Jumping on the Jura Bandwagon: What's Old Is New Again

Class transcript:

Hello, one and all. Welcome. Happy Easter to you all. Happy Passover. Enjoy that Easter candy. If you're not religious, you know, it's widely available. We are thrilled that you took time out of this gorgeous Sunday afternoon, that you took screen time out of this gorgeous Sunday afternoon. Big ups to all of you who are enjoying your screen time outside. You know, if I had my way, we would, you know, rally up the patio seating at Rebler's Hour and do it that way. But as such, we are in one of our gorgeous booths here. Here, what I affectionately call the recording studio, particularly excited for this lineup of wines. Someone had suggested that we should have done a kosher wine class, which I think is a great tie-in, naturally, for the Passover season.

So maybe in, you know, future years, we will take advantage of that opportunity for the sake of kosher wine. I actually did a deeper dive for the sake of kosher. It is kind of fascinating, and it is not all plonk anymore. But we are going with a sommelier's crush object, a hipster sommelier fetish as such, wines from the Jura. So a sleepy region of eastern France that I love the way Jens Strauss puts it, that has, you know, blinking somewhat found itself in the, you know, spotlight of the international wine press. And they turn out remarkable, yet somewhat idiosyncratic wines. And we are here to celebrate that idiosyncrasy. And equally, wines, I think, that really want to go with food.

So in as much as the Jura makes some of the most interesting and unique wines in France, it also produces some of the most iconic foodstuff in France. First and foremost, Comté cheese, which is a kind of semi-hard cow's milk cheese from a particularly fetishized Montvillard breed of cows. But there's this like wonderful kind of, you know, synergistic relationship between these oxidative white wines in particular and the local cheese. And then they have the king of chickens there. They have these like smoked sausages they work with. You know, nobody is getting skinny in Ågera. And, you know, especially over winter, it's cooler climate. So you got to pack it on a little bit to stay warm. At any rate, on the red side, you're dealing with, you know, more ethereal, easy drinking kind of offerings.

So for me, early spring, you know, the combination of oxidative whites and, you know, ethereal racy reds felt particularly fitting for the sake of this wine. And then, you know, addressing this theme of resurrection on the Hawaiian side, you have, you know, the, you know, the, you know, the, you know, the, you know, the, you know, you know, what the French affectionately call the France perdu, the forgotten France that is rising, a forgotten corner of the country that is coming to not only national attention, but international attention. And, you know, kind of fun to think, consider, you know, what does that do for the region? You know, there are, you know, certainly advantages, you know, for the sake of that spotlight shining, but, you know, some disadvantages as well, you know, cheaply in terms of prices.

So, you know, there's a lot of, you know, you know, a lot of options for wines that were, you know, formerly affordable, but good on them. We are thrilled at this renaissance. We have two flights of three wines that we're going to be living in for the sake of this lesson. We're going to start with the whites. The white wine flight devoted to one singular grape, Sauvignon, which we'll talk about further, really a case study in oxidation. You have 2018, 2016, and 2011 vintages to try here. And then for the sake of the reds, a tour de force of, you know, a few of the wines that we're the noble red grapes of the Jura each in its own way bright mineral driven bracing but you know different expressions of you know the local soils and different expressions of these proud noble grapes that have become associated with the region over the centuries.

We are thrilled to have Zoe Nystrom back with us, and Zoe is tasting through the wines providing you with her ever-illuminating tasting notes for the sake of this lesson; and we're going to get right into it having given the stragglers a bit of time to join us here. Thank you again, happy Easter, happy Passover if you're not religious at all, you know, happy Sunday, happy Wine School day. Once again Zoe has the wines which is tremendously exciting because usually she has you know more intelligent things to say about the offerings. You know often than than I do we're going to kick it off with a bit of verse as we are want to not French verse as such this is one of my favorite American poets but you know this being Easter Sunday and myself a proud Episcopalian we are going to reference my favorite Old Testament miracle or sorry rather New Testament because my favorite Old Testament miracle would be you know parting the Red Sea because yeah it's just pretty dramatic.

I like that a little better than the brain bush just more cinematic. For the sake of the New Testament, you know it's not Lazarus, it's not you know, your run-a-day, you know, your everyday, you know kind of leper curing it is water into wine that is, you know, the greatest New Testament miracle as far as I'm concerned. This is a wedding toast from Richard Wilbur. Saint John tells how at Cana's wedding feast, the water pots poured wine in such amount that by his sober count there were a hundred gallons. It made no earthly sense to show how whatsoever love elects to bless, brims to a sweet excess that can without depletion overflow. Which is to say, that what love sees is true, that this world's fullness is not made but found.

Life hungers to abound and pour its plenty out for such as you. Now if your loves will lend an ear to mine, I toast you both good son and dear new daughter, may you not lack for water and may that water smack Cana's wine. I love! I love that uh third uh stanza uh which is to say that what love sees is true that this world's fullness is not made but found. Life hungers to abound and pour its plenty out for such as you. Um, you know, I would hope that in our own way, uh, each Sunday, uh, we are finding life's uh fullness uh in our own way, um, in wine and uh, wine you know, uh, plays a crucial part, um, in uh, the Eucharist.

Uh you know the Last Supper was a Passover Seder um and uh you know I don't know if you know um JC was on the marketing board um you know for the vignerons of the world but he definitely did them a favor with this whole you know wine as a sacramental rite thing. You know that definitely you know broadened the market for wine in subsequent centuries and millennia so um good on you uh JC uh for for doing that. Um at any rate um we are kicking it um you know kind of a bucolic kind of pastoral um for the sake of this lesson and we're continuing we're considering um uh the Jura um uh which is a mountainous region of uh eastern France.

I'm gonna pull up a map just to situate everybody, um, you know, geographically because I think that, you know, geography is, you know, hugely important especially when it comes to wine from the old world. You know, wine is a map, um, you know, wine is more than just, you know, a you know reductive set of grapes that then plunder for the sake of replanting elsewhere. Wine speaks to its origins like no other, uh, food stuff, um, and, uh, the Jura, um, is a a mountain range, um, so you can see here, you are actually, uh, technically, um, the wine region is, uh, uh, what's called the first plateau of the Jura mountains, and the Jura mountains separate France from Switzerland, um, and, uh, there's actually a Swiss Jura as well, uh, they make wine there as well, it's just not, uh, nearly as well-known.

It's heralded, um, as, uh, wines from, uh, the French side of the border, but, um, you're not like literally in the Jura mountains; it should be said, you're essentially, uh, in, you know, the first set of foothills, um, for the sake of, uh, the Jura mountains. Now um we're going to consider a couple wines here from one of my favorite um local distributors local importers wine traditions um they're not going to win any you know fashion contests they don't carry you know the Jura has become chock-a-block with these like natural wine luminaries. Au Renoir, Puccine, Ganavat that we're going to taste later um you know wine traditions don't really do that they you know shine a light on you know kind of you know just local vignerons you know doing their own thing making remarkable wines that punch well above their weight um as far as value and as much as I love the superstars you know um you know this book um this distributor is one that you know I could happily drink through you know their entire inventory um and you know I think there's something said said for that you know that you know kind of matter of factness um is really what I love about wine particularly when it comes from the old world and when it reflects its place of origin but um on their website they have a great you know to my mind um succinct description of what the Jura is so one has to like a wine region where the traditional white wine is yellow and red wine is translucent.

From Celine Lebon and that comes from um Celine uh essentially the French roots or the Latin root for salinity. The Jura was a huge center of the salt trade. They still mine salt there to this day. Le Bon refers to the fact that once the salt trade diminished, they tried to rebrand as a resort town, as a spa town, essentially, and some more to the south. The Jura vineyards extend 80 kilometers along a band of hills known as the River Malt. It's important to note how tiny this region is. The Jura, as such, could fit fully in Margaux. Margaux is one of the departments of the Omedoc in Bordeaux. The whole of this region could fit in a tiny subsection of Bordeaux. The whole of the Jura could fit into the Macanais in Burgundy.

