Parc des Expositions in Angers,
commented: “The fair is now 27 years old, it has reached cruising speed – and needs
shaking up. A makeover is required, focusing on promotion and discovery, and restoring
the central role of wines, the year’s vintage and tasting.” Pierre Aguilas, president of the
Loire Valley Wine Trade Fair, wants the winemaking community “to give itself the resources
to unite all energies so that this annual gathering remains the meeting-place for Loire
wines”.

One thing is certain: the fair’s popularity is intact. Julien Chazot, a wine-bar owner in Lyon
and ever-present fair visitor, said: “I love coming to Angers, it’s my Loire-wine event of the
year, an opportunity to meet with producers and track the quality of each appellation.
And the fair’s special asset is its convivial atmosphere!”

The Loire Valley Wine Trade Fair closed its doors tonight, and invites you to mark 4-6
February 2013 in your diary, for an edition that promises a number of new features.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 9, 2012 at 1:03 pm
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The final day of the Salon is always something of an anticlimax; I usually have to leave early, often around midday, in order to make my travel connections – train then plane – on time. I begin tasting with gusto, but the few hours I have fly by, and my departure time always arrives much earlier than expected. Yesterday morning was no exception; I had hardly started tasting with the delightful Coralie Delecheneau of La Grange Tiphaine when I suddenly realised it was time to go. Happily, I managed to taste most of her whites, which include some lovely bright and breezy examples of Montlouis, and also a delicious Pét-Nat fizz, before I had to dash.

Ironically, I took the 1pm shuttle bus rather than the 2pm shuttle bus. Theoretically, the second bus would have been good for me, but the bus service has been so erratic (not running at all on Monday morning, and returning to Angers from the Salon on Tuesday evening for a dinner appointment again the bus did not turn up) that I wasn’t prepared to take a chance with the later bus. As it was I left the Salon an hour earlier than I needed to, an hour of time I could have spent interacting with exhibitors (who all pay a lot of money to set up a stand at the Salon) such as Coralie Delecheneau of La Grange Tiphaine, wasted because I don’t trust the unfortunately haphazard bus service provided by Parc Expo (amended – see Charles Sydney’s comments below).

One other feature of the 2012 Salon des Vins de Loire that is worthy of comment is visitor numbers; I’ve only been attending this annual event for a few years now, but this seems to me to have been by far the quietest Salon I have been to. Pushing it back a week has discouraged attendees, upsetting schedules, distancing it from the off events, pushing it closer to other important wine fairs, namely ViniSud (February 20th-22nd). If InterLoire thought the Salon would win out against all these competing demands that was arrogant; it’s quite clear that some see La Dive Bouteille and Nicolas Joly’s Renaissance tastings as the main events, and the Salon as the “off-event”. It’s also clear that InterLoire need to demonstrate a dynamic response to recent events; you can’t just let someone as influential and innovative as François Chidaine resign in despair then carry on as if everything was OK. And you can’t carry on putting on a half-cocked show like the Salon des Vins de Loire and expect people to keep visiting, regardless.

Oh, and while I remember, as visitors numbers are sure to be down (hence deserted aisles as above, Wednesday morning), when that news is released please don’t blame it on difficulties travelling due to the cold weather; my flight from Edinburgh and train from Paris both departed on time, and arrived on time. In Angers, the buses and taxis were running as normal, even on Monday morning. The only part of the transport service that failed was the shuttle bus to the Salon itself. The reduction in visitor numbers this year is down to questionable decisions about timing of the Salon; thus the responsibility lies at the feet of InterLoire.

