Where's the beef?

Being an Australian wine traveller gets you in a lot of doors around the world. For one thing Australians have been loved as travellers a long time as they tend to be open-minded, fun, aware and generally up for a good time. I'm concerned that this positive image is starting to lose its sheen but that's another topic. As one of the world's major producers and the largest exporter outside of Europe you would struggle to find anyone in the global wine industry that isn't aware that Australia makes wine.

In fact most are aware of the meteoric rise of Australian wine in the '90s in Europe and North America thanks to the strong marketing and communications of varietal labelling. Not to mention the major strides made in large-scale commercial production reducing costs whilst making clean fruit-driven wines. Australia became the number one country imported into the United Kingdom and in many cases second only to Italy or France. It's brands seemed indestructible.

Undoubtedly with a certain amount of glee the rest of the world has watched Australian wine fall from grace over the past five or more years. Numerous experts both within Australia and without have looked at figures and attempted to explain this incredible reversal of fortune. Having made some of the most important advances along with the United States in the '70s and '80s, Australia has seen other wine-producing countries in South America, Europe and Africa beat them at their own game in terms of value/quality and cost.

Mornington Peninsula - 10/3/2013

When I was young my grandparents owned a holiday house that our family made use of at least twice a year, particularly during summer. The house was pretty old, the beds weren't very comfortable and worst of all there was no television. In spite of this I always looked forward to holidays there. The house was in Rye on the Mornington Peninsula between Rosebud and Sorrento, and I have fond memories of beaching, fish & chips and the summer carnival. They sold the house when I was in my early teens and suddenly there was a hole in my heart where those experiences used to be. Once I became interested in wine that hole was filled in a different way when I discovered it as a wine region. Over the years I was introduced to many other wines and regions in Australia, especially in the Yarra Valley where I worked for quite a while, but Mornington always remained my favourite region in Australia. So it seems fitting that the first region I visited since my return was to the Mornington Peninsula.

At Main Ridge Estate, my favourite producer in the world

Felton Road

Back in 2011 not long before I left for my trip I attended a media lunch at Vue de Monde with Blair Walter from Felton Road, by accident. I should have been there the day before at the trade lunch but got mixed up, and somehow was able to stay with the illustrious likes of James Halliday, Jane Faulkner, Jeni Port, Dan Sims, Ben Edwards, Matt Skinner and a number of other Melbourne-based journalists and educators. Feeling very guilty and intimidated I then had the fortune of sitting next to Blair himself for the tasting of the entire range of new releases and then the insane lunch prepared by the Vue staff on the hundred-and-whatever floor of the Eureka Building. Over the many courses we were all regaled by tales from the god of Australian Wine James Halliday working the classic 1983 vintage in Burgundy, which not only put me further in awe of his legacy but also look forward to my trip in the hopes I would have even half the experience. That surreal afternoon will stay with me and created quite the connection with Felton Road wines. This week I had the chance to catch up with Blair again as he was in town for the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival, and taste a few of the wines.

Blair Walter

Luciano Sandrone

One of the things I want to write in summarising my trip is to talk about some of the amazing people I met who imparted some of their wisdom and experience in wine and life. I am still in the process of looking back upon my blog archive which is taking me a lot longer than it should. But as it happens one of the people I intended to write about is making his first ever visit to Australia and I was lucky enough to be invited to a masterclass showing his wines here in Melbourne by the importer Bibendum Wines. This man is Luciano Sandrone, and after introducing him I will talk about why he had such an effect upon me.

Luciano Sandrone and myself when I visited in April 2012

Re-adjusting

It's an odd feeling looking back on a sixteen-month trip and trying to remember the places and experiences. Of course the further back I go the blurrier it tends to be, but there are still very clear and strong memories right from the beginning. I also have the benefit of a chronicle to refer to, which I am now in the process of doing. With roughly 200 entries to read through that's likely to take me a while, and so I'm going to ask you to be patient as I'm also trying to organise my life and try and find sources of income.

Petaluma Riesling 1998

Return to Oz

A few days ago I stepped onto Australian soil for the first time in 500 days. It is a pretty surreal experience returning home after having been on the move for so long, and seeing so many amazing and different countries. Firstly there is the fact that I have returned from sub-zero and icy temperatures in South Korea to warm and dry 30+ temperatures in Melbourne, and I can actually walk around in shorts and T-shirts like a proper Australian. I am also experiencing a kind of reverse culture-shock, as I had got so used to being in foreign and fascinating cultures and being somewhat out of my element. It probably doesn't make sense to feel so out of place in my own home town.