We're dealing with wine made on a small scale. For me, one of the coolest things about the Jura is the staggering variety of wines made there. Historically, there was much more land planted to the vine than there is now. At its zenith, 20,000 hectares today, essentially a tenth of that. The Dunlop landscape, you're dealing with polyculture. The classic image of the Jura, not necessarily dominated only by vines in isolation. These are small family farms that until recently weren't dedicated, but by recently, I say 60's, 70's, people worked with a lot of different plants. They certainly had cows. This is like cow porn. These beauties are Montbeliard cows. They give us the milk that goes into Comte cheese. They got grapes in the background. They are really well cared for beautiful animals.

Honestly, in their own way, probably more iconic historically than the wines certainly have been at cheese. Comté, I don't think it has the market share here that does in France, but it's one of those wines that really occupies this special place in the French cheese board imagination. Then the books at Wine Traditions close it out happily. In the last few years, the idiosyncratic wines of the region have made great progress in finding the rightful place at the table of the 20th century. Again, what the French call 'France Perdue', this forgotten bucolic corner of the country that is in the midst of revival. Sometimes obligingly, and then sometimes feeling miscast for the sake of being the hip young kid in the midst of this revival and celebrated by Scandinavian, Japanese, and whatever I am, sommeliers.

Well, keeping this perfect, let's talk a little geology. Thank you for joining us on Easter as your eyes glaze over. Before you get to the wine, we're gonna talk a little geology, because, you know, I think something kind of cool about lazy raw people don't realize this, Jurassic like the buck and dinosaurs comes from the giraffe. So there's a layer of limestone that dates from the Jurassic period, beginning essentially about 40 million years ago. Beginning, essentially about 40 million years ago. That gave its name to the Jurassic era. And fittingly, some of the largest preserved dinosaur tracks in the world were recently discovered in the Jura. Now, 150 million years ago, this is what the world looked like. Madness. Most of Europe, at least most of the region that we're considering today, was under a shallow sea.

And that was the case throughout the earlier geological period, which is called the Triassic and the Jurassic period. And these shallow seas give you these small organisms. You can see one of them on the label I'm holding. That's an ammonite. That's a fossilized, essentially, shellfish. But you get all these little organisms with shells that break down over time. They are deposited on the seafloor. They give you calcium-heavy sedimentary rock. So that is the story of the Jura. That is the story of the Jura. That is the story of Burgundy, as well, to the west. But flash forward a few dozen million years, and what happens is Africa breaks free from Gondwana. It's like the Reunite Gondwana land bumper stickers. But it breaks free.

And then it moves north, and it slams into the Eurasian Plate, creating the Alps Mountains. And as it does that, it does different things. There are actually individual fault lines in Burgundy proper. But in the Jura, it essentially folds the land. So you have these alternating layers. You have, at the top, this Jurassic layer, a very pure limestone. And then you have these older layers of Triassic, what's essentially a mudstone that has some, you know, essentially ancient oyster shells in it, but is not as pure. And what happens is, in Burgundy, is you get more of that limestone that is still at the top of, you know, the layer of deposits in the vineyards. Whereas this folding in the Jura Mountains, in that first plateau of the Jura, it exposes more of that more ancient rock, that Triassic mudstone, which is, you know, closer to 30 to 60, 70 percent calcium carbonate, as opposed to the more pure limestone in Burgundy.

And that gives you a heavier moral, clay soils in the Jurassic area, which is good because they equally shed and retain water in a way that is well suited to this cooler climate than you find in Burgundy. I was just saying something because Burgundy is pretty cool itself, but wet climate as well. And these clays have very unique properties whereby they shed excess water, but retain just enough to saturate and nurture the vines. So, you know, that's, you know, tens of millions of, uh, geological history, um, for, uh, the sake of a few minutes. Um, flash forward to the modern era. Um, what are we talking with, uh, when we're dealing with these, these vineyards for the sake of the Jura? Um, uh, this is a region that has made wine since the Middle Ages, been celebrated by French kings.

Uh, Henry IV, huge fan. Um, uh, the region, you know, was historically dominated by the Ducie of Burgundy, um, which itself was distinct from, um, uh, you know, uh, France proper. Um, uh, and, uh, it has its own distinct history though, um, under, uh, Spanish and Habsburg rule. Um, and, uh, they attribute, uh, that, you know, few centuries, um, of, you know, Spanish dominion to the affinity that they have for oxidative aging in their wine. It's very similar to, um, the Spanish wines of Andalusia, uh, but we'll get there in just a moment. Uh, over time, um, they evolved, um, essentially five grapes that they work with, um, cheaply for the sake of the uh, designation of origin, um, which itself, um, were among the first when those AOCs were established in France, in the 1930s.

Uh, the one we're going to consider for the sake of our first exercise, the superstar, um, uh, is, uh, Sauvignon. Um, now this is a different grape, uh, than Savy B. Um, we are dealing with, uh, Sauvignon, um, not Sauvignon, but Sauvignon. And, uh, big up to our old friend, Mary Taylor, uh, who helped me with pronouncing, and corrected me. She has a beautiful French accent. I do not. Uh, but Sauvignon is S-A-V-A-G-N-I-N. Sauvignon is S-A-U-V-I, uh, G-N-O-N. So, uh, Sauvignon. Um, and it is arguably the most ancient modern grape still in production, uh, genetically, uh, identical, um, to, um, kind of, uh, middle-aged, um, grape pits. Found throughout central France from 900 years ago. And I have to, you know, emphasize this.

This is a relatively recent finding and super cool, um, if you're a grape nerd, um, because, uh, you're dealing not with, like, the same family of creatures. You're dealing with the same fucking breed of dog. Not only the same, you know, breed of dog, the same dog. You know, the way grape vines are propagated, they propagate cuttings that are genetically identical. They tend not to propagate seeds, which are, you know, offspring of the parent plant. These are cuttings that are identical over the course of 900 years. And that speaks to, uh, the way in which, you know, the, um, you know, uh, vignerons of the Middle Ages, uh, through to the modern-day valued Sauvignon. Now, what's so cool about this grape that we preserved over the course of a millennium, um, in, you know, its preserved and unadulterated form?

Uh, well, uh, it has thicker skins, uh, relatively loose clusters, maintains its acid really beautifully as it ripens, uh, has this wonderful fruity, uh, floral quality, and lends itself beautifully to a variety of different styles. Now, that, um, you know, thick skin, uh, high acid as it ripens, uh, recipe, hugely important in cooler, wetter regions, uh, like, uh, the Girard. Um, now, for the sake of our flight, we're going to address wines, um, you know, at different levels of oxidation. Um, we're, uh, going to start with a producer I referenced earlier from, uh, the aforementioned Wine Traditions book. Um, a beautiful, uh, gentleman, uh, here. This is André Jean-Maurice. He's a wine producer. He's a wine producer. He's a wine producer.

He's a wine He, uh, is a proud son of, uh, local cooperative growers who set out on its own in 2010, and over a short period of time, has really emerged as, you know, in my mind, you know, one of the most promising, um, you know, kind of, uh, new estates, um, in, uh, the Girard. He's in the northern part of the region, uh, it's called Arbois, um, uh, which, along with Chateau Chalon, is, is the most important sub-region of the Girard. We're tasting two wines, um, one of which is made in a less oxidative style, one of which is made in a more oxidative style. Um, oxidation, um, the word of the day. Um, let's taste these two wines, and then we'll talk process. Um, so let's taste through these two wines.

