Category Something Different

“To Fall In Love, Drink This” by Alice Feiring

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At this time of year, I see people in literary circles writing a round up of the most enjoyable books they’ve read over the past 12 months. I always prefer those to the similar articles that are published a month or so earlier, but which largely serve the purpose of a holiday gift guide. No, I don’t want to know what is going to gather dust on bedside tables up and down the country; tell me what people have actually tried and enjoyed.

I used to be an avid reader. I’m sure the reason I needed to start wearing glasses as a teen was because of the books I’d read, hidden under the duvet after lights-out at boarding school. Fingers were wagged, disapproving looks given, but I just had to get to the end of the action in the fourth Harry Potter book – if you’re not familiar with that one, it’s the first really chunky one in the series – come hell or high water.

How times have changed!

I’d like to take a photo of the stack of books that I devoured this year. Or to set myself the task of reading 12 books in as many months. But this year, Google was the source of most material that I sought to read. Until March, the search function helped allay pregnancy worries; then the internet provided a refresher course on caring for a newborn baby, answering any questions I had, day or night. Not long after, I found myself reading everything I could about bronchiolitis. Later, during our beach holiday, it would be to get any updates on the forest fires in Calabria and those we could see burning on Sicily and the Eolian islands across the water. Then, with a stint in England and the autumn came some form of normality, but still the exhaustion that a parent of young kids experiences once everyone is in bed for the night meant that I too fell asleep before you could say Jack Robinson. As a result, some books were started in good faith but they later languished on my bedside table before being relegated back to the bookshelf.

I daydream about one day having a house in the countryside and in my reverie, there is a wistful, floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall bookshelf. In this fantasy, the room has the most amazing natural light, a comfortable chair or sofa that you could lounge on for hours, and a warm breeze coming in, carrying the scent of jasmine plants outside. I land back in today’s reality with a bump.

It is now 5am on December 13th (one of my kids woke up in the middle of the night and I can’t get back to sleep) and as the score currently stands, Alice Feiring’s memoir “To Fall In Love, Drink This” is the only book I’ve finished this year.

There’s everything you need from a memoir: flawed parents, an adolescent’s search for identity, plus grief, longing, and even a serial killer! All while claiming to be an introvert, it is Alice’s ability to connect on a human level – whether it be with the plumber or her beloved brother – which puts the meat on the bones of this memoir.

The book starts in a place which is entirely foreign to me – a Jewish American family near New York in the late 1950s – but then travels to familiar-sounding vineyards in France, Italy and Georgia and puts me back down again, in the final chapter, in the middle of lockdown, something I – as we all do – remember all too clearly.

Wine is the thread that pulls it all together and facilitates those human connections. Personal narrative alternates periodically with wine talk. It’s a book which can be read by a wine expert or a complete novice. The language – as with all Alice’s writing – is engaging and explanatory without ever verging on patronising. There were moments when I found myself nodding ‘I know this already’ but enjoying the ride; and moments when I found myself with eyes wide open, scribbling down notes of new wines to seek out.

Final consideration: the essay format is perfect for these busy times when even people with the best intentions have short attention spans. I could read a couple of pages or twenty before falling asleep and then put the book down for a month or so when life got too busy without particularly losing track.

To rephrase the title somewhat: if you read anything next year, read this.

And, on a side note, what do you suggest I read next year? It doesn’t necessarily have to be linked to wine. Do you have any recommendations?

Does Natural Wine Need Protection?

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That was the title of a debate held last week at the restaurant Noma in Copenhagen. I was honoured to be one of the speakers at this event, organised by a not-for-profit organisation called MAD (“food” in Danish) which holds talks and events for the hospitality industry.

The moderator at last week’s debate was Aaron Ayscough, whom I’m sure you know because of his book published last year, or his blog Not Drinking Poison. We thought we met in Paris about a decade ago, but it turns out – in another turn of events that reminds you how small the world actually is – that we attended the same primary school. If you’re not familiar with Aaron’s writing, you should sign up to his Substack.

The other speakers were Katie Worobeck, Canadian export now turned micro-winemaker with 3 hectares near Rotalier, Jura (under the name Maison Maenad), Christian Binner (established winemaker in Ammerschwihr, Alsace and on the board of the Syndicat de défense des vins naturels aka “Vin Méthode Nature“) and Alice Feiring. The latter surely needs no introduction.

The audience – a wonderfully engaged and attentive group of 120 people – were given the opportunity to vote at the beginning of the event. 34% in favour of protection; about 50% undecided. At the end of the debate, 54% were in favour so I’m pleased to say that we were able to convince 24 people in the room.

My line of reasoning was very simple. Natural wine does need protection; and by protection, I mean that it needs certification, but first it needs a universally-accepted definition. This certification is not to protect the winemakers; Katie spoke before me, arguing against additional bureaucracy for the vigneron.ne.s so I picked up on that point, turning it to address the consumer – they’re the ones who need the protection. While there is ambiguity about what a natural wine is, anyone can claim to make it and how is a consumer going to know the difference?

Christian spoke about how, when he started making wine, he knew each and every person who bought his wine personally; now it’s not possible because his wine is sold around the world. I built upon that too, saying how a wine drinker might want to buy a natural wine but cannot keep track of all the new wines being made around the world. The natural wine movement has become too large for word-of-mouth; isn’t the green leaf showing organic agriculture beautifully simple at conveying the message?

[Deep breath, quick sip of water, and approach from a different angle.]

Christian Binner and I… a.k.a. Team Protection

The VinNatur Association has a two page charter, outlining the allowed and forbidden practices in the vineyard and the cellar. It was approved by the associate-winemakers in 2016, not without a fair bit of controversy at first.