I stopped in Seoul on the way home to visit a friend

The last seven months of my trip didn't involve a lot of wine travel, with the exception of four weeks in France, a few visits in Italy and the vintage in Germany. For this reason I am concerned that I am getting a bit rusty, so I'm keen to get back into the swing of things here in Melbourne. The problem is that I'm yet to be gainfully employed, and therefore unlikely to be invited to any trade-related activities such as tastings. Having said that, my immediate plans are to start visiting more Australian wineries and continue writing about them here on the blog. An important realisation came upon me as I travelled that I have visited barely any of the many and varied regions in Australia, and only one in Marlborough, and thus have little first-hand experience with them apart from reading talking and of course tasting. I am excited for any readers who visit this blog to learn a bit more about the great quality and diversity of Australian and New Zealand wine, particularly those not residing in either of those countries who don't know a lot beyond shiraz.

The food in Korea was the deserved highlight

Now that I am back I am trying to collect all my thoughts and experiences from my blog, and periodically I will be summarising various things, including some of my favourite people, regions and wines. I am always looking for discussions and feedback about what I write, and I encourage people to make their voices heard. I am always hoping to learn new things about wine and admit that it is impossible to know enough about wine. I also wanted to let people know that I am thinking of attempting a book about my trip, and am open to suggestions or encouragement (or discouragement) in this endeavour. It's a little bit up in the air for me at the moment as I am still trying to find my feet, but I'll keep you posted on any developments. Thanks again for taking the time to visit my blog, I have had an amazing journey and owe a lot to the people who helped me a long the way, particularly all the wonderful wineries I visited.

The last six weeks of my time in Europe were spent in Italy with my amazing parents

Not what you think (Avellino, Italy)

One of the many things I've learnt on my journey has been to not make assumptions about things, wine or otherwise, the best thing is not listen to white noise or demons and angels on shoulders. This is one major reason I prefer to ignore a lot of wine critics and marketing hype as they can tend to cloud my judgement and enjoyment of things, in essence by not reading ‘professional’ assessment of wines or wineries, nor by reading much on wineries’ websites. What I have preferred to do is to visit a winery and establish my own impression and feel for the philosophy, approach and practices and then determine what I feel is important and good about the winery whilst avoiding the negative and generally unimportant things. A perfect example of an assumption I made was about the region of Campania, which I didn’t have the chance to visit when I was here previously, simply passing through from Puglia on the way to Sicilia when I stopped for a night in Napoli before boarding the ferry to Palermo. Not unlike every other region in Italy Campania has it’s own wine history, traditions, grape varieties and styles which it is deservedly proud of, but I was very wrong in my generalisation of this region as being warm and Mediterranean like much of southern-Europe. In fact it has a more continental climate thanks to the elevations and weather patterns provided by the mountains so close to the coast. On the only occasion that I had to visit wineries in Campania I chose to do so in Avellino which according to Jacopo Cossater is where some of the best white wines of the south come from, and I met with the two largest and most important representatives of the entire Campania region; Feudi di San Gregorio and Mastroberardino.

A model of the only thing to survive the 1980 earthquake in a nearby village, the abbey

Polarising (Umbria, Italy - Day Three)

I have had the pleasure of meeting a great many people who work in wine over the course of my journey who have all imparted wisdom to me, and I hope that I have given some small amount in return as this is the essence of wine communication, that in travels in two directions. Most of the people have been hosts at wineries that I have visited, but a few of them I either met also visiting wineries or simply in unconnected situations, like a woman who consults business strategy and communication to small wineries in Italy whilst having lunch in Beaune, France. Someone I met whilst in Sicily was a wine journalist and blogger originally from Verona but now living with his recently married wife in Perugia. At the time he was making a much smaller version of my own journey in the south of Italy, including Campania, Calabria, Molise and Abruzzo. His name is Jacopo Cossater and he not only contributes to the most important wine magazine in Italy and the most visited wine website in Italy, but he also regularly writes on his own site enoicheillusioni. We met whilst visiting one of my favourite winemakers in Italy, Arianna Occhipinti, and shared some discussions over several meals whilst in Sicily. I was thrilled to catch up over dinner with Jacopo and his lovely wife Laura with my parents when we visited Perugia, and even more so when he invited me to visit a few of his favourite producers around Perugia in Montefalco and Spoleto. Regretfully I forgot to bring my camera so the images in this post have been taken with many thanks from the websites of the producers in question.