As for the wine, well I have already mentioned La Grange Tiphaine, and the other star of Wednesday morning was Bruno Cormerais. Bruno might well have all the gravitas of the late Sir Harry Secombe (I’m thinking of his Goon Show years rather than when he led us all in Sunday evening worship on Songs of Praise), but this man’s wines are some of the most exciting and innovative in Muscadet. I have been meaning to taste them for some time, but having encountered his 2004 Bruno 7 Ans cuvée (aged sur lie for seven years) on Tuesday evening, brought to a dinner I attended by David Cobbold of More than just Wine (and tasting blind no-one, including some experienced Loire tasters, spotted it as a Muscadet), I was spurred into action. I tasted through the range with his son, Maxime, and found some very high quality especially in the less warm years such as 2008 and 2010, although once we progressed on to the Granite de Clisson (and now just Clisson) cuvées, and the special Maxime and Bruno bottlings, they were petty good all round. I’m looking forward to writing these up.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 9, 2012 at 11:38 am
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There are always exciting discoveries to be made at the Salon. New discoveries don’t have to be new domaines, by the way; it could be a new wine from a well-known vigneron, or some other significant development, such as the completion of an innovative project or certification as bio (organic) or biodynamic perhaps. Sometimes it may be a perceived change in the style of winemaking. During yesterday’s time at the Salon, I saw examples of all these….on occasion many of them all rolled up at just one domaine, which is invigorating. It drives home what a lively and dynamic wine region the Loire really is.

On top form yesterday, and clearly innovating and developing, were Pithon-Paillé, home to Jo Pithon (pictured left). I have often really liked the wines of this domaine; last year I found traces of oxidation running through the wines but happily this turned out to be nothing more than two tired samples, and subsequent tastes were better. The first thing I noticed here is that the style of winemaking has progressed away from the more wood-influenced and perhaps slightly oxidative style that typifed the Pithon wines of old and which I thought might be returning when I tasted last year; yesterday the white wines had a really fine, matchsticky, slightly reductive style, a characteristic which interestingly I have noticed in more white wines this year than ever before. It is a style that really appeals and which bodes well for the wine’s (and region’s) future I believe. When I asked what had changed in the winery, it turns out there has been a progressive move from smaller oak barrels, at 225 litres, to 350 litres and now 600 litres, along with rigorous topping up. These whites are much more serious as a result. Then came another innovation, a Pithon-Paillé Crémant de Loire, made using wine from 2009 and must from 2010, with the addition of a neutral yeast, a novel method – more on this when I write a report. And also news that, now certified as organic on the vast majority of their plots, not only those they own but also on those from where they acquire their Chinon, Bourgueil and Saumur fruit, Pithon-Paillé will be converting to biodynamics in 2012. It is a process that commences with the pruning, so by the time the 2013 Salon comes around – if InterLoire manage to organise one, that is – they should be fully certified. Regardless of your opinion of biodynamics, there is no doubt that it is associated with the production of high quality wines, so these are exciting times at this domaine!

Of course, that s just one domaine; I also discovered some really good Crémant de Loire from Château d’Aulée, nice Muscadets from Château Coing de Saint-Fiacre, and some really exciting white Anjou (good reds too, but the whites are tip-top) from a trio of young vignerons going by the name of Les Seches Roches. I also attended a private tasting of 2007 sweet wines from the Layon, some of which were superb, as well as tasting some Chinon and I even made a sighting of the rarely-seen Philippe Alliet (the man, not just the wines). And I have the photographic evidence to prove it!

I should pont out that the flow of information at the Salon is not all one-way though; I managed to confound Philippe Germain, of Château de la Roulerie, with news of several lieux-dits bottlings of Roulerie’s Coteaux du Layon from long-past vintages. Les Cerisiers and Les Aunis he knew, but he was surprised to find in my cellartracker portfolio two vintages of a cuvée called Les Coteaux, which he hadn’t heard of before. Some more research for Philippe, I think.

As it turns out, it’s not just the visitors that make exciting discoveries at the Salon, but sometimes the exhibitors too.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 8, 2012 at 6:32 am
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Yesterday morning I was up bright and early for the first day of the Salon; unfortunately Tom King of the RSJ Restaurant was up early but not so bright. At about 8:20am he lurched into the breakfast room (and I mean he lurched) looking the worse for wear. He was ill and had been up all night, and wouldn’t be coming with us to the Salon. That meant no driver, and no convenient door-to-door lift. Catching the Navette – just like catching any bus – means being somewhere at a certain time. Within microseconds of receiving this news Jim Budd appeared wearing coat, scarf and carrying bag; he was off to catch the 8:45 bus. I decided to emulate him, but in retrospect wish I hadn’t. Nevertheless, like an innocent lamb, five minutes later I was heading out for the Navette. Jim eventually caught a lift (lucky fellah!), but I waited for the bus to arrive.