I want you to taste the Sauvignon Terre Bleu. Terre Bleu, um, refers to, uh, a, uh, what they say, blue earth, um, which is, uh, morally, uh, muddy, essentially impure, uh, calcareous, um, you know, kind of clay-heavy, um, uh, set of soils, um, that dominate, uh, about 70-80% of, uh, the Girard, um, and are particularly well-suited to Sauvignon. Uh, Chardonnay grows everywhere, but tends to historically prefer, um, uh, you know, uh, more pure limestone. Pinot Noir is a diva, uh, can only really handle pure limestone, uh, but we'll, we'll get to that later. Um, uh, at any rate, uh, Sauvignon loves these heavier soils, uh, but we're tasting wine here that is made in a more traditional way, in what a Burgundian method, which is to say, um, anytime you age wine in barrel, and we're dealing with older, um, neutral barrels here, um, so used barrels, um, wine will evaporate over time because, um, you know, oak has pores, um, and over time, you know, the wine, a portion of the wine is lost, the angel's share, as it were. Now, in traditional winemaking, you want to guard against oxidation, any microbiological spoilage, so anytime you have headspace in that barrel, you're inviting, you know, evil microbiological actors to hang on to the barrel, and, uh, you know, you're not going to let them lurk, to wreak havoc on your, uh, pristine, um, you know, uh, product wine, so typically, um, uh, as wine evaporates, um, uh, uh, winemakers will 'valet', uh, 'valet' is French for top off, so this is a wine made in that traditional Burgundian style, whereby the barrels are topped off.

Um, Zoe, you don't have this wine, um, I'm upset that you don't have this wine, but, you know, for the sake of my tasting notes, you know, it should be noted that they call this style Sauvignon Poiret, uh, they call it Sauvignon Poiret, um, uh, and for me, you know, uh, it's kind of cool because there's a bit of disjuncture between the, the smell of it and the taste of it, so, you know, on the nose, it's flinky, it's smoky, it's got a little bit of this track much, um, match, uh, quality to it, but on the palate, it's oh so pure, um, it's fresh, it's fruity, uh, it's truly lovely, um, uh, you know, bright, uh, crisp, um, all the fabulous orchard fruit, uh, your heart you know, a true kind of harbinger of spring, uh, in a glass, uh, any, you know, tasting notes from the commentary, uh, for the sake of this one, Zoe?

Yeah, absolutely, if you were to, uh, plant today blues on holy ground, would you get the sacre blue? That's terrible, uh, yeah, so plus three points, uh, whoever, uh, came up with that, um, really good Easter Sunday, um, that's a definitely dad joke, um, good, good dad humor there, um, on, on Easter Sunday, uh, good on you, um, so, um, you know, I think this is a wine that's remarkable for its freshness, um, and, you know, it's really, it's, it's defining feature. Now, move on to, uh, the second wine, um, Sauvignon, um, which they have a lot of different names for, but they would say sous-bol, um, uh, it's a wine aged like sherry, um, so, uh, it is a wine aged in a method, uh, this is, and this is a 2016, whereby they do not top off these barrels, uh, and this is the fate of that wine during that aging period, uh, vol, uh, what the Spanish called floor, um, what the French called veil of yeast, the same, the very same yeast that ferment the wine initially, uh, just a different iteration of it, Saccharomyces cerveza, um, that, uh, has adapted, uh, to, uh, form colonies that float on the surface of the wine, form this blanket, um, now, they're doing something a little different than what, uh, uh, you know, this blanket does initially, that, than what Saccharomyces does during the primary fermentation cycle of the wine. They are not taking, um, you know, that, that sugar as such, that glucose, um, and, and fermenting, uh, into, um, you know, uh, alcohol.

Um, they are, uh, taking that very acid itself, uh, that acid, uh, other available sugars, uh, and, uh, they're making acetaldehyde and other chemical constituents, uh, soliton, um, all of these other things that make this wine what it is. Um, and additionally, they're protecting this wine from oxidation over time. So, um, if this wine didn't have this veil of foam, it would be much darker than it currently is. Um, you know, for me, um, you know, this is rich, it's nutty. Um, it has all these fascinating chemical constituents. I, I spoke, um, about the, uh, acetaldehyde. Um, it's a tough one to pronounce. Um, I'm going to put that on the screen there for you. Um, but, uh, acetaldehyde, uh, is produced by the yeast. Um, it is produced anytime alcohol oxidizes, um, acetaldehyde.

Um, uh, it is a type of aldehyde. Um, uh, it lives, uh, you know, and is present equally in walnuts and green apples. Uh, people talk about like a green apple taste, uh, and Spanish ham and coffee and bread. Um, it is one of the most kind of important, um, you know, chemical constituents of, uh, flavor for the sake of that, you know, kind of rich nuttiness, uh, that I can think of, um, in, um, you know, any, uh, set of foods. Um, and it plays an important, hugely important part in the development of, uh, the wines of, uh, the Girard to the extent that they test for it, uh, in, uh, Langean that we were going to taste for briefly now. Um, uh, you know, for me, uh, this is a wine that tastes older.

Uh, it has lost, uh, that, you know, primacy of fruit, um, and, uh, you know, kind of bright, uh, florality and, you know, uh, you know, taking on, you know, a different quality, um, you know, something that is, is much richer, um, uh, something that is much more layered, um, you know, uh, it would technically be lower in acid, but, you know, that blanket of floor is equally, uh, still, um, consuming sugar. So, you know, it's lower in acid, but lower in sugar, um, uh, as well. Um, and, you know, for me, the, the magical transformation of these wines is, is textural, um, as much as it is in terms of flavor. And then, you know, if ever there was a lesson to eat with, uh, please, you know, uh, try food with these wines, especially the oxidized ones.

Uh, they really shine with food. Um, you know, uh, these are wines that are much more complex through the action of that aging, through the action of that yeast than are, uh, wines like the floral that we started off with. You're talking about, you know, hundreds, um, over 300, um, you know, different volatile compounds, um, in wines like this. Um, and, uh, you know, there is this nerdy Sam Francois Chartier, who has this whole theory of, um, what he calls bridge ingredients, which are these chemical constituents. And the more that a wine has, the more they lend themselves to a variety of different purposes for the sake of linking up with other foods that share these chemical signatures.

And, you know, I have to say that when it comes to these oxidative wines, like Bonjon, like Sherry, um, you know, I really, uh, share that, um, you know, belief, um, in these bridge, um, you know, uh, compounds in the culture. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, um, of these wines. Are they for everybody? No. Are they a bit, you know, obtuse? You know, are they a bit, you know, closed off maybe at first, yes. Um, but give them time, let them open up in the fridge, drink half a bottle, give it a week, come back to it. Um, let it open up in the class, let it come to temp. Um, and I think you too, um, you know, we'll be preaching, uh, you know, the gospel of, of Bonjon, and then, you know, try it with him, try it with cheese.

Um, there's a huge chocolate culture in the Jura. Um, you know, hopefully better average you know better than the average like drugstore you know bunny rabbit but if that's all you have on hand you know um you know 86 years give it a try with your you know um and you know let me know uh what you think uh any thoughts on the difference uh between these two offerings zoe yeah absolutely um lisa marie is like just her haikus have gotten so amazing um give me just one moment i feel like uh i feel like lisa marie should have a a second career writing for like greeting card like japanese greeting card companies or you know something along those lines would would be you know or we could co-opt her wine haiku power for you know our our list we have a co-opted cartoonist on the end yeah exactly a co-opted poet seems yeah that seems very fitting yeah from co-opted you know yeah tasting um cartoons to co-opted Tasting haikus, it's very yeah, I love it. Uh, what does Lisa Marie have for the sake of her haiku? All right, we have the Terry Blue reminds me of rock climbing on the nose, then shifts into tart tangerine dreams, crumbling down into the steep mountain dotted with white flowers and crashing into oyster shells. I mean, that is, that is beautiful.