A charter, or a definition, is worth nothing if it is not enforced. And who to enforce it? [Here I had to be succinct if I was going to stay within my alloted 5 minutes so I left that as a rhetorical question and explained what VinNatur do.] VinNatur tried four different companies and sent them to visit a selection of our winemakers. They got feedback from everyone and chose the best, a company called Valoritalia. They then personally trained their inspectors and they helped draw up the Check Plan which is used during the inspection visits. These visits last no longer than an hour, take place every 2 or 3 years and are of no additional cost to the winemaker.

Why does VinNatur do all this? To defend our little corner from being abused by large, conventional producers who want to pass themselves as being natural. We’ve all seen buzzwords like “skin contact” and “no sulphites” but applied to wines which were not farmed organically and which were vinified by a conventional oenologist but were designed to appeal to the natural wine target audience. No certification is perfect, but the existence of a framework and the threat of being inspected is better than nothing.

I won’t reveal all my arguments and examples here, just in case we do a re-run of the debate in the future (yes, MAD team, I really hope we do!) but I will leave you with my closing argument:

Wine consumption is decreasing around the world, sales are slowing down and winemakers are feeling the pinch and becoming anxious about the future. But the natural wine category is bucking that trend and so it’s logical and understandable that large, conventional winemakers are trying to jump aboard. If we can certify organic wine, and we can certify biodynamic wine, why can’t we certify natural wine?

With Aaron Ayscough, Katie Worobeck and Alice Feiring when we arrived at noma.

December 2023 update : do you want to hear the debate for yourself? Excitingly, the MAD team have made an audio recording available! If you make a donation, through their website, and thereby help them continue to serve the hospitality community with the education and inspiration it needs to make restaurants more socially and environmentally sustainable, you’ll be send a link to download the debate in podcast format.

Music, memory, wine and waiting.

Emma Bentley 1 Comment

I got thinking this morning as I was in the car, listening to the radio, about music. More specifically, how some songs have the unique ability to transport you back to a particular moment in time. Whether anguish or excitement, some songs encapsulate and even accentuate the emotion and when, maybe years later, you hear the opening chords, all the feelings you had during that particular break-up or road-trip come flashing back. 

Books are different because, while they can trigger similar emotive reactions, they are a distraction from your current situation and they transport you to a new place, away from any grief or hardship. Unlike music, if you were to re-read a favourite book years later, you may enjoy it just as much, but you will most likely interpret it from a new perspective.

The impact of a good wine lies somewhere in between. To the question “what’s the best wine you’ve ever drunk?” we have all heard the response: “it was the bottle we had on the first date with my future spouse.” Like when you browse through Spotify, when you choose a wine, you are deciding what kind of ambiance you want to set. Whilst there’s a sea of mundanity to wade through – in music too – when you take the first sip of a really good wine, it provokes an instant “wow” which elevates the moment and imprints itself in your memory.

It’s easy for wines and wineries to retain that special place once the sentimental connection has been created. A quick photo of the label and the memory has been immortalised.

There is a wine – “Tout Naturellement” from Florian and Mathilde Beck Hartweg – which I choose when I’m stressed or upset because the initial sniff can alleviate that tension simply through its familiarity. Most of the time, however, while I might be able to remember my tasting notes of a given wine, I can’t remember the exact taste of the wine on my tongue in the way that I can recall song lyrics, hum the melody and relive the feelings.

That is probably because, when you return to a wine which once had forged an emotional association, you look at it through a different lens. Maybe the expectations are higher, maybe your taste has changed, maybe the wine has changed. While it may prompt you to remember the first time you tried it, the memories don’t come flooding back as they would with a song on the radio. It’s more like a book. Your perspective is everything.

In The Vineyards With: Melanie Tarlant (Champagne)

Tarlant is the Champagne house which has accompanied most of our special occasions. It is a winery Alessandro knew because they are longtime members of the VinNatur Association and which I knew because I count Melanie (and now Daniel) as friends. When I moved in with Alessandro, we popped a bottle of their Brut Nature “Zéro.” We drank Cuvée Louis to celebrate the birth of our first born (a gift from Micheline months earlier, when I told her I was pregnant.)

It was our wedding anniversary recently, and of course, I reached again for a bottle of Tarlant. This time it was a bottle of “Zéro” that I bought during a visit to the winery in the spring of 2016.

Alessandro wasn’t feeling too well so we only drank half a bottle and, as we often do, saved the rest for the next day. The thing is, the next day the baby got sick and he’s been in hospital for three days now so Ale and I have been passing like ships in the night, alternating shifts at his bedside, juggling work and our daughter. As I was rummaging in the fridge this morning for something to take for lunch in the hospital, I spotted that bottle of Tarlant in the door of the fridge, still half-finished.

“Champagne naturel, ouvert et sentimental.” Sounds quite appropriate.

Let’s hope the baby gets discharged from the hospital tomorrow (keep your fingers crossed!) and we can sit down at home all together and enjoy the rest of the bottle. The bubbles may have lost their effervescence, and we too will be more exhausted than usual, but I’m sure the taste of the wine will be even sweeter because of the wait. It will then, of course, become another memory engraved on my heart.

Denouncing Sexual Violence

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Yesterday, 6th April 2023, was the day that Isabelle Perraud went to court to defend herself against a diffamation charge brought by Sébastien Riffault.

The back story : a year ago, the Paye Ton Pinard association (of which Perraud is president) shared allegations online that the famous Sancerre vigneron had sexually assaulted and even raped young, female sommelières during his frequent trips to Denmark.