And – in temperatures well below 0ºC, I waited, and waited……

Eventually an InterLoire employee appeared and after making a few telephone calls information began to trickle out. Nobody seemed to know what was happening, but the main piece of news was that the buses hadn’t turned up, and that the bus company weren’t picking up the phone. I was stranded. More importantly, so were a number of foreign buyers and importers waiting at the same bus stop, people who generate tangible business for the region, driving money into local coffers. And at the railway station (the main bus pick-up point), I later learnt, there were hoards of buyers and journalists left stranded. There was no real explanation, no back-up plan, and no co-ordinated response (although scrounging of lifts with the help of the InterLoire employee did yield results for a lucky few). There were no taxis available and it was – although someone did suggest it – too far to walk, especially along the snow and ice-encrusted pavements.

To be fair, none of this was really InterLoire’s fault, but to me it seemed to hammer another nail into the Salon’s coffin; no matter whose fault it is, first-time visitors (and maybe those more established) will see this as yet another aspect of a disorganised and poorly presented meeting. Perhaps next year they won’t return; I’m going to be watching for the reports on numbers of visitors to the Salon with interest this year, as I suspect they will already be down. But what’s the betting that is blamed on the icy weather rather than the lack of judgement shown in pushing back the Salon one week?

Anyway, enough opinion on InterLoire. What of the wine? Yesterday was a really productive day, as I revisited domaines I know well, domaines I have overlooked for a couple of years, and some new faces too. As for the former category, first tasting of the day was at Domaine de la Pépière, with Marc Ollivier’s associate Rémi Branger (pictured right). The wines here were as good as ever, and it was a fascinating experience tasting and contrasting his newer cuvées, including the 2010 Clisson (newly ratified cru communal), 2009 Trois (three years sur lie), 2009 Château Thébaud (a cru communal of the future, surely) and also some remarkably good red wines from the 2011 vintage. In the domaines too-long overlooked I tasted at François Pinon – some good wines there, in a very floral, pure, minerally style – and new names included the two Muscadet domaines, Gérard Vinet and the Choblet brothers of Domaine du Haut Bourg. The latter knock out wines which are perhaps the best from the Côtes de Grandlieu appellation I have ever tasted, particularly the lees-aged wines; it is amazing what ten years sur lie in subterranean tanks can do for a wine. These polished, floral more stony Chablis-like styles are great wines for richer dishes. I tasted the 2001 (from bottle) and the 2002 (a sample from cuve).

Later on, dinner at Favre d’Anne was pretty good; rather more upmarket than I am used to during the Salon, but the carpaccio of scallops with wild mushrooms and truffle oil was certainly an experience worth having. And please note I was on my best behaviour….especially as Jean-Martin Dutour, president of InterLoire, was on the next table. It was, I decided, perhaps not the best time for me to draw his attention to my criticisms of the workings of this year’s Salon. I hope and expect he already realises – especially following the resignation of François Chidaine from the committee – that he has a difficult situation on his hands. It might only take another appellation or two to follow Bourgueil’s lead and to remove their funding from InterLoire for the whole system to unravel.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 7, 2012 at 6:46 am
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Breakfast was at a very civil 8am on Sunday morning; even so, after a late night on Saturday, I still stumbled bleary-eyed into the dining room as if it were four hours earlier. It was only when Jim Budd directed my vision outside that I realised something very unusual had happened; a significant snowfall. The ground outside was covered with two inches of snow; nothing unusual in Scotland, but here in Angers (and for much of the rest of France) it was equivalent to the landing of a UFO and Elvis stepping out – ie. somewhat unanticipated and worthy of hours and hours of televsion news coverage. An appropriate response to this event from the French authorities seemed, I thought, rather unlikely (I’m referring to the snowfall here, not Elvis; just to be clear, there is no Elvis at the 2012 Salon). Nevertheless, once our car was cleared of ice and snow, we got underway. Within and around Angers my concerns proved well-founded; the roads were snowbound, and we progressed at about 20 mph. Fortunately the autoroute had been more thoroughly gritted and salted, and thereafter we made good progress. Naturally as we approached our destination – Domaine Luneau-Papin near Le Landreau – the conditions worsened again, but nothing that held us back.