I can't as opposed to indeed as opposed to the T-Pay with the oxidation smells like singed hay, that shifts into almond strip teas with a caramelized orange peel. Oh, oh fire! Uh, I like that. A uh note, you know, for me there's something, you know, lovably, you know, not necessarily homespun but you know again. that like pastoral quality you know these there's those these are honest wines and you know sometimes it's hard to think of uh you know white wine as earthy but you know in some way i think you know bonjour embraces that uh there's an earthiness uh to uh to these wines and you know uh again they're they're a bit uh challenging you know they're 

idiosyncratic uh certainly nerdy um yes but um they're wines that grow on you um they're wines that sink their hoax into you they're they're haunting you know um even if they aren't you know as approachable um you know as you know some of the others we've featured and you know I think it's its fun to get a sense of what this grape is like, uh, left to its own devices, um, and you know it doesn't get much more classic, uh, than these wines, you know. Um, uh, this is not a producer, um, uh, André Jean is not a producer that you know people would consider as part of the natural wine movement which is is surging um in the region, but you know I would consider these wines very natural, you know.

So, uh, he is not a citrus wine, uh, he isn't uh some producers still occasionally chaperalize, but uh chapelization being the need to add sugar to the wine primate prior to fermentation to boost the alcohol content, but um, uh, not as much. As Budg Nobody knows, he's UNC's, you know, more and more because, you know, #globalwarming. They don't need to do that in the Jura. And, you know, these are really pure expressions of plates. He's working entirely with native yeast. He actually makes what they call pied de couvert with the first batch of his sparkling wine. About a quarter of the wines in Jura are sparkling. And so his first batch of wine he mixes kind of basically like sourdough starter with. And he inoculates all of his further wines with that.

And, you know, that's a way that a lot of winemakers work to ensure a healthy ferment and to consistently apply native yeast in their cellars. So, you know, he's using neutral oak. These are beauties. And, you know, they're not inexpensive. You know, you're dealing with, you know, $29 and, you know, $40 for the tipé. But, you know, for the region, they are remarkable values in my mind. And, you know, especially for the sake of tipé, you know, something that is very ageable and really fabulous. So it should be said that, you know, you have tipé, the style often referred to as baby vin jaune, which, of course, leads to the question, you know, what is this vin jaume madness?

So you saw a picture, which I'll bring back now, of that epic barrel, you know, in desperate need of a top off with that layer of flour. So for the sake of, you know, and typically they're using used, you know, Burgundian barrels, 228 liter used barrels. So, you know, they're using, you know, Burgundian barrels, 228 liter used barrels. And there's a very little need with few exceptions in the Jura for new oak, or at least there shouldn't be. And, you know, this is the way the wine starts out, and they're constantly tasting. And, you know, if the wine, you know, doesn't have the character they want, you know, very often they'll release it as a younger wine.

But if it has, you know, potential, if it has, you know, all the character they want for the wines that are among their best, they will make a wine that they call Béjon. Now, historically, these wines were called Vendégard. They were even called Vonglacé. Glacé for ice, because often they were harvested after the last harvest. The grapes for these wines typically harvested at higher alcohol levels, potential alcohol levels, it should be said. You know, because the higher alcohol presents spoilage when you're leaving that headspace in your barrel, as does higher acid for that matter. Now, the unicorn of the Jura, its most iconic wine, Béjon, historically again called Vendégard, is a wine that classically ages for a minimum of six years under that carpet of yeast that I just showed.

Now, there's a very famous, although it's a bit of a modern creation release party for this wine, the piercing of the barrels every February. But, you know, it's a great marketing tool, and far be it from me to deprive anyone of a fun wine festival. This comes from the Rollet family, a bunch of siblings. This looks like kind of like this awesome reservoir dogs-ish lineup, but with family vignerons. And sadly, they just sold their estate. They didn't have any descendants that wanted to take it over to a Burgundian winemaker. But, you know, it should be said that a new buyer committed to, you know, really maintaining the character of their wines as such because they are not again part of this like, you know, hit natural wine, you know, kind of I don't know, like cool table at the, you know, cafeteria, you know, kind of clique but they make wines that speak to the place in a really pure and beautiful way.

So this is their Vendégard. It's 2011. This is a bottle size mimics the Chalon. So the Chalon is the iconic bottle of the region. It's a 620 centiliter or 620 milliliter bottle. And the romantic story of the Clavois that it is what's left over after evaporation of a liter of wine that you start off with after six years. That story is probably more apocryphal than not, as are many things in the wine world. If you listen to, you know, some true, you know, kind of historians of the region, Stéphane Tissot in particular says that it's bottled in the 620 centiliter bottle because that was the traditional Spanish bottle size. But regardless of who you believe, there's this iconic bottle size.

And for a long time, Vingeant didn't make its way to the States because the TTP, the people that regulated alcohol in the States, who are very unimaginative and very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very programmatic about the size of bottles they allow, didn't allow this quirky 620 centiliter bottle to come in. So for the American market, the rural ladies of the world, if they want to bring in Vingeant, have to bring it in, in this sadly debased 375 milliliter style. Vingeant is amazing. It's different from vineyard to vineyard. You know, typically producer will at least one, but increasingly there's interest in single vineyard. Vingeant, Tissot, who are chasing for sake of wine, are very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very actually releases four different ones.

It should be said that the Vingeant of Arbois, which is the wine that we're tasting now, said to be, you know, kind of different than the Vingeant of Chateau Chillon, which is an appellation, a designation origin entirely for Vingeant. You know, eat your heart out for the sake of, you know, just single, you know, myopic focus, for the sake of, you know, your branding. So Chateau Chillon, the most famous, arguably the oldest Vingeant here. We are further north in Arbois for the sake of this one. Actually, for you know, the sake of this particular estate, we are in Arbois proper, exactly. I said that the Vingeant of Arbois, because the Sauvignon planted to kind of heavier soils, broader, weightier, whereas the Vingeant of Arbois, which is the Vingeant of Arbois, which is the Vingeant of Arbois, Chateau Chillon, more linear, more citric, more age-worthy.

It definitely smells like sherry, but it is unfortified. Traditionally, sherry has great spirit added to it. I want to emphasize that the oxidative wines of the Girard have no spirit added. You will lose some volume of water relative to alcohol over time, but traditionally, there is zero spirit added to the mix by law. Now, you know, equally, the conditions in the cellar are a little different than they are in sherry. In sherry, they tend to bump up the humidity, so they're really looking at like 70% plus humidity, and they go along, you know, they go to, you know, long ends to ensure that in the cellars of Andalusia, but they prefer drier cellars, drier conditions in Arbois, and they prefer a huge swing of temperatures over the season, so they kind of want this layer of flora to, you know, develop and die off, and develop and die off over time, and that gives you this autolytic component.

Autolysis is, you know, this aging process that happens after those yeast cells die. I'm going to bring up that picture, you know, for the last time, because I love this picture of a barrel of Benjami, something like really speaks to me about it, but it's that layer at the bottom, you know, it's not protecting the wine from oxidation, but it is adding this, you know, dead yeast cell thing to the party, and that gives you glycerol, which is a different, you know, kind of essentially alcohol sugar. That's unfermentable. That gives the wine this remarkable weight, and that's coupled with, you know, a lot of different chemical constituents for me, particularly solitone, which, or salt alone, rather, which gives you that curry kind of hazelnuts-like dimension for the wine. Any thoughts about these?

If you hate them, don't hesitate to chime in. It should be said, these are nerdy fucking wines. They are hateable. You know, if my sister was participating in this class, you know, she would have moved on to the reds already, and probably not been happy with them either. So, you know, feel free to be unabashed in your feedback. What do you got, Tiff? Yeah, we have, like, a lot of comments talking about how it reminds us of Sherry because of that oxidation, and then also after going into so much of our, like, Amontillados and a bunch of our, like, drier, like, nuttier wines, like, those comments have been quite strong. There is a good question about if introducing oxygen during fermentation increases the longevity of wine, or at least makes it, like, a little bit less immune to oxidation in its life, even though it's not fortified like a Madeira or a Sherry would be.

