let's talk about aix: the côteaux d'aix en provence AOC

When I spoke to Var natural vigneron Jean-Christophe Comor back in July, he aired certain criticisms of the Conseil Interprofessionnel des Vins de Provence, or CIVP: chiefly, that tended to market rosé colour over rosé terroir. He found it absurd that the rosés of Provence are divided into the appellations Côtes de Provence, Côteaux Varois en Provence, and Côteaux d'Aix en Provence. "They don't all have the same terroir," he said. "But they all do the same [vinification] techniques."

As an itinerant wine writer and bystander to the scenario, I'm actually perfectly happy there are three distinct Provençal appellations, because it apparently means there are several distinct promotional budgets. So it was that, in the wake of a press junket to the Côteaux Varois this past May, I was invited to return to Provence in late September to attend a tasting of the wines of the adjacent Côteaux d'Aix en Provence appellation. The kicker - in fact, the trip's redeeming feature - was that this time we were to principally taste the region's oft-overlooked red wines.

At 4127ha, the Côteaux d'Aix en Provence appellation has only about a fifth of the planted surface as the adjacent Côtes de Provence, while covering a similar area. This testifies to the more urbanized landscape of the Côteaux d'Aix en Provence appellation, which extends from Arles and Saint-Rémy to the respective outskirts of Marseille and Aix. The terroir is, to put it lightly, diverse, varying from hilly sites bordering the Côteaux Varois to lowlands bordering the Étang de Berre and coastal sites west of Marseille. That's not to say the appellation's reds lack identity. The tasting of the appellation's red wines, held at the Château Vignelaure, revealed a slightly anachronistic Bordeaux fascination, presumably attributable to the fabulous wealth and conservatism of local landowners. But there were highlights, too.

as var as I know: 25 years of the côteaux varois en provence AOC

My first move, upon being freed from my recent restaurant work somewhat sooner than anticipated, was to belatedly accept a lot of press junket invitations. This is how at the end of May I found myself spending two days shuttling around the Var with a gaggle of other journalists and bloggers, on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Côteaux Varois en Provence AOC. 

The Côteaux Varois en Provence, a predominantly red wine appellation at its ascension to AOC in 1993, now devotes a whopping 91% of its production to rosé. I had mentally prepared myself for two days of industry doublespeak intended to pass off the effects of highly invasive vinification as the result of unique terroir and know-how. Perversely, this the reason rosé production holds such fascination for me: in no other wine category is there such a vast, irreconcilable gulf between what the mass wine market wants and what can feasibly be produced via natural vinification methods.

Natural rosé is one thing. The Provençal rosé currently soaring in popularity - salmon-coloured, dewdrop-clear, fruit-basket-flavored - is a different product entirely. In a surprisingly double-edged speech he gave at the AOC’s anniversary party in Saint-Julien, Gilles Masson, director of the Center of Research and Experimentation on Rosé Wine, called the “Provençal rosé idéotype” - a wine that is “transparent, fruity, round” - “almost an invention.” He went further than his prepared slides, saying it was “a type of wine that never existed in history.”

the île de porquerolles: domaine de l'île, domaine perzinksy & domaine de la courtade

I sometimes worry I come across as too principled. I so rarely get invited on press junkets. I suspect many PR people imagine me to be a saber-rattling natural wine radical who, if cornered on a cliff's edge by LVMH regional sales managers, would sooner jump than appear in their selfies.

In fact, I quite like playing the shill now and then. I have no trouble appearing gracious and amused when plied with free things. So it was that I recently enjoyed a splendid trip to the Île de Porquerolles the other day, organised by the Côtes de Provence AOC in conjunction with a Lyonnais press agency called Claire de Lune.

The Île de Porquerolles is an island south of the Provençal town of Toulon. Formerly a private island belonging to the industrialist François Joseph Fournier, who purchased it in 1912, Porquerolles was bequeathed to the French state in 1985, and today is home to three wineries: Domaine La Courtade, Domaine Perzinsky, and Domaine de l'Île. "There are three domaines on the Île," explains Domaine Perzinksy oenologist Richard Auther, "And we have three completely different styles."

n.d.p. in london: little georgia, hackney

In the course of some typically cursory research for this blog post, I turned up an execrable hack restaurant review of Hackney b.y.o.b. haven Little Georgia by The Sunday Times' Giles Coren. Ordinarily I'd just hit the little 'x' on the browser and graze onwards, but in this case the reviewer, a man who is on record as being "proud to be famous for being rude," manages to miss the graces of the restaurant so squarely as to actually infer their existence to a perceptive reader. Like, if you are at a party and someone is walking around blindfolded poking the other guests with a tail, you can be confident there is a donkey present.

In this case, Coren's eagerness to impersonate A.A. Gill - another Sunday Times restaurant critic,* another famous tosser - leads him to spend 15 of the review's 20 paragraphs making wincingly humorless, tone-deaf jokes about how people in Hackney are, in general, poorer than he is. He repeats again and again in his endless intro** the common blunder by which writers and speakers routinely lower themselves beneath even the most quivering insecure eastside hipster, which is to say he complains about hipsters. When Coren finally gets to the meal he emits little more than the names of the dishes at Little Georgia, having pretty much spent his literary load complaining about the hipsters in the poor neighborhood where he feels unwelcome.

All in all, high comedy. I visited the place last week in London and can attest that everything Coren failed to notice, all the discreet charms of Little Georgia, pretty much made me swoon with restaurant affection (a feeling seemingly alien to these reviewers I have mentioned).

revelations: une promesse du vin tasting at spring restaurant, 75001

Wherein this author reveals he is not hardcore enough about this whole wine schtick to wait around for Anselme Selosse to show up. Yes, the Selosse, he of the otherworldly Champagnes from Avize. He arrived late to the tasting my friend Josh at Spring organized in honor of wine writer George Bardawil's book "Une Promesse du Vin," and I'd already moseyed on to the day's next tasting.

I'd like to say I left because after tasting through the stellar line-up Josh had assembled that day - the wines of vignerons who were on time, including masters like Claude Papin, André Ostertag, and Christine Campadieu of Domaine La Tour Vieille - I'd had my fill of heavenly wines for the day.

But really it was just me being in a hurry. To hell with it, I thought, I'll just have to get rich and purchase some Selosse for my own private consumption one day. I was planning to do that anyway.