Vines are only outnumbered by olive trees here

Continuing traditions (Soave, Italy)

Due to a few inconveniences both good and bad I lost at least seven days of potential visits whilst I was in Italy. Some of these interruptions were for holidays, including Easter which I spent with wonderful family friends in Milano, and who my parents and I also spent Christmas with last week. Other inconveniences were due either to the inability to find wineries thanks to inaccurate directions or addresses, or to wineries not replying to my emails. A final inconvenience was Vinitaly held in Verona, which was a fascinating insight into the world of trade shows but not a particularly good way to learn about wines and regions as not only are you simply tasting wines in a convention centre but the hosts are also extremely distracted with countless other things and therefore not able to give the best introduction to their winery. Whilst I was in Verona I did manage to visit a few producers in Valpolicella which is to the north of the city extending from the east to the west, but there are a number of other areas in Veneto that were left unexplored, including the highest volume DOCG, Prosecco. I had the chance to join a group from Australia for dinner in Verona at the invitation of their Soave producer, and being familiar with their quality I was thrilled to have the chance to take my parents there on my return.

The castle sits overlooking the village of Soave

Recapturing the vibe (Montalcino, Italy - Day Two)

It’s such a relief to simply be in holiday mode after most of the past 14 months have been spent not only travelling but researching and arranging appointments and then writing as much as I can. I have joined my parents who have flown up from Melbourne for us to travel in Italy for my last six weeks in Europe. Not only is this a great experience for me not having seen them for over 14 months, but also my mother brought me as a baby to Italy for five months whilst she worked on her masters in a dialect from Campania. I may have mentioned in a post back in April that I was actually returning to Italy after almost 30 years, and now my mother and I are reunited in Italy as well. As I am travelling I won’t be doing much writing in the hope of making the most of the trip with my parents, but they are interested to visit a few wineries whilst we are here so I will write about them. I raved to them about how beautiful Montalcino was, and as we were staying a few nights in Siena to the north and we were passing through, I made an appointment to a winery that I didn’t visit when I was here before.

Poggio di Sotto

Impressions of France

This post has been almost twelve months in the making, as the first region I visited in Europe was Champagne way back in the third week of January, and my final one in Europe was Burgundy. Over the year I have made periodic visits to France which was not intentional but merely a product of its very central location in Western Europe, and the fact that most of the regions happen to be quite close to the borders of other countries. It is important to keep this in mind as I collect my thoughts and look back on my experiences on the most famous wine producing country in the world. It is also important to keep in mind that my visits to different regions in France have come at different stages in my experience and thus each new region I visited in France was actually a big jump forward in my development having focused on another country entirely (Germany, Italy, Spain etc.) By the time I got to Burgundy I had seen the best that the rest of Europe had to offer and had a significantly better understanding about wine production, viticulture and the concept of terroir. So without further ado, here are my impressions of France.

Day 1 in French wine country

Here endeth the lesson (Beaujolais, France)

Fourteen and some months after I left Australia I arrived at my last day visiting wineries, and it certainly has been quite a journey. As it turns out I am very glad to be finishing in Burgundy, partly because I generally love the wines and they are amongst my favourite in Europe, but also as Burgundy is such a diverse and often complicated region that I was glad to have had all the previous experience before visiting. Having already visited the Chablis and the Cote d’Or on my previous trip in 2010 there was very little that surprised me in these regions and it was more a question of familiarising myself further. South of the Cote de Beaune on the other hand was a different story, as not only did I know very little about these appelations but I had had almost no tasting experience with them. Unfortunately I wasn't able to secure any appointments either in the Cote Challonaise or the Cote Maconnaise and had to be content with driving through parts of the area to see the type of landscape it is. One of the more famous appelations in the Cote Maconnaise is the village of Chardonnay, not because of the quality of the wines but because it is supposedly the birthplace of possibly my favourite white grape variety. Technically still part of Macon but a different appelation to the south is the famous Beaujolais which totally took me by surprise, and I was pretty happy to finish somewhere that did. The king of varieties here is gamay, and there are no other parts of the world that grow it in the quantity or quality they do here. There is a separate appelation for Beaujolais Blanc wines which are 100% chardonnay, but really it’s the gamay that makes this region what it is.