Yeah, so, I mean, oxygen, you have to think of as this greedy, O2 is this greedy, which is, you know, the oxygen that pervades the atmosphere. It's a really greedy molecule. It wants to strip, you know, everything, particularly ethanol, of its electrons, and when it does that, it creates, there's that word again, acet aldehyde, which is that green apple, bruised apple character that basically is the death of wine. So, you know, oxidation is the death of all wine. You know, there are a lot of different things that protect wine from oxidation over time, sulfur being one of them, you know, but acid being a huge one. You know, what happens, you know, for my sake in these wines, I don't know, I don't know, but what happens is that the gradual introduction of oxygen, so you're not shocking the wine with oxygen as such here, you know, it would be like, you know, you know, the very white, you know, sultry, baby, here's some oxygen, you know, kind of, you know, oxygen introduction, you know, method, as opposed to like that, you know, spinal tap, oxygen, you know, kind of, and, you know, the spinal tap would just be like too much, and, you know, the wine would shrivel, die, but, you know, berry, you know, with a base, oh, you know, the wine is, you know, you know, kind of, you know, in this very, like, agreeable place, and, you know, maybe, you know, there's some, like, I don't know, furry handcuffs, or maybe it's getting, you know, but whatever, you know, For the sake of the wine, it's in this very, you know, durable, you know, emotionally secure place. So, you know, that slower introduction of oxygen over time, that layer of bottled, in my mind, protects the wine in bottle from oxidation and wine death, whereas, if you just, you know, throw the wine to the wolves, I'm not going to shout again, but you just throw the wine to the wolves, you know, without, you know, that, you know, berry white interlude, you know, really, you know, what you get is, you know, more of a shock to the system, and faster wine death, you know, which is why I think some of the most age-worthy wines in the world are, well, Jones, there's a famous 1779 vintage that is still drinkable to this fucking day, you know, that's madness. People talk about the Comet vintage, this is a Haley's Comet 1811, it's hugely famous across Europe, but those wines are still drinkable to this fucking day.

So, you know, oxidation, which is death, equally, if you do it in a very measured way, you know, for a younger wine, makes it more durable in the long run, and, you know, I think, you know, there are larger life lessons there to be gleaned, but, you know, I think that's what these wines do well, that's what, you know, Bonjean does well, is that it's in a protective, you know, environment for the sake of, you know, these oak barrels, that is less oxidative than it would be, you know, if it was just, you know, exposed to the elements, you know, but by the same token, you know, it's got that, you know, gentle, oxidative undertone over time. So, yeah, I promise I won't talk, like, very white anymore, but that's my, that's my, you know, take on oxidation and longevity.

I think that's great. Could you talk a little bit about the oxidation in terms of flavor profiles, and why that reminds us a little bit of petrol, like we would see in some of our Chardonnays? There are different things happening there, they're different, so you actually have different chemical constituents that, ultimately, kind of take you to the same place, so you have a world of, like, lactones, and disettles, and the aforementioned sulfolone, you know, that are taking you to this nutty place, in this petroly place. In Riesling, there's a different chemical constituent called TDN that takes you to the same place, it does it differently, you know, and the kind of chemical, pathway is, is different, you know, but the chemical pathway, for the sake of sherry and Vingean, is very much the same, you know, Riesling is kind of an outlier, so we're not going to consider that, but, you know, for the sake of our sherries and Vingean, and then, you know, the other wine that, you know, we haven't talked about is Tokaj, there's actually a really traditional, the Hungarian Tokaj, a very traditional style of Hungarian Tokaj, that's actually aged a soup bowl under floor, as well. It's an even rarer, and even more of a unicorn, than, than Vinchon, but, you know, the, the pathway, the chemical pathway is a little different for the sake of Riesling, and I think, you know, on the, on the nose, on the palate, goes a different place.

I, you know, I find that, you know, aggressive petrol signature in Riesling, very, you know, more aggressive than, you know, the, um, kind of that, like, more kind of toasted coconut, walnut, um, you know, brown butter, um, you know, curry, uh, kind of, uh, set of flavors that you get, um, from, um, wine's aged soup bowl. And not to mention the textural difference, getting that, like, waxy, oily. Yeah, yeah, yeah, all those things, that's a great point, that's a great point, so, and the quality of the acid is very different, too, you know, and, and these things don't exist in isolation, it's important to say, so, you know, with a wine like Riesling, you know, could have, you know, the same chemical profile, you know, for the sake of all those, you know, constituents that develop as the wine ages as a vin jaune, but, you know, Riesling's gonna have more tartaric acid, because it, it is this amazing creature that retains it, you know, beautifully, you know, as it ripens more so than any other grape, um, you know, it's gonna have a different, you know, kind of profile, um, to start off with, and the fact that it has that higher acid level, um, that affects the way we perceive all these other things, you know, so it's It's not like you can just kind of, you know, sit a control panel and dial up the treble, and, you know, it; things change predictably, dialing up that treble, it changes the whole organism, you know, for the sake of our, you know, sense of taste, in, in ways that are just now beginning to be sussed out, um, in, in really fascinating ways.

That's awesome. Let's move on to the rest; I'm super excited. That sounds delightful, uh, because you actually have this fucking flight, Zoe, um, so, uh, we're talking Plussard, um, so Plussard, um, it should be said, there's a, the, there's a, a bit of a, um, uh, you know, kind of, uh, blue steel, a tigra thing happening, uh, with, with Plussard, so, um, uh, this is Plussard, um, bottled P-L-O-U-S-S, uh, A-R-D, uh, Plussard, um, and, uh, it is from, um, a particular village, I'm going to have to pull up, uh, my PDF expert map of the region, uh, once more, um, so it's from a village that is kind of like the self-proclaimed local capital of, uh, Plussard, um, which is, uh, Poupillon,  right here, uh, just south of Arpois, um, and in Poupillon, they, they call, uh, uh, they, they have a Plussard as such, but, um, in other places throughout the region, historically, it has been Poulsard, um, so it's the same grape, It's all the same grape, the Tigray Blue Steel, it's the same thing. Uh, it is a very thin-skinned red varietal. Um, historically, it was even labeled as such, uh, rosé, um, uh, because it was so, uh, thin-skinned, and it's, it's really a cool grape. Um, and it's really like the, you know, the 90s, the early aughts were, like, not a good period for Plussard, so people were chasing extraction, you know, chasing new oak, it was like, you know, the anti-Plussard moment, but we're coming into this amazing,renaissance of, of these, like, lower alcohol, you know Kind of gender, um, non-conformist red wines, where we're more comfortable with the fact that, you know, we're drinking something that, you know, looks like a pump, feels like a sneaker, you know, drinks kind of like, uh, you know, uh, rosé, but, you know, it has some of the grip of red, and we're okay with that, because, you know, we don't need to put, you know, Plussard in a box, you know, let's just appreciate it as such, because it's, you know, fucking awesome. Um, uh, Zoe, uh, what are your tasting notes, uh, for this particular entity? Um, I thought it smelled and tasted, like, a lot like trail mix, um, and then, like, warm clay pot, when I'm doing a tiny bit of hardeling, um, I think that it has that, like, brightness of red fruit, but there is, like, a dried or savory quality there as well.

There is a little bit of funkiness, but it's not, it's definitely not, like, a bar meal, it's not a wet leather, it's just kind of, like, there's some funky hay somewhere around you. Um, if I can just call people out, as apparently I was just doing today, which is that I love that Kate said that it smells like Twizzlers, because it's that ripe candied red, but it also has- Oh, good call. Yeah, people say red currant a lot for Plussard, but I, I like, I like it better, because there's a little licorice leaf in the mix. I love that you called out potting soil, because it doesn't smell, for me, it doesn't smell like, you know, vineyard soil, or, like, compost. It smells like, you know, like the bougie indoor soil, you know?