At Luneau-Papin we eventually located Pierre in his underground garage, after about 15 minutes of knocking and doorbell-ringing. First up was a tour of the cellars, and a chance to taste through all the 2011 brut de cuve samples, along with a selection of other recent vintages, mostly 2010 but also the occasional cuvée from the 2009 vintage. The most notable feature here was the pure, rich, clean, minerally character of the wines. Perhaps the most important word here is clean; having already tasted a large number of Muscadets from this vintage it is clear that 2011 was seriously troubled by rot. Watch out if you encounter any for the tell-tale flavours; dead fruit, brown fruit, undergrowth, dead leaves, damp soil and even plain old rotten fruit, in wines that should be vibrant and fresh. If you’re unsure about this ‘rot’ flavour I find blackberries, left on the bush until the core has turned from white-green to sticky brown, often assisted by rain, to provide a very vivid flavour of rot. Somehow I don’t think this is an aroma/flavour that will be making it into those expensive nez du vin sets anytime soon though.

Then inside for more vintages, back to the 2002 Excelsior and 1999 L d’Or, as well as plenty of younger vintages, as well as a brilliant lunch of langoustines, scallops and cheese. We left fairly early, anticipating road mayhem on our return journey, but in fact the situation had improved, and we made it back in time for oysters and onglet at the Angers’ Brasserie de la Gare, with wines from Didier Richou, Jo Landron and Domaine de la Noblaie. Although the roads around our hotel remain untreated and are thus now covered in compacted ice and snow, and deadly treacherous, the rest were reasonably clear. Let’s hope they stay that way so we can make it out for the first day of the Salon tomorrow.

More on Monday’s adventures soon….

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 6, 2012 at 7:18 am
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I awoke four minutes before my alarm clock sounded at 4am on Saturday morning; it’s funny how the brain’s internal clock seems to manage such precise feats of timing such as that. Thankfully the anticipated ‘big freeze’ was obviously delayed somewhere which meant my departure from Edinburgh airport wasn’t. After about two hours in the air I landed at Paris CDG Airport 15 minutes ahead of schedule, and yet I soon realised – as I stood at the back of an interminably long queue through passport control – that if I didn’t do something quick I was going to miss my train to Angers. I leap-frogged about eighty places in the line, with the assistance of airport staff it has to be said (I’m British – I’m allergic to queue-jumping unless done with official authorisation) and after a well-paced run through the airport I made it onto the 9:48am train for Angers just as the doors were closing. It was all vaguely reminiscent of my late night dashes for the last train home after the monthly meetings of Chester Claret Club, which I attended many years ago; I would often find myself leaping onto the train just as the door-closure alarm was sounding.

Aside from trying to eject a Frenchman from seat 61, only to quickly realise I was in the wrong carriage and had the wrong seat 61 (thereby affording me a valuable opportunity to practise apologising in French – my intention all along of course) my journey out was thankfully uneventful. By 1:30pm I was lunching on an entrecôte in Angers, and by 3pm I was en route with Jim Budd and Tom King of the RSJ Restaurant for Domaine de la Bergerie.

There we met Yves Guégniard and his wife Marie-Annick, and we made a tour of his estate, which is a handsome one at the best of times but with the vneyards lying under a moderate dusting of snow it was even more picturesque. We looked at some of Yves’ oldest vines, Chenin Blanc of approximately 100 years old, the original plants grafted oto American rootstock but then – remarkably considering the fact the original planted were so established – propagated by provignage. This is essentially tip-layering, bending down one of the shoots and securing it under the surface of the soil, traditionally with nothing more technical than a rock placed over it. Once it has rooted (on it’s own roots, note, not grafted) it can be separated from its parent plant, although this last step – as we saw with Yves’ vines – isn’t essential. I wonder if this maintained union between the grafted vines, and its offspring established on its own roots, is somehow important in preventing the younger vine from succumbing to phylloxera?