None of these victims have officially reported the allegations to the police, thus enabling Riffault to claim that the entire affair is a baseless witch hunt against him.

I don’t want to run the risk of receiving a diffamation letter myself – so I’m going to share three, very revealing, pages from yesterday’s Libération newspaper. (If you right-click on the image, open it in a new window, you can zoom in and read the text for yourselves.)

If your French could do with some brushing up, in italics is my translation of what is reported: the article in yesterday’s Libération, summarising the conclusions of their investigation, states that in the period between 2019 and 2022, 11 young women in Denmark claim to have been victims of sexual harassment or assault by Riffault; 2 of them claim to have been raped.

The numerous testimonies are moving, corroborative, and IMO convincing. There’s also a sequence of events detailed in the article which is a little too familiar with my own experience. (Remember that?)

This sequence starts with: let’s try to keep this private and pretend it didn’t happen so that I can move on. Sometimes that’s enough and with time and therapy, it is possible to sweep the emotions and memories under the rug. But, sometimes, the next step is realising that the situation is bigger than just you, that other women have found themselves in similar situations and that you’re dealing with a potential serial predator.

Next, word gets out but there’s a sense of “let’s try to figure this out ourselves” – by the employer in my case, and by the importer in Denmark in this instance. The Libé article says that at the end of 2021 (at this point, the accusations were all still word of mouth) Rosforth&Rosforth supposedly spoke to Riffault and gave him a warning. In January/February 2022, after the publication by one of the victims of an article in Frihedsbrevet, they ceased importing Riffault’s wines completely.

That’s an important step but it doesn’t take much to realise that the solution is not sustainable. Accepting the resignation of the employee or dropping the winemaker from the portfolio doesn’t remove the toxic element. Another employee will arrive or another importer will seize the opportunity and the behaviour will re-start.

The absence of criminal charges against Riffault allows him to deflect judgement on his own behaviour by pointing an accusatory finger at those who give voice and share the words of the young women. As an outsider to this case, I feel it’s important to state that I adhere to the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” but, when the body of evidence is this substantial, my gut says that the wrong person was being tried in court yesterday.

There are a couple more elements published in the Libé article which leave such a foul taste in my mouth, I feel they are worth translating for a wider audience:

1. Riffault’s Australian importer Ryan Larkin made his own investigation (finding other alleged victims in Sweden and Norway), published the findings in a newsletter (May 2021) took a position (to stop working with Riffault’s wines), only to backtrack six months later and seemingly wash his hands of the matter.

If we are asking women to come forward, to bear their soul to the police, to go through the agony of testifying in court, to put their trust in the justice system… then it’s not too much for us to ask men to grow a backbone and show some active allyship.

2. I needed to look up the definition of “corbeau” this morning because whilst I was familiar with its English translation as “crow” or “raven,” I wasn’t familiar with its alternative meaning: “poison-pen letter-writer.” Between October 2022 and January 2023, an anonymous person was sending emails to discourage potential witnesses from testifying in court, and sometimes even signing off those emails with the identities of other women who knew nothing about the case. The Libération article finishes with the bombshell that the police traced the fradulent email address back to none other than Riffault’s wife who is now under investigation herself.

Because the final line of the article is a threat from Sébastien Riffault to press diffamation charges against anyone who propagates these supposedly false accusations against his wife, I will bow out here and trust that the police investigation leaves no stone unturned in the quest for justice.

If you want to read a thread of live tweets from the hearing yesterday, Stéphane Méjanès has a blow-by-blow account of the proceedings:

The judge will announce their decision on the 8th June and then there will surely be an appeal. Whoever said justice was quick and straightforward…

In the meantime, I wish that all those involved in the case – particularly Isabelle and the two women who testified yesterday, but also all the other women involved, and even Sébastien and his wife – regardless of the outcome of this affair, if they have a clean conscience, I wish that they are able to find peace and sleep easy at night.

R.I.P. Paolo Dettori

Emma Bentley 1 Comment

Twice this morning I wrote an introductory paragraph just to shake my head and hold my finger down on the backspace button. Once, I only got as far as a starting sentence. Then I sat in silence, looking at the white screen for I don’t know how long.

The truth of the matter is that it is very hard to write about the legacy of a man whom you called your Italian dad, my babbo, when it doesn’t seem in any way possible that he has left us.

He was only 69, but coming from Sardinia, a land known for their population of centenarians, he should have seen many more harvests.

I think this was the first fair we did together: Vini Birre Ribelli, in Brussels – December 2014.

Paolo was not the founder of the winery Tenute Dettori, nor is the winery’s future in any kind of jeopardy, for his conscientious and highly capable son Alessandro has been firmly at the reins for twenty years. Obviously Paolo shaped and grew the business, but this post is not the place for listing professional accomplishments; no, this is strictly personal.

Paolo was a man of few words; sometimes when presenting a wine he would simply say “this is my wine” but while it sounds strange, it actually made space the other person’s reaction. Similarly he frequently introduced me as his daughter, and I, in turn, addressed him as my babbo, father.

It must have been sometime in 2015, when I was still very much single, and I accompanied a journalist from Le Rouge et Le Blanc to Tenute Dettori. It was during a lunch with Jean-Marc and signor Paolo that conversation turned to my wedding, which at this stage was completely fictive, but it was decided that the wedding would obviously be held at the Badde Nigolosu agriturismo. Jean-Marc offered his services for deciding the menu – clearly I couldn’t risk trying all the rich food and not fitting into my dress – and Paolo turned his mind to which wines from the family archive would be appropriate.

