• WORKING IN THE VINES – SABLET STYLE

    par | Jan 17, 2011

    By LINCOLN SILIAKUS

    Last October, I broke the news about two young potential vigneronnes, Carla Giovanelli and Julie Galet.
    Well, they were at it again the other day down the back of my garden.
    Now that they have picked the grapes and made a 2010 wine, they have turned to the next stage in the winemakers’ life – the winter vine trimming.

    Despite its reputation for providing a gentle quality of life, Provence can be crudely cold in winter.

    Carla and Julie rugged up for the task

    It may not be easy, but is it really that hard?

    As hard as it looks?

    The next step?  Maybe we’ll see them driving their great-uncle Serge’s tractor with a plough or spraying a bit of sulphur.

    The serious part of this story is that, in common with many villages in Provence, Sablet needs a new generation of winemakers. But that is happening. As well as the charmingly effusive Vasco Perdigao, Frederic Meffre produces a lovely Sablet rouge from vines to the east of Sablet and Pablo Hocht, who works with Louis Barruol at St Cosme, has just started producing a fulsome red from vines on the Plan de Dieu at the opposite end of the appellation.

  • BLENDING ART, WINE AND OLD STONES IN RASTEAU

    par | Jan 14, 2011

    By LINCOLN SILIAKUS

    The new airy cellar of the Cave Cooperative at Rasteau has a room designed as an art gallery, which is terrific for local artists whose works hang aesthetically on its rough limestone walls.  The Coop has taken the name Ortas as its umbrella brand: it’s apparently a simplified anagram of Rasteau.  As I sip their delightful and affordable wines, I frequently think of Orcas, those large, pied, toothy dolphins that snap up cute little seals frolicking in the surf.  Anyway…

    The generosity of Ortas towards artists has been rewarded nicely by Nathalie Weber, a well-known artist from nearby Villedieu, who has reciprocated by designing a « Landscapes and Poetry » exhibition specifically for the cellar.  She specifically painted works to fit into the site. (suite…)

  • AUTUMN IN SABLET

    par | Nov 2, 2010

    By LINCOLN SILIAKUS

    This pic says it all: the vines, the trees in the Trignon creek and the Dentelles de Montmirail in the distance.
    This is what it was like over the long weekend.  Well, most of the time it was a lot worse than that with hard rain and warm southerly winds.
    The wind has turned to the north this morning. It’s the infamous mistral, which should dry everything out.

    The green grey and gold of Provence

  • HOW I BALLSED UP TYRRELS HUNTER VALLEY SHIRAZ

    par | Fév 21, 2010

    By LINCOLN SILIAKUS

    Now that I am Down Under, I will use the vernacular.
    I got it arse-about.  I ballsed up.  OK.  I made a mistake.

    He bought a bottle, which he kept hidden.
    — This one expresses a particular Australian terroir. Let’s see if you can get it.
    Swirl, sniff, sip and gulp. To me, it was a Bordeaux, and I’d tasted quite a few just before leaving Paris. There was plenty of well integrated but not overpoweringly plumy fruit, lots of tobacco and woody spiciness, little pepper and no discernable trace of alcohol on the nose.
    — Well, it’s not a shiraz, anyway, I said.
    Lindsay raised an eyebrow.
    — So, it’s probably from the Coonawarra, I blundered on, as that cool area near the sea in South Australia is where many of the Bordeaux-style wines come from.
    He showed me the bottle. A shiraz from the Hunter valley. Ooops! (See Tyrells).
    What a pleasure to balls it up with this wine. And what fun it is going to be trying to learn about what is really happening in Aussie wines

    Lindsay and Joan enjoying the joke

  • SABLET UNDER A BLANKET OF SNOW

    par | Jan 12, 2010

    By LINCOLN SILIAKUS

    The snow storms that jammed freeways in northern France have moved down to the South.
    It has snowed all night in Sablet, and continues.

    The wind has just picked up a minute ago. If it turns into a mistral, the sky will turn blue and the snow will pile up in drifts. This is what the locals fear most, as the roads turn into skating rinks and their cars end up in ditches.

    In any event, the wood stove is working nicely and I’m not moving today.

    If the old adage is true that a good freeze in winter is the best fertilizer for the vines, we are in for another good year this year.

    sablet-church-snow sablet-gigondas

    Left : Sablet village barely visible.
    Right : Sablet vines with river Trignon behind (Gigondas AOC on the other side of the trees)