WINE FROM MONTMARTRE, A SUNDAY WELL SPENT
By LINCOLN SILIAKUS
Daniel J. Berger, dapper wine enthusiast and blogueur, lined up two real personalities to show us around Montmartre in Paris last Sunday.
Francis Gourdin and Raymond Lansoy
Originally from the south, Francis Gourdin has been the official Paris City oenologist for 30 years, and is therefore responsible for the tiny cult vineyard, Le Clos Montmartre, on the north side of the hill just under the monstrous Sacré-Coeur Basilica built during the architecturally-challenged late nineteenth century.
Raymond Lansoy is a local author from just up the road who looks just like a Montmartre author should. Let’s just say that he looked as if he’d slept in his clothes. His grandfather frequented the adjacent Lapin Agile singalong bistro which was also popular with Picasso and the other usual suspects.
Back then when Picasso was hanging around, the authorities wanted to plonk a building on the plot, a good hundred metres across. That project failed and it became a children’s playground instead. The artists over the road worried that another project was inevitable, brought in a vigneron they knew from the Beaujolais. (suite…)