When I first started dating my now-husband, I took him to meet the Dettori family. They are already sitting at a table outside drinking a beer before dinner when we arrive, so we sit down and I introduce my new man to the Sardinians. Paolo had been smoking a cigarette somewhere else and when he comes back to the group, without a moment’s hesitation, he pulls up a chair right between us, and starts asking my Alessandro questions so quietly that even I couldn’t hear but I believe they were along the lines of “what do you do?” and “how many hectares do you have?” After a couple of answers, Paolo turns to me and says “va bene, va bene questo” and gives me a smile and a thumbs up.

A few years later and Paolo meets my father-in-law, Angiolino and it’s wonderful to see both strands of my Italian family come together.

My babbo cracking jokes with my father-in-law, Vinitaly 2022.

The funeral is at 4pm this afternoon so this evening, I’ll open a bottle of Dettori, probably a 2007 – one of the wines chosen for my hypothetical wedding – in his memory. My thoughts today lie with his real family – two children, five grandchildren and the wider Dettori family. But once these acute recollections start to fade, this is how I’ll remember you, signor Paolo, looking out to sea in your happy place.

Photo: June 2014… but it could just as easily been taken the day before yesterday, for you could always spot signor Paolo sitting here looking out to sea.

Giorgio Pinchiorri guilty of stalking ex-sommelier

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There’s a famous restaurant in the centre of Florence called Enoteca Pinchiorri. It has three Michelin stars and the tasting menu starts at 175 euros, not including wine. It’s reputed internationally.

According to the Michelin Guide: “For decades Pinchiorri has represented luxury and haute cuisine at the highest level in Italy. The restaurant has a number of dining rooms, including a historic room, which has an almost museum-like feel. Highly attentive service from the legendary owners, Annie and Giorgio, and an excellent menu featuring the best of Tuscan, Italian and international cuisine. The wine list is renowned across the globe.”

Three days ago, a judge agreed a plea deal from the owner Giorgio Pinchiorri (age 78) for stalking an ex-sommelier and gave him a four month suspended sentence. The victim was a 30-something woman who started working at Enoteca Pinchiorri in 2015. She quit in 2016 to avoid his unwanted advances but the SMSs, telephone calls and letters continued nonetheless for several years. As reported in La Nazione “Pinchiorri also tried to win her over with gifts and surprises outside her house.”

The local newspaper Arno gives more detail: “The employee had told him to stop more than once, even going so far as to report him to the police, and the commissioner gave him a warning and told him not to go near the woman anymore. But he [Pinchiorri], apparently, had not given up on her, continuing to give her unwanted attention, with messages, phone calls and gifts.”

The situation reached its peak in September 2019, when she found him waiting for her outside her place of work. She called the police once again and the justice system was then, this time, cranked into action.

The first I heard about this story was while scrolling through Facebook earlier today, when I saw a post from wine writer Jacopo Cossater (who writes for Intravino and has a podcast called Vino sul Divano) asking why no-one was talking about the Pinchiorri story. The comments underneath were what prompted me to write this blogpost. I’ll give a selection of them here.

“I think he has already had his punishment. After all he is a man of a certain age who has probably lost his mind. Of course she had the right to defend herself and she did. That’s enough.”

“But really, seriously, does anyone think that he actually posed any kind of danger? More than anything, it seems to me more a form of senile fallacy than sexual blackmail.

I remember that time when Marchesi, in his eighties, kissed me on the mouth. Had he had been my employer I would have been pissed off, at work I am asexual and even excessively so. Instead, I simply felt sorry for him.

“It has been in the public realm for years, Giorgio Pinchiorri and his family are “paying” for his “crime” both emotionally and criminally, I don’t understand what the restaurant has to do with it, in which families work and which is a flagship in the industry.”

“There’s something I don’t get: it is right to talk about it but it had to be done when the news first came out and in fact it did. Now there is a sentence in a plea deal. That is, there has been the course of justice, right or wrong, so the offended party – at least in theory – I believe has been compensated. So good to talk about it but it is also important to do it at the right times. In my opinion, the sentence can be a starting point but not a crucifixion.”

So if we talk about a case before it has been concluded by a judge, firstly, journalists risk being accused of slander and, secondly, the defendant should (rightly) be considered innocent before proven guilty. However, if we talk about a case once a sentence has been passed, we shouldn’t be talking about it because it’s in the past? #facepalm

It shocked me how quickly people are to make excuses for a man who has publicly conceded that he stalked an ex-employee. Every so often these cases come up, sometimes in Italy, in France or in the USA and we tend to brush it under the carpet because the man is famous, or is old, or “didn’t do it to me.”

A 78 year old is just as capable of harassing, assaulting or stalking a woman as an 18 year old man and, in this case, it’s even worse because he was blinded by his position of superiority and did not accept her requests for him to back off.

It’s time to break the omerta, to stop making excuses and instead to start putting ourselves in the position of the victim. It is a truly terrifying feeling to find someone unwanted waiting for you outside your house or your place of work. How much entitlement does this man have to feel that a lady half his age ought to yield to his advances?! We need to turn this society of toxic masculinity and misogyny into a society in which a man accepts being told no by a woman. All these stories have a common theme and the baseline is some (not all, of course) men’s sense of entitlement. So, either men need to develop the self-awareness to recognise this in their behaviour or to have it pointed out by friends, family, colleagues or members of the wider community. And we need to talk about it.