A cold day in Beaujolais

So good they named it twice (Cote de Beaune, France – Day Two)

The famous village of Chateauneuf-du-Pape wasn't always named as such, it was renamed from just Chateauneuf after the Papal regime had all of their best vineyards here back in the 15th century. The association with this important period in history was strong enough to change the name of the village, thereby highlighting the importance of viticulture, and today it is the largest single appelation in France. This isn't the only village in France that has changed its name to signify the importance of viticulture, some of the most famous are in Burgundy. Within the Cote d’Or, villages that neighboured the best grand cru vineyards began to take the name of the vineyard to lift their profile. Gevrey became Gevrey-Chambertin, Chambolle became Chambolle-Musigny, Vosne became Vosne-Romanee and Aloxe became Aloxe Corton. Arguably the most famous white wines in the world come from the Montrachet Grand Cru vineyards which are between the villages of Puligny and Chassagne, and thus they both took the name of the vineyard and became Puligny-Montrachet and Chassagne-Montrachet respectively. In a way this is like a seal of approval or a sponsorship, but in the same way that a sponsorship from Pepsi doesn't guarantee that The Spice Girls are good, just because the fruit comes from a classified vineyard it doesn't mean it will be the same style or the same quality. This is one of the problems with the appelation classification system, is that it is merely for a place and not for the human influence, and two wines from the same vineyard but a different producer can be very different. As I always say, trust the producer first and the rest will follow.

Barrels and bottles

A Beaune to pick (Cote de Beaune, France - Day One)

Something that amazed me when I first came to Burgundy back in 2010 was how small the region was compared to how important it was, particularly in comparison to Bordeaux which is as big as it is important. The Cote d’Or stretches for about 40 kilometres from North-East to South-West, and is as narrow as 500 metres wide in such places as Premeaux-Prissey. The amount of wine that is produced can’t be that much considering the yields of only a few tonnes per hectare, and yet you can find Burgundy all around the world. Despite the relatively small size of the region there are a lot of differences between each part, particularly between the Cote des Nuits and the Cote de Beaune. The Cote de Beaunes starts in Aloxe-Corton, stretches north of the town of Beaune (the heart of the Cote d’Or) and continues past it all the way to just past Chassagne-Montrachet. I was always confused by the claim that the red wines of the Cote des Nuits were more feminine than their counterparts further south, whereas I (and several of my fellow students at university) felt the opposite was true. Pinot noir from the Cote de Beaune is first and foremost lighter, more pure and fresh, shows the minerality better and most importantly is more approachable sooner. I much prefer the red wines of the Cote de Beaune for all of these reasons, but it is also the chardonnay wines that distinguish this part of Burgundy as supreme, with the Montrachet Grand Cru parcels producing arguably the best white wines in the world. I was thrilled to visit three producers today that all exemplify the style of the Cote des Beaune yet have their own unique expression of it.

Ma Cuisine, one of the best dining experiences of my trip

What goes around (Cote des Nuits, France – Day Three)

Now that winter has arrived I feel like I've come full circle in Europe because I arrived mid January in Paris. Back in February when I was in Germany you may remember that the temperature dropped well below zero and there was quite a bit of snow in regions like the Mosel, Rheingau and Franken. The morning of my third day in the Cote d’Or I awoke to falling snow that continued all morning and covered the cars, houses and buildings quite beautifully. It also made driving a little more challenging both for visibility reasons but also as the road was a little slippery. Seeing this just reinforces the fact that these wine regions North of the Loire Valley really are very cool-climate, and you would very rarely see snow in any regions in Australia, even further south in Tasmania. These cold temperatures and snow or frost are of course the reason that grape vines go into dormancy by turning brown and into canes, to protect themselves. It’s a shame that humans can’t develop a hard exterior that perfectly protects them over the winter, we would save a fortune on heating expenses, warm clothes and car problems. My final day in the Cote des Nuits I visited three small producers all with a different approach and expression.

Nuits-St-George vineyards under snow

Expressions of interest (Cote des Nuits, France - Day Two)

One of the true revelations of my journey has been to discover the four components of what makes a great wine which must all be present and in balance. The first is the vine (obviously), but more importantly the right variety for the place. The place is the second component; for lack of a better term the terroir or the environment, which includes the climate but not the weather. The weather is a part of the third component which is the vintage, and how the specifics of the entire year can influence the character. The final component is the influence that people have, which includes everything viticulturally, oenologically, philosophically, spiritually and financially. All four components have their own influence on the character of the wine and to be a great wine they must be all working together, however one or more of the four often stands out more than the others whether intentionally or not. The most common component to dominate is the human influence of winemaking and something I am beginning to realise is that this is true in every region, even here in Burgundy. Winemakers whether deliberately or not want to impart their signature on the wine through anything from skin contact, use of oak, fruit sorting, ripeness of fruit at harvest and even the type and amount of filtration. So even within a single vineyard you may have slightly (or very) different expressions of the other three components. My day consisted of three appointments, all north of the village of Nuits-St-George.