Later we returned to Yves’ residence for a tasting, first featuring the wines not of Yves but of friend and colleague Vincent Ogereau. I will write these up in due course but the overall impression was of a range of wines quite understated in style, with unfortunately unattractive labels but with a capacity – having tasted quite a few older examples now – for aging. Vincent doesn’t receive the press he deserves in my opinion, and the same can be said of Yves Guégniard of Domaine de la Bergerie, whose wines came next, and were also very good across the range. We finished up with Claude Papin, and some of his wines, which are still fashioned by Claude, although the hand of René Papin – one of his two sons – is increasingly present I think. Certainly I thought some of Claude’s whites displayed a tighter, more minerally and reductive style than I have experienced before.

We finished our day with dinner at La Bergerie, the restaurant run by Yves son-in-law David Guitton. This was a truly excellent dinner, accompanied by wines from Claude, Yves and Vincent, and I’ll be writing it up in due course. The most striking wine was perhaps Yves’ Crémant de Loire Rosé, perhaps one of the most elegant and yet seductive examples of the style I have encountered. Must get my hands on some of that…

More on Sunday’s adventures soon…

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 5, 2012 at 6:28 pm
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Tomorrow (Saturday) morning I will be heading out to Angers, principally for the Salon which starts on Monday although I will be keeping myself busy over the weekend with a small programme of visits, including Domaine de la Bergerie (Anjou, Chaume, Quarts de Chaume, etc.) and Domaine Luneau-Papin (Muscadet). I’m looking forward to the first of these visits as Yves Guégniard is a very talented guy who turns out a range of really beautiful wines, his Savennières and sweet wines being the pick of the bunch I think. The trip to Luneau-Papin should also be rather special, as it is too many years since I was anywhere near Muscadet-land. I know Pierre-Marie (Pierre Luneau-Papin’s son) will be showing a range of older vintages of L d’Or at the Salon, back to the 1976 (no – not a typo!), and I doubt such wines will be open for our visit so I suspect I will have to visit him at his stand at the Salon as well, as this would beat my previous oldest Muscadet tasting experience by quite a few years (six, to be precise, having tasted the 1982 not that long ago).

Last year I spent a whole day at the Salon focused on Savennières, alongside all my other usual ‘visits’; this gave me a fine opportunity to really get to grips with this appellation, to understand the different styles of wine. I still need to embody these thoughts in a new guide to the appellation, something that I will endeavour to do this year. I also spent some time with some of the new blood in Montlouis, including Xavier Weisskopf and Lise et Bertrand Jousset. This year I’m not so sure what main focus should be, although I am leaning towards (a) Chaume/Quarts de Chaume/Bonnezeaux – which would help me update and expand my guide to Anjou along with my Savennières experiences from last year, or (b) Sancerre – to help me understand, as I did with Savennières, the different styles; although here it would reflect terroir more than winemaking, as I wrote in my The New Sancerre post from the end of last week. Maybe I’ll do both. I’m also open to suggestions – add them to the comments below.

In addition, it was my hope to try and add some new profiles to the site based on recently tasted wines I have enjoyed, such as Domaine du Mortier. Like a number of the smaller, more organic, biodynamic or ‘natural’ domaines, however, the Boisard brothers of Domaine du Mortier don’t seem to exhibit at the Salon. I could have caught them at the first ever Salon Professionnel Vignerons Bio de Loire…..but that was last week, an off-event cast adrift by the shift of the Salon back one week, about which I wrote in Hints to InterLoire on the 2012 Salon. If InterLoire see that as a victory (Mortier and the Bio Salon aren’t engaged with InterLoire, who seem to regard such domaines and off-events as competing rather than enhancing) then that is a peculiarly small, narrow-minded, insular and self-destructive approach to marketing.

And one last thing; this year the Salon’s blog trophy is limited to those who write about/for wine bars. Which, to me, seems typically narrow-minded. I’m beginning to have a lot of sympathy for the recently resigned François Chidaine.

Next week my usual updates will be replaced with blog posts as I report on my activities at the Salon (hence my homepage makeover this week, with my new links to ‘recent blog posts’). If all goes well, and none of the airports or train stations I will be passing through on my way to Angers have been closed by snow, then I’ll be able to report on my first visits maybe sometime tomorrow.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on February 3, 2012 at 7:45 am
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François Chidaine’s recent resignation from the InterLoire executive, reported here and here, was very telling. Chidaine runs what is undoubtedly one of the Loire’s leading domaines, and his quality-orientated focus is vital if the Loire is to receive the attention and trade it deserves. His criticisms of InterLoire clearly indicate that they have a very different focus; their objectives are not clear, they lack ambition, funds are misspent on pointless exercises such as Touraine primeur and – most pointedly in view of my current situation – the Salon des Vins de Loire comes in for some particular criticism. This, he says, is a “bureaucratic machine” which “doesn’t deliver value for money” and, “if it does not evolve, it will disappear”.