The translations above are my own. For anyone who thinks I may have been exaggerating, the original Italian texts can be found below:

“Uno degli ultimi episodi contestati dall’accusa risalirebbe al settembre del 2019, quando, uscendo da un ristorante del centro dove lavora in quel periodo, la donna si sarebbe ritrovata Pinchiorri nuovamente di fronte. A quel punto avrebbe chiamato i carabinieri. Stando al racconto fatto dalla ex dipendente, assistita dall’avvocato Federico Scavetta, Pinchiorri aveva cercato di conquistarla anche con regali e sorprese fatte trovare sotto casa.” La Nazione.

“La dipendente più di una volta si era ribellata, arrivando perfino a denunciarlo, al punto che il questore lo aveva ammonito intimandogli di non avvicinarsi più alla donna. Ma lui, a quanto pare, non aveva desistito, continuando a riservarle attenzioni non gradite, con messaggi, telefonate e regali.” Arno.

Checking In

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According to the calendar, we’re nearly at the end of March but I have no idea where the time has gone. A quarter of the year has already passed and yet, what do we have to show for it? Pratically nothing, in my case.

Normally at this time, we’ve got back from a week in the Loire, slurping oysters and devouring as much salted butter as humanly possible, and we’re gearing up for Vinitaly and the spin-off natural wine tastings. Not this year and we don’t really know when we will again. The continued inability to plan ahead is increasingly tiresome.

We’re still at home (a new lockdown in Italy started 10 days ago) and if you turn on the TV, the headlines haven’t changed much. Do you remember the days not so long ago really when we knew nothing about viruses and vaccines?

The only difference is that over the last couple of weeks, the baby has turned into a fully-fledged toddler – along with all the tantrums that this adorable phase brings.

At the winery, the vineyard maintenance work is coming to an end and our attention is turning to the bottling of the 2020 vintage which will start next month. The upside of this entire situation is that the 2020s are turning out to be quite special. Who would of thought it! What a cruel twist of fate that the year most of us will want to forget – our annus horribilis – may become the year that we look for on a label.

Meanwhile, we haven’t drunk anything noteworthy recently. Quite possibily a side-effect of this daily ennui but the wines we have opened lack their sparkle.

That said, I have discovered a new cocktail on David Lebovitz’s website that has become my go-to aperitif in the evenings. The Jasmine.

Here’s my twist on it (for two people): put 3 oz gin + 1.5oz fresh lemon juice + 1 oz Triple Sec / Cointreau + 1 oz Campari in a shaker. Add ice. Shake. Pour. Garnish with a wide strip of lemon zest and top up with a splash of tonic water. (Or not, depending on how your day has gone!) Sit back and enjoy. Repeat this process tomorrow. And the next day… and the next…

Open Space

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I was scrolling through Twitter this morning when I came across a conversation between Meg Herring, Peter Pharos and Randall Grahm.

It started from a relatively innocent tweet:

The discussion continued, tamely enough, between various people talking about grape varieties that can yield overly-fragrant, perfumed wines… until we reach this point:

MIND BLOWN.

I spent a good hour this afternoon doing some repetitive maintenance work in the vineyards so I had time to mull this concept over further.

When I talk about wine, I tend to follow the standard formula of talking about what there *is* – i.e. the aromas, flavours, finish. If I mention what there *isn’t*, it is normally a thinly-veilled criticism – i.e. “X was lacking in acidity.” The notion that some wines have “open space” turns everything on its head.

The reason this concept had such an effet on me is because it was exactly my experience of drinking Laura Aschero’s Rossese 2018 almost a year ago. “Fruity, fragrant… so light bodied it’s over half way to becoming a rosé… it works perfectly on this warm, sunny day.” (You can read the full post here.)

When assessing a wine, I am often guilty of falling into the trap of focussing on the vinification. I ask myself: is this Merlot an important wine which was fully ripe and did 3 weeks on the skins before a year or two in barrel… or is this a grappes entières carbo bomb?

If I’m hungry, my stomach overrides my brain and I tend to think about the potential food pairings: i.e. would I pair this Merlot with a cote de boeuf or with a mixed charcuterie plate? Is this wine the main course or is it just the aperitif?

What I don’t do enough – and it’s where Randall has opened my eyes – is to think more philosophically about wine. A simple, light-bodied wine could be just that, and often they are… but occasionally I come across wines which are light but exquisitely crafted. (There are a couple of Tai Rosso wines from the Colli Berici that spring to mind, for example.) It is during these moments that I will endeavour to look more holistically, in the way that Randall described, for the “palatal open space.”

“It’s not always absence but rather potentiality.”

Liberation, Partisans and Romeo & Juliet

Emma Bentley 1 Comment

Once you start to scratch the surface, wine is so much more than a drink. Of course, there is what you see on a shop shelf as your eye has been caught by a flashy label and you pause to think about varietals and food pairings… but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

You may think I’m talking about winemaking – that non-stop rollercoaster ride of sugars, yeasts, bacteria, acids, oxidation and reduction… but even though there are still some things we don’t understand, it has been covered time and time again by people far more knowledgeable than myself and it’s not what I’m going to talk about today.

There’s another aspect to wine which fascinates me, probably because even from a very early age I’ve always loved history. Wine is the vehicle for being able to talk to winemakers and ask questions about their land – not necessarily the age and density of the vines – but the history of the place. Who lived there. What they did. Who they loved. Why.

I have found the Italians to be more open about these things than the French. I suppose it’s because Italians really do live up to that old stereotype of strong family ties and plenty of tradition. I was a 20-something girl who spoke little-to-no Italian when I visited Elena at La Stoppa, Giovanna at Pacina and Emilio at La Busattina. They had no real idea who I was but in each case, a mid-morning visit to the winery turned into lunch together with the family, cousins, etc… Probing into family histories is not to be attempted while tasting tank samples in a damp, frigid cellar but once you reach the end of a leisurely lunch and a waft of freshly brewed coffee reaches your nose, I’ve found that you can tentatively ask your host to tell you something about their ancestors.