Water is an important resource for wine production

Chalk and cheese (Cote des Nuits, France - Day One)

There is a very good reason that the part of Burgundy between Dijon and the beginning of the Cote Challonaise is referred to as the Cote d’Or or Golden Coast, and it’s not because of the colour of the leaves in Autumn. It’s because the greatest and most aught after wines in the world are from this mysterious and unattainable part of the world, crafted from only two varieties, either pinot noir or chardonnay. These are the benchmarks not only for wines made with these grapes but all wines, particularly cool-climate elegant wines. I visited here as part of my 2010 trip, only spending a total of three days which included one in Chablis. With so little time back then I ended up visiting three negociant style houses based in Beaune and only one small producer in Volnay, but none in the Cote des Nuits although I did taste wines from this area. When I drove back from Dijon to Beaune after my visits in Chablis I passed all the vineyards that have such mythical names, realising just how small the appelations are. Some domaines own many hectares of vineyards in a multitude of different appelations and buying fruit or wine to make up the difference, releasing 50 or more wines each year. Other domaines are pure proprietors who only make wines from their own meagre holdings less than 15 hectares, often within one village. The difference between these two types of burgundy houses can be profound as I discovered on my first day in the northern part of the Golden Coast.

They use these at Louis Jadot to indicate when they have tasted from a barrel and it needs topping up

Keep it simple (Chablis, France – Day Two)

If anyone has played competitive team sport in their life they may have heard of the KIS principle, which stand for Keep It Simple. Looking back on my trip I am finding it fascinating that many of the wineries and regions that I most connected with have this same principle in mind. Even more interesting is that this connection was regardless of red or white wine, but applied to philosophies and practices as well as style. The clarity purity and minerality of the rieslings I tasted in Germany blew me away, as did the gruner veltliners in Austria. Some of the best wines I tasted in Spain were those that were straightforward and approachable, such as the albarinos in Rias Baixas and the verdejos in Rueda. In terms of French wine, the simple white wines of the Loire Valley and Chablis have a special place in my heart, as the minimal intervention they make in the wineries means it is purely the expression of the variety in their particular terroir. In fact there are a number of similarities in terms of climate and soil composition between Sancerre, Pouilly and Chablis, but the latter chooses to express through chardonnay rather than sauvignon blanc. The minerality of these regions is legendary, but I am starting to see there are some different expressions that still follow the KIS principle.

Some of the characters of Chablis

The name game (Chablis, France - Day One)

When I was younger I didn’t like my name. In terms of my first name I didn’t really have a problem with James, but I didn’t like it being such a common name, nor did I like derivations and colloquialisms of it, like Jim, Jimmy or Jamie. Considering how uncommon my surname is and how much of a individual I attempted to be, you would think I would like my surname but this was not the case. I wasn't a fan of the length of it nor did I like the fact that people could neither spell it by ear nor could they pronounce it when reading it. I love my name now, being proud of its uniqueness and also as the last male Scarcebrook in the family I have a sense of obligation to continue the name. People in Europe, particularly France, are similarly fiercely proud of their names, often naming their children after themselves. Continuing the family name carries over to the family business as well, but complications arise with splitting of estates between children or establishing new estates with the same name. Within the same village it is not uncommon to find several producers of the same name, and within an entire region this could multiply significantly. Not for the first time on my trip I arrived at the wrong winery because it had essentially the same name, even though there is no relation between them. This gets complicated out in the market as a producers name is effectively their brand, so when someone else is using the same brand their products can reflect on your own reputation. I guess this is another complication that makes wine so special, and it is important to trust your source, be it a restaurant, store or importer.

Limestone clay and a bit of chalk

It is and it isn't (Pouilly, France - Day Two)

I've never really understood the phrase “the exception that proves the rule”, and I'm wondering if someone can explain it to me. Doesn't an exception by definition DISprove a rule? Isn't that the whole point of a rule? I understand the concept of “rules were meant to be broken”, never more appropriate than when talking about the rules and regulations around appellation des origine controlee (AOC) in France, and similar denominations in other European countries. The idea that the best wines are produced from certain varieties in certain terroirs perfected over the centuries isn't the question for me. The question is the determination of yields and practices in the vineyards in cellars that are determined by this quite rigid system. In terms of planting other varieties, not only can you not label any wine made from the varieties, but the mere existence of them is forbidden. Around Europe there are mavericks looking to shake things up a bit, breaking away from the norm and attempting to disprove the rules, or prove the exception. One of these is Domaine Didier Dagueneau.

Domaine Didier Dagueneau