Since I’ve blogged last, I’ve been less and less at the cuverie and living more of a Burgundian life. Remember Matt and Megan and their petits children? They graciously asked if I’d be willing to stay in their house and help out in exchange for a cozy home, great company and delicious food. Oh but of course! Lila and Jack go to daycare all week, with only a half-day on Friday. Jack, just last week, has started going full day. It tiring for him, but seems to be working out. As for Lila, she loves it. She comes home exhausted all day from playing with her friend Kimmy, who she talks about often. But nevertheless has at least two more hours of play in her til bedtime.
Week of September 28:
Jack is just going half-day to daycare this week. I’ve been working in the cuverie until he arrives around lunch time then I switch into babysitter mode. As for the cuverie, it’s been the same daily routine. Now Geraldine, Alex and Gavin are talking about getting ready to put the red through the press.
When red wines start loosing their temperature, ending their fermentation and tasting more like wine in stead of juice, you know it’s time. This is yet another big process. First we pump the juice into another cuve.
This is way cool and really mesmerizing to watch.
The biggest danger in this is the gas that you can encounter in the tank. Opening the door slowly, letting out the gas and last bits of juice.
Then, as seen here, Jonathon or Gav jump in the tank and start shoveling.
These presses only take about an hour to get out all of that remaining juice. The pressed juice, which is a fabulous vibrant hot pink, is then joined with the juice we extracted first. And now they sit in their tanks, waiting for “second fermentation.” This process takes a lot longer. Essentially we’re waiting for the malo to kick in. As I explained before, the malolactic acid eats and replaces the harsher tasting volatile acids. These are the acids you want to taste in your wine (though not too much; it must be closely watched!).
With our weekend off, we took many adventures. Jane and I jumped in Vince’s van and we all went looking for L’abbaye Cîteaux.
It’s nice to get out of Beaune. It’s starting to get slightly cooler, but is very pleasant in the sun. You can tell the leaves on the vines are longing to be bright yellow, but aren’t just there yet. There were rolling pastures for miles, lots of cows and very little else in the countryside.
We found the abbey and read all about the diligent monks and their daily routine. This abbey has been around since the 16th century and has always made the fabulous cîteaux cheese. Completely self-sustained, each monk contributes his work for the whole of the abbey. I made friends with the cows.
That night we met Dennis for a glass of wine at the Bistro Bourguignon.
It has a great atmosphere and lots of delicious wines. After that we were of to meet all of our friends at our favorite pub, Pickwick’s. There was a live meringue band!
The next morning was a little hard, but Jane was determined, as it was her last day, to get up and going onto our next adventure. Alex let us borrow is car and Vince, Gav, Jane and I drove to the Jura Mountains. They were only a short two hour drive East on l’autoroute. We left rainy, cloudy, ugly, hungover Beaune and arrived in the luscious, sunny mountain of Arbois.
Dennis told us about the restaurant La Balance so we quietly found our way. La Balance, hence the name, likes to prepare and cook food that perfectly balances with your wine selection. For instance, Jane picked a traditional oxidized Jura wine that was then used in the sauce that was drizzled atop my delectable river trout.
It was a well spent three-hour lunch. After lunch we drove around and tried to get lost. The mountains were full of white-faced cliffs with little, barely recognizable châteaux on top that were silhouetted by the late afternoon sun.
Week of October 5:
Monday Jane left, back to NYC for her. Geraldine’s friend Fredèric came to help so with Jack now at full-time daycare with Lila, I was installed as the data computer imputer. In other words, Alex has been collecting business cards from all over the world for the last 12 years. He has a box full waiting to be inputted onto the company mailing list. Oh lala. You can only stare at a computer screen for so long.
Because Geraldine's birthday was right in the middle of harvest (September 5) she decided to celebrate a month later! It is the French tradition that on your birthday you cook and offer delicious wine (often the vintage of your birth year) to your friends. In essence, it makes her happy to share with us and she is delighted that we're here to honor her. She brought us a delicious lunch, two different deserts and among others, a bottle of Côte de Nuit village en magnum in the vintage of her birth! What a celebration!
Needless to say we were all happily boozed to finish the last press of the day :)
While the crew is working hard, Alex is the front man for his business and often does tours and tastings. This group of Canadians LOVED watching us transfer juice from cuve to cuve, took many pictures and asked many questions of us all. (We all had to laugh, we looked like shit!)
On Thursday I moved in with the McClunes, in their comfy home in Saint Romain. Friday I had the kids all to myself and we played all day, inside and out.
The weekend was the beginning of the cold front and the beginning of the McClune adventures. Matt has been working late all week finishing up and preparing for his art exhibition in Basel, Switzerland. Saturday Megan, the kids and I went on a lovely walk around St. Romain.
Lila and I threw rocks into creeks, played hide-and-go-seek and fed the miniature horses.
Sunday we had planned to go on a longer hike but the refrigerator broke Saturday night. Instead I went into town and met up with Gav for his last day in Beaune.
He, his girlfriend Jo, Vince and I went for a drive in the Côte de Nuits. The vines, only after a week, have completely gone gold! Spectacular!
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