Some of the stories that I’ve heard are still too sensitive and private for me to be able to recount here but that does not mean that the stories have been in any way forgotten. In many cases, I’m still filled with gratitude that they confided in me.

Those trees conceal a natural bunker, a strategic position near the crest of the hill but just off the main path.

April 25th is Liberation Day in Italy, celebrating the fall of the nazi-fascist regime at the hands of the Allied troops and the local resistance. Today I went for a walk through another part of the vineyards (you may remember my walk the other week to see the two castles) to go and revisit a partisan hide-out that I know of on the hillside.

This is where you turn off from the footpath. Watch out for snakes as you go through the long grass. I often see harmless black “scarbonassi” around here.
My four-legged companion is agile enough to have found a different route down to the bunker.
Stones from the rudimentary shelter the partisans made.

That pile of stones pales into insignificance compared to the grotto that is hidden at the Filippi winery across the valley near Soave.

I wish I could go and visit to take photos but we’re still in lockdown here so I’ll just describe it to you. There’s a path that runs through the dense woodland just below the Vigne della Brà vineyard. After a couple of hundred metres, look out for two sticks placed “haphazardly” on the left. It’s Filippo’s telltale sign to turn off the path and head even deeper into the forest. After another 40 or so metres, you’ll discover a large grotto carved out by hand by workers wanting the soft limestone rocks to build the house and the entrance arch.

13th century arch made from limestone rocks dug out from the grotto.

The grotto is about 40 metres long, 2 to 3 metres high and 4 or 5 metres deep in places. There is very little natural light as barely any sunshine can penetrate the thick woodland canopy. As a result, it’s an eerily mystical place. When it has been raining heavily, the lower half of the grotto will be underwater and the dogs go there to drink. It was a very important place for the resistance fighters as their local knowledge of the area meant that they could go there for shelter.

Today feels like a fitting day to recount my in-laws’ family link to the partisan resistance. Now the lineage is rather convoluted but the story is centred around my grand-uncle-in-law (that is: my father-in-law’s father’s brother.) At the outbreak of the ear, he was young, determined and not afraid to stand up for his beliefs. Like many others of his generation, he refused to accept the fascist regime and became part of the local resistance.

What makes this particular story more remarkable is that his girlfriend at the time decided to join him in the resistance! There were very few active female fighters in these parts and so because they were the only couple active in the hills near Verona, they were given the code names Romeo and Juliet. They cut off all contact with their families and eeked out an existence on the hills for years, in hideouts like those I’ve seen and described. The story becomes a little less romantic because Romeo’s brother – my grandfather-in-law – was arrested frequently and each time interrogated harshly by the local authorities who wanted to find the location of the two lovebirds but he never yielded.

Whilst wine has allowed me to discover these stories, it feels horribly limited and superficial at times. The majority of people only care about the taste on their tongue and the buzz afterwards. Is there a wine which would be a fitting tribute to the Romeo and Juliets, to honour those who walked back alone from the other side of the Mediterranean after they found out second-hand that the war had ended, to remember those who fell in love with the wrong person at the most inopportune of times? Or is it enough to spend a few minutes thinking about them and about how, for all we complain about our current situation, 75 years ago it was far, far worse?

Coronavirus Takes More Victims

Emma Bentley 3 Comments

VinNatur Genova, Genova Wine Festival, Live Wine… That’s just the start of the wine fairs in Italy which have been cancelled because of this dasted virus.

Angiolino and Alessandro Maule packing up unused wine glasses after VinNatur Genova falls victim to the coronavirus restrictions.

I’m writing this on Monday afternoon when I should have been in full swing at VinNatur Genova. Unfortunately, at 8pm last night, we got a phone call saying that we wouldn’t be allowed to open to the public today because the authorities were imposing a lockdown. It then provoked a chain reaction: informing exhibitors, cancelling orders for the next day, and replying to those who wanted a refund on their now obsolete tickets.

The next victim was the Genova Wine Week – the long-awaited week of tastings and winemaker dinners, which was supposed to finish with the Genova Wine Festival. All cancelled.

Next up on any winelover’s calendar is Live Wine (1-2 March) in Milan, which was supposed to have Alice Feiring as a special guest. That’s bitten the dust too.

As we drive back, the elephant sitting in the car with us is what happens about Vinitaly (19-23 April.) It’s too early to say because two months are an eternity when radio bulletins are providing us with unwanted updates every 15 minutes. Maybe by that point, the restrictions on public and private events will be lifted, but who’s going to come? It’s now when the buyers and journalists are purchasing their tickets and reserving hotels. Given the international audience Vinitaly attracts, the damage will already have been done.

Watch this space but keep your fingers crossed.

Secolo XIX highlights the disappointment following the restrictions: https://www.ilsecoloxix.it/eventi/2020/02/24/news/vinnatur-2020-genova-sospesa-per-il-coronavirus-dopo-una-partenza-col-botto-1.38511583

Intravino also poses the question about Vinitaly: http://www.intravino.com/primo-piano/coronavirus-e-fiere-genova-wine-festival-salta-live-wine-pure-e-neanche-io-mi-sento-bene/

What’s On Around Vinitaly?

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Spring is right around the corner. The days are getting longer and warmer, the first vegetables in my orto have been sown and my taste buds are turning towards pétillant naturels rather than heavy reds.

I’ve had time to unpack my suitcase and settle back after the Loire fairs earlier this month and so my mind goes to the next big appointment in the wine trade diary: Vinitaly!