I hope you will excuse me hanging onto Chidaine’s coat-tails but I’m going to weigh in behind him. I have no strong knowledge of Touraine primeur (other than one from Henri Marionnet which is often pretty good, but it is not really a market that a regional body should by piling into I think) but I have plenty of experience of the Salon by now. Considering this is an international showcase for the Loire’s wines, there is plenty wrong with the Salon. Here are four InterLoire/Salon problems that need addressing, and some suggestions:

1. Work for the good of the Loire overall. Around the Salon a programme of ‘off-events’ has built up. The Renaissance tasting (Nicolas Joly and biodynamic domaines) in Angers is the best known, La Dive Bouteille at Château de Brézé another, also this year a Loire Bio Salon and ‘Puzelat & Friends’ (which sounds more like a variety television show than a tasting but wil no doubt feature the wines of Thierry Puzelat and his biodynamic peers).

Last year the Salon was moved forward one day, Sunday-Tuesday, directly clashing with off-events. You aren’t permitted to leave your stand at the Salon unmanned, therefore vignerons were forced to choose one event over the other, or rope in friends to man their stand.

This year the Salon has been moved back, putting a whole week between the off-events (which kick off January 29th) and the Salon (startng February 6th). If this was competitive business, you could understand the tactics, but InterLoire is supposed to be helping, not hindering.

As a result this year visitors have to choose between the two tasting opportunities, or fork out for a long stay in Angers, or make two separate trips. Alice Feiring told me she is doing the off-events, not the Salon. I’m doing the Salon, not the off-events. Visitor numbers may well be down.

Get your timetable sorted InterLoire. Work in advance with your wine colleagues, even if they are not InterLoire members.

2. As well as working more closely with the off-events, be more inclusive with non-members. Some top domaines aren’t members; no Foucault, no Foreau. Is this a fait accompli? Or could a new approach change this situation? Think: what could you do to involve these domaines?

3. Sort out your support for visitors. I’m happy to travel to the Salon with no real support at all and have done so every year up until now. I have had one night in a hotel paid for each year (although this year I believe I may get more support – which I shan’t turn down!), nothing more up until this year. But the support you do offer is useless. This includes:

(a) a discount code for Air France…that is only valid if you fly into Nantes airport. I suspect this is useless for most visitors; it is certainly no use to me, as my regular route is Edinburgh to Paris. Why not have a code that I could use to fly into Paris? How many Salon visitors will fly into Nantes? Why be so selective?

(b) the offer of a paper SNCF rail travel voucher, to be handed over when buying at the counter; seriously, how many of those travelling to the Salon do you think might turn up and buy their tickets on the day? As I suspect is the case with most visitors, I book my tickets online months in advance. Why would I want a voucher to get money off an expensive buy-on-the-day ticket?

4. Sort out your website. Seriously, it’s now one week to the 2012 Salon. Why, when I look at the website for this hugely important tasting fair, do I see:

(a) scrolling news items with the generic “Lorem ipsum dolor…” text because you have launched an unfinished website?

(b) a floor plan for the 2011 fair?

(c) a list of exhibitors for the 2011 fair?

(d) a list of “Prepare your visit” links which lead to a page stating:

“This page is empty. There is no content actually published here. Probably an update ist [sic] acitvated [sic]. Please try again in a few moments“?

(e) blank photo and video sections?

(f) Dead, greyed-out links to social media sites – hover the cursor over the top to be helpfully informed “We’re working on it!”?

I’m sorry, but you’re not “working on it” quite hard enough.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on January 29, 2012 at 11:57 am
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It is somewhat strange that although it was Sancerre that first drew me to the Loire, these days the wines of this most famous of all Loire vineyards hardly ever pass my lips. I can’t recall which domaines I was drinking in those very early days, more than twenty years ago, although I am certain that the wines of the Vacheron family had a place in my cellar; I visited their domaine for the first time in 1992, and carried the bottles back to the UK with me.