It's like, uh, there's something, like, dirty but clean about it, by the same, by the same token. Um, uh, and, and I love that about Plussard, you know, it's both of the earth, but it has this, like, really bright, um, you know, tart red fruit character, um, you know, uh, currant, um, you know, I had mentioned that, like, uh, that, like, red raspberry, um, you know, even some, like, sour cherry, um, in the mix, but, you know, there's a little bit of earthiness as well. Um, it's a really adorable thing. And that does the winemaking, uh, uh, does the repartee.

Um, uh, they are famous for their hospitality, so they have this open house in, like, April, May, and spring every year, um, go out of their way to welcome all their customers to the winery and taste some of their wines, and, uh, it's a brother-sister team, which appeals to me because I have a sister, um, Although I do wonder what kind of wines Meg would want to make, I feel like we would have a really fast falling out and, uh, as much as I love her, maybe we would, you know, make wine under the same label but there would be like, you know, Meg's wine and Bill's wines, but at any rate, kind of like a Gavansa, you know, like one takes bread, one takes wine, yeah, exactly, kind of scenario, uh, but at any rate, they're they're just lovely people, um, kind of like a similar story so you know, you're dealing with a lot of families that have long roots and so there's a family that you know traces their roots in the region back, you know, many centuries but you know, um, it's essentially the grandfathers that, uh, started commercial production, uh, and you know they're perpetuating it to this day and finding finding their way, um, in a region that you know, um, was very off the beaten path, uh, until really the last decade, uh, and you know they're making the kind of wines that don't, you know, this is not like a 90-pointer, you know, nobody's gonna, nobody's gonna nobody's gonna like go to Ruth's Chris and order this to impress a bunch of out-of-town clients, you know, this is like the great like French blanc du plaisir, you know.

It's like, uh, this is just what you drink because you love wine and you love wine and food, and you know you want a chillable red that is crushable on a preposterously beautiful spring day. You know I don't want to drink Opus One, you know. I want fucking Poussard. You know for that moment, and good on him for that. So, Pinot, this is I love this wine, I love this wine maker, I love this wine maker. So he, this is Stéphane Tissot, so he took over his father's domain or his mother and father. I don't like this great old French wine maker. I don't like this great old French wine maker. I don't like this great old French kind of folk wisdom.

If you want to when merchants are approaching French winemakers, if you want to sell the wine, you sell the wife, you don't sell you know the husband because traditionally the wife held the strings the pocketbook and you know that's a very gendered organization of labor even though my wife you know I'd be bankrupt without her but at any rate I think it's important to acknowledge that you know these historic domains these historic estates you know you have the front you have the Stephans um of the world you know who are kind of like you know these these towering you know figures in the mind of like hipster psalms but you know the wives are actually equally important and and she is um holding it down their tasting room she is the public face um of of the winery and um do they have her name on the they should have her name on the label Stephanie no no um so Andre Ariel are um would be Stefan's um no Stefan is is him uh but uh she um you know equally um you know responsible for um the viability of this estate and they're just lovely fucking people he's very experimental um he is working in you know quote unquote kind of like natural milieu um but not like you know obnoxious about it um and also like you know you get into this like a lot of like as you're going to try in a second um you know uh Genovac lives in this kind of like more prickly like um you know I don't I don't play with friends I'm outside the region I'm kind of like doing my own thing world whereas you know Stefan is very much you know um kind of outside of the AOC system and wanting to do things like raising wine in Anfora and working without sulfur where possible and stuff like that but still committed to the welfare of the region and so I think that's where I want to live uh with wine uh at the at the end of the day you know pushing the boundaries but still part of the community um uh so um this is super cool Pinot um Pinot in the Girard is a racier, uh, animal, um, you know, you're in Arbois again. This is a vineyard that's kind of adjacent to the winery, um, totally biodynamic.

Uh, Stefan had a falling out with his father, uh, because in 1990 he wanted to convert the state entirely to organics and his father wasn't convinced it could be profitable, um, and uh, he pushed forward and said, 'Either you know, I'm going to do it this way or I'm not going to do it at all', um, and uh, so they moved forward. Uh, what I love about this wine is it's entirely whole cluster. I love where Pinot goes when it, uh, embraces the stems, um, so uh you're throwing the stems into the fermentation. Vat in addition to the fruit, um, and that gives you know, it's much more, um, you know, kind of uh resiny, um, herbal, spicy character um in the wine, and actually, because stems have a shit ton of phosphorus in them, um, which tends to dampen acidity I think, you know, gives the wines a little more balance in, in a place that is, um, you know, cool.

Um, sees 15% new oak um for added spice and wears it well, so tastiness on this one, yeah, I thought at first I didn't think it was going to be, um, as poopy as it was and I really enjoyed that funkiness, but it is a very pleasant, um, a baby, you know, or your own baby's diapers, or like that, really, a little bit different. It's like, before they before they get started on solid food, poop, you know it's like that uh yeah that like uh just nursing poop that that is yeah which I just I really enjoy how that like placed again like that those nice like really juicy fruits as opposed to like like Poussard where I felt like the it was still bright but it still had somewhat of a dried quality to it, this is really virality expressive um in that way with the cranberries and the like bright strawberries um but that acid is beautiful and is very balancing and I love like all the marjoram and thyme fresh herbs yeah yeah and that herbal leaf uh something I love it is it is like you know Barnyardy um this is you know Pinot that you know brings the funk in a way that I think sometimes you know Pinot makers shy away some shy away from it and it's vivid in the same way it kind of brings the funk but it's it's it's there's a i'm kind of an imitation of it in a way that I don't know you know I can't kind of heir to Pierre Auvenois, Jacques Poutinier, who are kind of part of that, you know, Jules Chave inspired, you know, first generation of natural when natural became a brand, French winemakers. Auvenois deserves as much credit as the Gang of Four and Beaujolais for popularizing a lot of those methods, certainly, and doing so to his credit in an undogmatic way. He would just assume, like, you know, make bread as he would, you know, wax, you know, lyrical about the, you know, deficiency of over-sulfuring wine, and he's not polemical in terms of, you know, how he approaches it.

Yeah, he's awesome. Anyway, we're dealing with a different winemaker. This is Jean-François Danneval, a fan-fan to his friends. He is in a different corner of the world. He's in a different corner of the world. He's in a different corner of the Jura. This is what's called the Sud-River Mont. So you're well south of Arbois. It is a backwater now, historically much more important. There were kind of larger share of the land plan divines once upon a time than there is now, but he is very much part of that revival. I think the most important thing I understand about him is that he left the region. He's tasting his dog here. He left the region for 10 years, worked in Chasseau-Montrachet, never thought of coming back, and then didn't come back to his family's domain, and very quickly made a name for himself, not only regionally, but certainly internationally.

And now all of his wines are, you know, ridiculously hard to come by. More tastings, Trousseau. Trousseau is a fascinating grape for me. I love it. It's a little more sinister than Pinot. Typically, actually, it's a little lighter than Pinot, but certainly not the case with this wine. This is white wine. But, I think it's a really good wine. It's a really good wine; rotation them in this order. It is the offspring of Sauvignon and another varietal, it should be said, so very incestuous in the Jura. And it's, you know, really like, I love, it goes to this like woodsy, earthy place that I just dig. He is also Fanfan stopped using he hasn't used a lick of sulfur in his cellars since like 2006 or some shit.

So he tends to bottle with residual CO2. So CO2 for a lot of natural winemakers does what sulfur does for non-natural natural winemakers, which is it's protective. So a lot of them will bottle their wines with a little bit of pinprickle petions. And some of that texture, some of that like like is what you're getting these wines. And very often they're wines that deserve a decant, which is honestly why I really like serving a lot of these wines in the four ounce. Because, you know, for the sake of tasting, that does what decanting does anyway. It should be said to you, know that there's not a mouse in the house anywhere here. So I've never tasted again about wine that has been mousy. So he's working naturally, but he's making unflawed wines, which is not easy to do.