I make a point of going every year. You may have spotted that I was interviewed for an episode of Monty Waldin’s “Italian Wine Podcast” recently. It was recorded during a stolen 45 minutes in a fishbowl somewhere in the depths of Veronafiera last April.

Chatting with Monty Waldin, 2018

Every year, you may be thinking…. *yawn*… whilst it sounds clichéed, every year, there’s something new. Here’s the run-down of what to expect if you’re coming to Vinitaly in 2019.

The old-timers know that the proceedings kick off on Friday 5th April with Vini Veri in Cerea (VR.) The list of participants is not yet available but you can be sure to find a smattering of the usual natural wine figures – of which my personal favourites usually present are Colombaia, Feudo d’Ugni and Vodopivec.

The next day (Saturday 6th) heralds the start of VinNatur, which *newsflash* has moved its annual fair from the famous Villa Favorita to the nearby Margraf Showroom, a exhibition and logistics hub for a large, local marble company. We’ll find out if marble and wine are a good combination – but one thing is for sure: easy parking and 17,000 square metres of space to house the 182 producers from 6 different countries.

Summa, up in the Alto Adige, is the most exclusive of the fairs – being reserved to some 2000 participants and 100 winemakers. Organised by Alois Lageder, current president of Demeter Italy, most of the exhibitors farm biodynamically and if you receive an invitation, I’ve heard it’s worth the detour.

That covers the “off” fairs and brings us onto probably the main reason why you come to the Verona area at this time of the year anyway: Vinitaly. I’m pleased to report that in recent years there’s been a substantial increase in how much space, time and attention is given to organic, sustainable and independently-owned wineries. Given that 30% of all the vineyards in Italy are organically farmed, this increase shouldn’t come as much of a surprise but it should be very much welcomed.

In 2019, you’ll find that the entireity of Pavillon 8 has been given over to FIVI (independent wineries) and Vinitalybio (organic producers), whilst VIVIT – which for me was always the big draw – has moved to a new venue, the newly created Organic Hall in “Area F.”

If you happen to be staying in central Verona and you haven’t reached your wine-saturation-point, then there’s one easy solution: Vinitaly and the City. Personally, however, and especially if the weather is good, I would suggest heading out to Bardolino for their evening entertainment at the Villa Carrara Bottagisio, right on Lake Garda from the 5th-7th April. More details in the links below.

VINI VERI: 5 – 7 April 2019 at AreaExp, Cerea VR (website)

VINNATUR: 6 – 8 April 2019 at Margraf, Torre di Confine VI (website)

SUMMA: 6 – 7 April 2019 at Magrè, Alto Adige (website)

VINITALY: 7 – 10 April 2019, Veronafiera (website)

VINITALY AND THE CITY: 5 – 8 April, in central Verona (website) and Bardolino website

Wine Writers: The Formidable Pamela Vandyke Price

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A friend of my parents recently downsized into a new house. Her husband was deceased and, as you might expect, she wanted away with many old possessions that were no longer relevant and didn’t belong in the new place. I therefore became the willing custodian of her vast selection of wine books.

Some of them were duplicates or previous editions of the current contents of my bookshelf – and in the case of Hugh Johnson’s World Atlas of Wine, I believe it’s the fourth of its kind! Many of them, however, were titles and tomes of which I had never heard and was looking forward to discovering. There was one book – a small and discreet hardback – which particularly stood out. Lest you take me for someone who could be swayed by a cover, no no, it was because of the musty smell that overwhelmed my nostrils. Even from a distance, the smell was strong to the point of being garish. Unable to ignore it any longer, I pick it up and look closer: “Dictionary of Wines and Spirits, 2280 Alphabetical Entries” by Pamela Vandyke Price.

If you’re not familiar with the name, Pamela Vandyke Price was an English wine writer, who was born in 1923 and died in 2014. Jancis Robinson has described her as “the first woman to write seriously about wine in Britain and who did more than most to popularise wines after World War Two.”

I really knew very little about this lady before finding this book and searching around on Google. She was at her peak before I was born. Her first book was published in 1966 and being, by all accounts, an utterly formidable woman, she went on to publish thirty more. I am delighted to have this most odorous of books in my collection, because just when I was starting to question what it means to be a woman in the wine industry, what future it could hold, and tracing the paths taken by women before me, these musty pages have fallen in my lap and reached out across the generational divide.

I’ll be sharing some of her writing on here in the hope that it entertains, interests and inspires the online wine community in this day and age. Until then, I love the closing lines of her obituary in the Guardian:

“Vandyke Price will be remembered by many as a difficult, prickly character, whose put-downs were deadly and who raged more than was needful at the mutability of circumstance in a writer’s life. By way of contrast, she was fiercely loyal in her friendships and she really loved her subject. Her nose and her palate – though always better on reds than on whites – were impressive to the end.

“Ah, the ladies have come! Now we shall not be able to taste anything – all your scents and smells,” remarked an old buffer in Bordeaux as Pamela swung into the tasting room at Sichel on the Quai de Bacalan. “I can smell the preparation you use on your hair,” she rejoined, “the cleaning fluid that has been used on your suit, your boot polish – and you have a pipe in your pocket.” What’s more, she could, and he did.”

A Self-Imposed Time Out

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You may have noticed that I’ve taken a bit of a break from the blog. I’ve actually taken a break from most social media platforms because I’ve needed to turn off and disconnect in order to avoid being triggered by certain people, places or labels.

It’s been more than 6 months since the judges found Marc Sibard guilty of harassment and sexual assault and more than five years since I handed in my resignation but I still have nightmares and recurring dreams. Just last night I found myself justifying to some imaginary character why I moved away from France. 