With the passing of time I came to realise that I found more variety, joy and individuality in the wines of Anjou, Saumur and Touraine, and Sancerre passed into memory. More lately I discovered how brilliant the underdog Muscadet could be; not the watery-green acid-juice of old, but wines of distinction, minerality, balance and freshness. What better foil for seafood and similar could there be (actually Muscadet from the top names is much more than that, so I will hope you will forgive me this clichéd pigeon-holing)? Sancerre almost ceased to exist. Why opt for such a wine, when there is Marc Ollivier’s Clos de Briords to be had, or Damien Laureau’s Savennières Roches-aux-Moines, or a Clos du Bourg sec from Domaine Huet?

Plenty of reasons of course, but one force that drove me away was the confusion – not just in my own mind, but in some of the wines as well – between Sauvignon Blanc and Sancerre. As I explored the world of wine for the first time it was only natural that I discovered New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. At first I loved the wines; all that vibrant gooseberry fruit, all that zip and verve. Much of this zingy-fruity juxtaposition was due to (a) picking ripe fruit for the fruit-rich character the New World is so good at, and (b) picking some grapes deliberately early, bringing the slightly unripe zingy freshness to the wine; it was some time before I discovered this trait was down to the higher methylpyrazine levels in grapes not fully ripened. I drank them with pleasure, even in the earlier Winedoctor years; there are plenty of positive notes buried deep and not-so-deep on these pages. But, in more recent years, this has not been the case. I tired of the slightly raw attack of acid that I sensed Sauvignon Blanc was giving me; it seemed caricatured, forced even. I tired of the flavour profile, which always seemed so in-your-face; there’s only so much passion fruit and capsicum I can take in a wine. I dropped the wines from my drinking inventory.

The wines have not entirely disappeared though; my wife still adores New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, and so I still have a slow but steady drip of bottles coming though my hands, including in recent years wines from Montana (just before they rebranded as Brancott Estate) and Villa Maria. I really don’t like them. They scream VARIETY and WINEMAKING whenever I taste them. Early last year I tasted two vintages of the Montana Sauvignon Blanc in quick succession – the 2009 and 2010 if I recall correctly – and concluded these wines were exactly what I shouldn’t be drinking. And yet in October, I read Jamie Goode’s opinion of the 2011 vintage, as he raved about what great quality and great value it is. To be balanced, I think he is probably right. It’s just that I don’t like it. I commented as such on his blog post.

As for Greywacke, the latest darling of the New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc scene, I’ve tasted the 2009, and recognise it as a step closer towards my palate than many of New Zealand’s simpler wines. The rawness isn’t there, although I still found it focused on fruit (admittedly with some rather wild, unusually garriguey flavours too). That’s OK if that’s what you want, and many people do. Just not me. But let’s not turn this into an anti-NZ post. Just to be clear, I acknowledge the wines are well made and good value, and appeal to many. It’s just that they mask what Sauvignon Blanc is really capable of. If you persist in drinking New Zealand Sauvignon above all other styles, you’re only halfway there in really understanding this variety.

About three years ago I rediscovered Sancerre, and ever since then my consumption has been creeping ever-so-slightly upwards. The bottles have to fight with those of Guy Bossard, Marc Ollivier and Jo Landron for my attention, but they are holding their own. The reason for this was my discovery that Sauvignon Blanc can be a superb translator of terroir. But the terroir has to be allowed to speak, and early picking to enhance methylpyrazine levels, extremes of fruit ripeness and heavy industrial-style winemaking (and perhaps other aspects I/we don’t understand) can obscure this. This ability to display its origins suddenly catapults Sauvignon Blanc to a much more interesting level in my mind; when in this style, not only is the structure and flavour-profile much more subtle, balanced and less in-your-face, Sauvignon Blanc becomes a much more cerebral, thought-provoking, engaging wine.