Tasting notes, Zoe. Yeah, I think that this is the first one that shows a quality of like purple fruit, and it's very plump. I think it's interesting that none of the red wines have, they're just virtually devoid of tannins. But this one does have a little bit of a grip to it. I like that like violet woodsy-ness. Something about it smells like a pinecone. So Meredith, this morning, I didn't, I didn't really like, I'm not a big breakfast eater. And I just got my Johnson & Johnson, so I wasn't that hungry. But then she made pancakes. And this smells like pancake syrup to me for some reason. I don't know if that's just like by association, but I'm getting like maple, like a crazy maple thing.

Which is probably not helpful for anyone at home, but maybe it's like a maple bacon. I do like that. It's like that natural sweetness of like saffron though, perhaps. I love where this wine is landing now. The texture is fucking awesome. It's stupidly good. And again, this is not a wine for people who are afraid of tannins, but it's chewy. And the quality fruit is like, yeah it's like the dried fruit um it's it's showing really well um and again like it has this pretty um like violet kind of floral infection um you know the color very different uh than uh the Pinot much deeper um for the sake of this wine that's something

that Truso is always going to bring to the party um whether it's at 12 and a half percent alcohol or or or even deeper um I didn't I failed to mention and I thought this would be of particular interest to um uh the commentary but um uh so uh uh fun fun uh Jean-François, restless innovator um he has gone so far as to embrace music therapy in the vineyard so this is a uh sound machine from the uh geode Uh, genetics, uh, company, um, he plays music to his fucking vines in the vineyard, um, I don't know what music he's playing, but I think this is old Vine Pinot, um, I've heard of this in the cellar actually, so um, I visited a winery uh coast in Sicily and uh, the assistant winemaker was uh, Polish, so she was um, playing Chopin to uh, her Sicilian wines, and for many to Chopin sounds kind of nice, um, to me, but um, I don't know what music we're playing, but um, the thought here um is that uh, sound waves strengthen the protein cells of the developing grapes and make them more resistant to um, so I want to know more about this, I want to know um, you know. If can you know, maybe he likes Drake. You know, maybe Trousseau's more of Rihanna. Maybe you know plusard is like part of the Bay hide, um I don't know but I I wanna, I wanna know more about how this happens, how we decide what grapes respond to what music.

Um, this just feels like a really important uh line line of inquiry for us. It should be said too that uh probably remember thehin coughing so, um a few years ago it was a well-worth-na family who said 'I'm a kid,' I tried to upload my van more to my cousin's hotel room, let's go online. So I didn't have anybody move around bye; he kept talking so suddenly I talked to him like oh, one. Of my Somme heroes, the three brothers who won this winery or won this restaurant in that was formerly one of that was like the best restaurant in the world according to the water people San Pellegrino. But there's three brothers, one of whom's a Somme, and he has like five different portions, this is at El Salar Con Roca of his wine, you know kind of cellar.

And he plays different music to the wines depending on you know which reasons are from. We don't the budget for that yet, but fun to think about, at any rate. And you know I want to, I want actually like a controlled experiment, you know. I want to play like Carmina. Burana to one set of you know bottles you know on one loop and then you know maybe you know it's something you know much more like gave you say much more you know easy you know or you know on the pop music Pantheon, maybe we do. Like I don't know, I just I want to, I want to further explore this music therapy for one thing, I think it's a fascinating line of inquiry.

What else you have Zoe does look like if I can just call David out that he did do like an experiment between tests and who would be to say um and Beethoven um, but apparently it didn't make a difference. I will say that this was done in the sixth grade so maybe we should redo it. With like, um, more modern, um, data points maybe a larger alert I just, yeah, I want, I want, I want things that are like as far apart as possible, um, uh, uh, I I don't know I'm gonna I'm gonna think more about this to you know what are the what are the polls you know that we can deal with and you know is it pop music, pop music feels too varied I think like a like classical work so it's like a it's like a whole movement you know and you know you could have like Stravinsky on the one hand and you know maybe the wines are nerdy you know maybe it works for wines that when they start are a little plumper and fattier and need to tighten up you know but you want to you know loosen up other wines that are you know high strong to be with I don't know maybe maybe that's Chopin maybe Sure does that um it's nocturnes it's like all nocturnes uh for those wines but uh neither neither here or there  any more questions from uh the commentary about these ones um well you have spoken a little bit about decanting and i feel like we've gotten some like snap points in different classes all together about your views of decanting and and could you speak a little bit more about that about i mean honestly i wish i did it more for the wines that i love um you know a i think it's fun ceremony Um, and you know glassware is beautiful and it's fun to have nice things, um, you know. But it's equally fragile, and obviously, like even if you don't have children, people are going to break them, but um, you don't need a special vessel to decant something, you know, like any like oversized glass bowl jar will do the job, but it makes a big difference.

Um, I think people misunderstand how it works though, so in my mind it makes a bigger difference for wines that are um high acid than it does for wines that are brutish and high alcohol, so you know, you're, you know, big swinging dicks in the wine world; they're not going to change. You know they're just going to be a big swinging dick in a glass ball jar, as opposed to you know something that is going to change at all. You know acid-driven wines; you know they do transform, you know they they are a little you know more high-strung and they do benefit from you know that genie-in-a-bottle escape um and you know certainly all the sure wines that we've tasted so far are ones that you know would benefit from just being poured out, and I think that's particularly true for reds.

So, I don't; I have like this big, I don't love almost; you know I don't have a lot of reds; I don't have a lot of uniformly white wines bottled. Without sulfur, I think it's really hard to do without you knowing, inviting mouse um, but red wine without sulfur is great um, especially if you bottle residual CO2, but those wines really shine once you pour them out. So a lot of natural wines, a lot of natural red wines, they want to be decanted, they need to be decanted um, and I, I should say that more than I do um, and you know I have friends that like uh Laurent Môm um, you know in Portland which is a great like natural wine store um, uh, you know in Maine that's you know at their restaurant, they decant everything, like they pour everything out if you order by the bottle because they're All natural wine-oriented, and I think there's something to be said for that.

So, um, it's something I wish I did more, but for different reasons than I think most people assume, if that makes sense. Absolutely, I really enjoy your experiment with the blender and the mixing tin. Yeah, so um, it should be said that there's this uh uh Nathan Myrvold who is a former Microsoft executive uh who wrote um, really liked the foremost encyclopedic reference work on modernist cuisine. He has advocated for using a blender um in decanting wine um uh and uh I think it was Zoe was like Thompson Alley and I uh we we played around with this. Idea, we did it with an Etna Rosa, which was a useful wine to do with because a younger wine we wanted something that you know we could play around with.

It's like pouring, it's like throwing a cocktail between uh vessels, a bottle. We kept I kept a portion of wine in the bottle undisturbed and then we did blend a portion... Unfortunately, we used um the Vitamix and maybe Nathan wasn't talking about it, although I'm sure he was because I find it hard to believe that Nathan Mirvold is using anything other than a Vitamix at home. But um, you know we use a Vitamix and the wine was how would you care? It was so dead, it was it was so dead it was uh it Tasted like the Vitamix more than it tasted like Etna Rosa, uh, by the time it was done, but, we went a step and we liked the double decanted, but we went a step further actually, and we, um, you know, said that, you know, if this cocktail, throwing thing works, you know, should we try, you know, shaker tins so we did the shaker tin thing, um, and it actually like was delightful, so uh, you know, at home, um, you know, for, for younger wines, it should be said that old wine, like male egos hugely fragile, um, do not, um, and like if you have old ass wine, do not decant it; people just like really misunderstand the need for decanting, like do not decant old ass Wine, like store it on and like be really careful, like if you're worried about yeah, that cannot be emphasized enough. The wine will give up the ghost but younger wines, natural wine should be decanted um uh you know and and and if you have the time, you know, give it give it a shake, see what happens. No ice though, no ice, dry shake, dry shake. I'm sorry, I'm just overwhelmed by old wine being compared to male ego. I made that I made that comparison a lot. I mean, I've been I've been married long enough to in terms of talking about like a poopiness or like an earthiness in wine, like obviously there's no point in talking about like a poopiness. In wine soil in wine, but is it just due to a lack of sulfur that more wines are earthy? There's a question of like exactly where that earthiness in terms of flavor comes from. You guys are killing the questions. So you've alluded to the reduction in wine which is, you know, a set of flavors, particularly mercaptans that emerge when wine is made and bottled in the absence of oxygen, and that will give you a rotten egg kind of sulfur smell, but typically blows off. There are a lot of other chemical constituents that can contribute that to wine. It's something that's often associated with Burgundy, both on the red and white side.