It’s not only inanimate objects that trigger my subconscious; even real people in real life will call me a storyteller or a money-hungry witch to my face.

“Why did you make it all up?” they ask.
Continue reading “A Self-Imposed Time Out” →

How We Talk (And Write) About Wine

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I spend about an hour most mornings reading. It could be the news, some left-wing opinion columns or just a few blogs. If you didn’t know better, you would call me a slug-a-bed because I have nothing to show as a result of this “wasted” time.

However, I find this habit deeply inspiring. Not always for the right reasons: there are some moments (like this) when I find the subject matter so infuriating and the words form so quickly that sparks fly off the keyboard.

On other occasions, I agree so wholeheartedly with the content that a simple retweet wouldn’t do it justice. It just so happens that this morning was one of those moments. It was this wonderful feeling of clarity when you just go “Yes. This. Word.”

It’s a piece in Punch by Jon Bonné called “Why It’s Time to Stop Fetishizing Wine Expertise” and carries the sub-line: “Our current fascination with wine expertise—and, often, the wine experts themselves—has actually made it harder to enjoy wine.”

As an aside, for a glimpse into “The Parker Effect”, I highly recommend this 10 minute podcast with Jancis Robinson on the BBC. Having only started in the wine industry in 2010, to hear about the moment that the most influential US wine expert Robert Parker locked horns with UK goddess Jancis in 2004 was very interesting to me. 

Anyway, back to Bonné’s article, I’m going to take a few excerpts with which I couldn’t agree more passionately.

“But the old ways of wine are fading into the distance. A new generation of drinkers has arrived, one with little interest in the fear and pomposity of the past. The blossoming sphere of natural wine has complicated old discussions about quality. And both wine journalism and wine discourse have been transformed—although not entirely for the better. We’ve thankfully lost a fair amount of imperiousness and talking-down. But we’ve also unearthed a lot of faux-egalitarian BS and first-person preening.”

Truth!

Next up – how being a so-called “wine expert” actually means creating an elitist language which only fellow wine experts can understand. (I’d actually just written something similar last month – here.)

“The more I thought about it, the more I had to acknowledge that our current fascination with expertise has actually made it harder to enjoy wine. Wine needs experts, of course, like any other pursuit. But rather than democratize wine, we’ve traded out reductivism for an infatuation with the mechanics and mystique of expertise.

We’re dazzled by tales of blind-tasting La Tâche and sabering Champagne, because they’re good clickbait and they sex up what otherwise could be a dowdy topic. But they’re parlor games, as is the obsessive memorization that some experts swear by. It all merely enhances a myth of expertise—namely that to understand wine, you must engage in a furtive, Masonic quest for truth.”

We move onto Bonné’s conclusions. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t printed them out and pinned them to the wall behind my computer in order to remind myself of these home truths every day.

“You discover that wine isn’t a thing to be fetishized. Its cultural value comes from the traditions surrounding its long history, and the improvements upon those traditions. Its prices have more to do with rarity, and ego, than innate quality.”

And finally…

“Frankly, we can embrace this complex world and still appreciate experts, without putting them on pedestals. For those of us who are experts, we might all be well-served to work on injecting a bit more humility into our work. Talking to everyone, not just our peers, like they’re grownups. A bit less Insta-bragging. A bit more acknowledging our relatively boring lives, and the many ho-hum wines that occupy them. This can only help to humanize wine, and that in turn will help to build a strong, diverse wine culture for the future.”

True dat.

Read the whole article on Punch by following this link.

Marc Sibard GUILTY of sexual assaults and harassment!

Emma Bentley 9 Comments

Marc Sibard, manager of the reputed Caves Augé shop in Paris, has been found guilty of multiple counts of sexual assault and sexual harassment and psychological harassment.

Always at the top of any list of ‘influential people in the wine industry,’ Marc Sibard has been one of the most powerful advocates for natural wine in France.

He has been at the head of the inimitable Caves Augé for over 30 years* and, in that time, has inspired, shaped and influenced a whole generation of consumers, sommeliers, winemakers but also, his employees.

* Edited to add: On Monday 10th July, I heard whispers through the grapevine that Marc Sibard may no longer be employed at the Caves Augé… but these are not (yet) confirmed.

* Finally: 31st August – it’s official. Marc Sibard has been fired.

An article on Marc Sibard in la Revue du Vin de France last month. The headline photo also comes from that same RVF article.

Enough was enough for several of those employees who went to the police and made accusations against him.

After close to five years of investigations, the case was heard at the High Court in Paris (Tribunal de Grande Instance) on 9th June 2017.

I was one of the plaintiffs. I worked at the Caves Augé and for the Lavinia group in 2011-12.

In my case, the charges were for two counts of sexual assault and for sexual harassment.

There are other two former employees, who also filed as “partie civile” and for them: further counts of sexual assault, sexual harassment and psychological harassment.

Four other female employees had told, during the investigations, of similar problems they had had with him – which either had been settled out of court or brushed under the carpet.

Today, July 6 2017, we found out that Marc Sibard has been found guilty on all counts; guilty of sexual assault, guilty of sexual harassment and guilty of psychological harassment.

He now has a suspended prison sentence, has to stay off booze for two years and will have a criminal record… but do you know what, right now, the details haven’t sunken in. All my brain can process is that he has been found guilty, that the case is finally over and, thank God, it went in our favour.

If you missed it, this was my (rather cryptic) blog post last month, musing about justice:

How Do You Get Justice

And here is a post I wrote six months after the judgement about the after-effects of the case:

A Self-Imposed Time Out