Much of Sancerre lies on Kimmeridgian limestone marl (or terres blanches as it is known locally), especially in the western reaches of the appellation, including the oft-praised cru Chavignol. This is the same band of chalky limestone that runs across the upper reaches of France, and it reappears at Chablis and in the southern Champagne region of the Côte des Bar. Wines from thoughtful growers aiming for something other than simple fruit expression from these slopes have a solid structure and firm, stony, minerally character; to my mind, they are more closely related to Chablis than other Sauvignon-based wines. The composition and substance of the wines are similar; I hope that, in the same way New World Chardonnay and Chablis are recognised as very distinct styles, with Chablis the ultimate cool-climate expression of the variety (although “expression of the soil” would be more appropriate to my mind) we can develop a better understanding of Sancerre in the same manner, through drawing similar distinctions. Other soil types in Sancerre give different styles of wine; there is caillottes, pebbly Portlandien/Oxfordian limestone; I’m not sure I could draw an easily defined or indeed identifiable tasting distinction between these wines and the Kimmeridgians. But then around Sancerre itself there is silex, or flint, and these wines are certainly distinctive. Whereas the limestone wines are solid, structured, these are much more filigree in style, with lacy fruit character, often with tinges of ripe citrus fruit, tangerine perhaps, or peach. They are fascinating to taste, especially when compared and contrasted with the limestone wines.

Not a hint of gooseberry, capsicum, passion fruit or the dreaded cat’s pee anywhere, you note?

I believe – although I am willing to be corrected – that much of this Sancerre rediscovery is not just down to changes in my own palate, but to improved awareness and confidence at some Sancerre domaines regarding their wine and their terroir, with new-found comfort at being distinct from New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc rather than feeling a need to imitate that very successful style. And, perhaps hand-in-hand with that, a more concerted effort to aim for appropriate ripeness (rather than greener, methylpyrazine-influenced style) in the fruit, enhancing terroir expression in the process. This is The New Sancerre. The wines of François Crochet have been very convincing in this regard, and to a lesser extent Pascal Reverdy. The wines of Alphonse Mellot – a totally biodynamic estate – have also been highly regarded by many, although suddenly much more convincing – in view of the arguments put forward above – are the single-vineyard wines of Domaine Vacheron, which have suddenly burst onto my tasting and drinking radar again, almost twenty years after my first visit to their domaine. I tasted the new range of lieu-dit wines in London late last year, and found them hugely convincing; these are brilliant wines, very expressive, displaying distinctive terroir-related characteristics, definitely “wines worth talking about” to quote Hugh Johnson. I will be writing them up as soon as possible. And the likes of François and Pascal Cotat hardly need a mention, such is their fame. Although the wine I tasted last night was from none of these domaines; it is not from an unknown domaine, not by a long shot, but it is from a vigneron not previously discussed on these pages (part of my promise to myself to try to ‘discover’ more rather than just sticking with old favourites). More importantly it is delicious, and very true to its marly origins. It will be my Wine of the Week on Monday….for now, its identity remains a secret.

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on January 27, 2012 at 7:37 am
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A message from Pithon-Paille which will be of interest to all those visiting the Salon des Vins de Loire in early February:

Dear Sir and Madam,

We are wine growers and Negociant-Eleveur (grape buyers) and work with the following appellations:
Anjou, Savennières, Coteaux du Layon, Quarts de Chaume, Crémant de Loire, Chinon, Bourgueil and Saumur Champigny. We proudly work in organic methods certified by Qualité France.

Our cellar will be open on Sunday 5th February from 10 am to 6pm for a tasting of our wines and a visit of our cave. We are located 25 kilometers (15 miles) south of Angers on the A87- exit 24. We will be hosting winemaking friends who will propose their wines also for a tasting.

Here are the dates of the professional wine salons early 2012 where we will be presenting our wines and you will be able to taste our selection:

Jan 23-25: Millésime Bio, Montpellier
Jan 28-29: Renaissance des Appellations, Angers
Feb 5: Open doors, St Lambert du Lattay
Feb 6-8: Salon des Vins de Loire, Angers
Feb 21: Hors-Piste – Gaillardises – Vinisud, Aéroport Hôtel, Maugio

If you are unable to make it to any of the salons and would like more information about our wines, feel free to contact us at the address below.

Yours sincerely,

Wendy Paillé – Jo Pithon
www.pithon-paille.com

Filed under: Loire
Posted by Chris Kissack on January 11, 2012 at 10:02 am
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