It just so happens that both Chardonnay in particular is prone to reduction, but you know Pinot Noir is not. In its own way, Poulsard actually is very prone to reduction, which is why a lot of natural winemakers kind of like to work with it because if you're working without sulfur and you want to like play up CO2 in wine, it helps mitigate the reductive influence, and reduction can kind of be helpful in kind of retaining, you know, kind of some of the, you know, durability of wine throughout the winemaking process. So earthiness in wine is hard to pin down. It's like a million different things that add up to, you know, a perception of something else in a way that I don't know if I'm fully equipped to describe and feels more romantic than it is scientific.

You know, for me, it reflects this willingness to go to a place when you're making wine that is less defined by pure fruit and as much defined by all the other things that, you know, make wine worth drinking and life worth living. So and being willing to like embrace things that aren't like conventionally delicious, you know, just like, you know, the things that aren't, you know, conventionally beautiful but more profound as such, you know. Those are the That's where you want to live your life, you know? Not not with the, you know, cellophane dreams of, you know, the wine world absolutely. Um, due to the jury's location um, you know. Sandwiched in between Switzerland, a ton of wine but very locally drunk and there's basically that industry plus the export of Germany, and then being in between Burgundy.

Do you think that their relationship is different or do you think that their identity is pulled from like a mixture between those places? The jurors so I get to toast it's actually a great excuse to toast it, so like um for me, you know, it is isolated and that isolation is important because you don't get a wine. Know, like, unless you're developing an isolationist perspective, you know even in the 19th century there were brand consultants and you know the brand consultants of the world would tell you if they tasted Vin Jaune and found out you know how unprofitable it was and found out how long you were keeping it in the cellar they would tell you stop - you know you need to be making Marlboro Sauvignon Blanc. It's a terrible idea.

You know what is this Sauvignon thing, um? You know this is like garbage, um? You know so it only survived because it was isolated, uh, to some extent, um. And you know there is there is you know nobility in that now you know historically. There's been a lot of interaction between, particularly Burgundy, uh, and the Girard, you know, for the sake of ideas, for the sake of Cooperage, for the sake of grapes, you know, Pinot. Chardonnay they've been in Girard for a long time but they undoubtedly came from Burgundy you know as early as the 13th 14th century perhaps earlier um but you know didn't didn't develop entirely in isolation um and you know certainly there were people seeking out the wines but stylistically um you know they had a um um style of wine that was um you know they had a um style of wine that was um you know they had a strength of their own convictions that i think is is really important and explains why their wines are as unique as they are and and you know it's come full circle you know uh you know the uh the the isolation has become in as much as throughout most of the 20th century um it was um a point against you know it worked against them for the sake of marketing their wines abroad you know suddenly you have you know this broader international wine market that wants to make um you know kind of room for uh wines that are idiosyncratic and and the you know very idiosyncratic uh the very idiosyncrasies of the wines themselves become a virtue um for the sake of you know hipster psalms and and and so i think there's there's beauty to that um and and as such um you know um there's you know a means of you know our reinvention and resurrection that feels you know fitting uh today so uh cheers to you all um to that end uh alone together uh at home thank you marcia you kind of just answered it of like how did azura become like the hipster psalm it girl yeah i i think a lot of that stuff happens in weird ways so i think those are like you know it's like how did chocolate rain become like an internet meme you know who knows you know you think i don't think the chocolate rain guy was in it for you know a you know commercial You know, music video contact, like contract, when he did that, you know, I think he was just like a, you know, a lovable weirdo making content, you know.

So, you have all these disparate wine regions that are lovable weirdos making content, you know. Suddenly, you know that weirdness, which you know for, you know, a century or two has held them back, um, you know, becomes a you know, a marketing vehicle, you know, a marketing vehicle. Um, it should be said I don't I don't want to overemphasize that weirdness because, you know, again like pre-phylloxera, well, phylloxera was the death knell actually, like the Jura really started to die with like downy and powdery mildew so like odium was was much more um uh in a wet region you know uh difficult for them than even phylloxera um but uh you know these wines were hugely embraced and celebrated um once upon a time and so this is much more a case of revival than it is you know taking something that is obscure and and bringing it into light so you know i don't want to over like emphasize the extent to which we're dealing with something that was like totally like um you know obscure or unknown i think it's a case of like underappreciated this is a better it's a better word for it um but you know it In the old world, particularly, there's just like a lot of stuff that's underappreciated, and you know, um, there were, you know, pre-phylloxera, there were just way more vines in Europe than there are now, even today.

And, and so, you know, in the Jura, they would love to replant more than they're capable of because throughout the EU, they're not allowed to, um, because there's cap on new plantings, um, you know. And, and so, because overproduction was more of an issue throughout the Eurozone than underproduction, but in the Jura, they kind of have a different problem, um, I don't know, like, uh, it's it's weird, um, and it feels, I think. like for the winemakers there for a lot of them i'm sure it feels weird too it's like i was i was making this wine that went with like chicken and morels and now like there's this dude in tokyo selling my wine with you know like this like you know uh two michelin star tasting menu so um it's just like happy accidents and i think it's important too not to like it's a it's a still very much a conservative region they still vote for and block the french equivalent of you know donald trump you know like the hipster or the forward-thinking progressive winemakers are not the rule here necessarily um i think it's important not to idealize The region, as such, you know. But, you know, nonetheless, they make this like really awesome juice that is really singular and, you know, has this hold over the imagination of those who love it. Yeah, they also diversified their varieties in terms of planting which just, well, yes, I know so, so like there were there were like four dozen different grapes they're working with pre-philoxera that got whittled down to the so they're currently five grapes uh loudly grown in uh Mizarra.

Um, we didn't cover Chardonnay at all. We didn't cover Cremant at all, which is chiefly made from Chardonnay, but Chardonnay is the most widely grown grape in the region. Sauvignon follows thereafter. And then Poussard, Trousseau, and Pinot Noir. They think of like, Girard is like kind of unique because it actually is the birthplace of Sauvignon, Trousseau, Poussard. And then they think of, they have thought of Chard and Pinot as kind of new to the scene, even though they're grapes that have been there for over half a millennium, you know. But yeah, historically there are way more grapes in that planet, and there are still producers with old, you know, vineyard holdings that make Vendée France under those holdings. But there were way more grapes once upon a time than there are now.

That's the story, honestly, like that's the story throughout France. That's not unique to Girard. That's all I got in terms of questions. Groovy. This has been so much fun. I have deeply enjoyed this chance to nerd out with these wines. I find, you know, very often that, you know, as a case of, you know, for the sake of this exercise, you know, wanting to spread my own knowledge, but equally, you know, re-engage things that I love and equally, you know, dive, dive deeper. So, you know, I thank you all for giving me any chance to dive deeper and spending, you know, your Easter Sunday or Passover Sunday or just a beautiful Sunday with us. So, solid.