April 17, 2024 • 52 mins
Roussillon in SW France produces 80% of France’s vin doux naturels (VDNs). The centuries-old process for making these fortified sweet wines, known as "mutage," occurs when a spirit is added to stop fermentation early, enabling the wine to retain its natural sugars. Roussillon AOP vin doux naturels include Banyuls, Maury, Rivesaltes, and Muscat de Rivesaltes. Eric Aracil, co-director & export manager at the Conseil Interprofessional des Vins du Roussillon (CIVR), discusses the region and wines.
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The Connected Table Radio Show is broadcast on W4CY Radio (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).
The Connected Table Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
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(00:01):
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(00:22):
W FOURCY Radio. Welcome to theConnected Table Live. We're your hosts,
(00:44):
Melanie Young and David Ransom. You'reinsatiably curious culinary couple. We bring you
the fascinating people we meet around theworld who lead the industry in wine,
spirits, food and hospitality. Weenjoy sharing their stories with you and inspiration
from the people we meet and thedestinations we visit, and we're doing that
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today with a very special edition ofThe Connected Table. Right David, absolutely,
Melanie. Recently we had the greatpleasure of going on our first actually
wine tour of Langadoc Russion in southwestFrance, which is a very big area
and region. We're familiar with thewines, but we never had the chance
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to really deep dive in. Whatwere your impressions, David Well, I
thought it was a fascinating region,again, a region we've known from Afar
but had never actually been to experienceit firsthand. And I was pretty fascinated
with pretty much everything I saw.It's a beautiful region geographically, and the
wines are not only some of thebest I think in France, but they're
(01:51):
really coming along in popularity as wellthese days, which is really nice to
see. And as we said,the region is called Langadoc Rusion, but
they're very separate and distinct. Andtoday we are going to spotlight Russillon,
which is the more southerly and smallerof the two regions, located just north
of the Spanish border in the departmentof the Pyrenees Oriental in fact that it
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borders the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean coastto the south, and then there are
these three rivers that run through thearea, the tech Agli and the tech
and some mountains to the north wherethere is Langadoc, and there's some really
important cities there as well, Perpignonin Montpelier. It's rich in history,
and we are so honored to havesomeone who's an expert and native to Russion
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join us today. His name isEric Arazil. He's born into a wine
growing family and a small village justin the heart of the Aspray region.
The name Ariso. We learned hisCatalan, and I was surprised that the
Catalan influenced in this area, veryclose to Spain and therefore Catalina. Yeah,
so we'll talk about that as well. So Eric grew up in the
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area and studied analogy and became aconsulting anologist at the four K Laboratory for
several years and then advanced. Hiscurrent position now is an export director and
he's with the basically Von der Russalan, which is what it's called in short
(03:22):
as the co director of the organizationthat hosted our trip, and it's called
the civ Or Conseil Interprofessional de vonde Russalon. So he's co director and
export manager and he's been there forlike twenty years or something. So he
lets some fascinating masterclasses that we're goingto discuss and just kind of give all
of you our listeners a kind ofa great spotlight on Russlan and why you
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should be looking at these wines andvisiting this region Benvenu, Eric, Hello,
how are you all? Oh,we're very good. We enjoyed meeting
you. Yeah, I'm really happyto be with you. So I think
you describe already a lot who Iam and what I am doing and uh
and where is So this area isa fascinating place for for the wine,
(04:13):
for sure, and uh and foreverything Okay, because it's full of story,
a wonderful culture. You talking aboutthe Catalan position. Uh. For
sure. Gerpina is one of themain city for the north Catalonia. Okay.
Is a is a brother or sistercity of Barcelona, which is just
(04:33):
in the southern Spain. So inoon we have a we have a wonderful
expression of everything, our culture.It's really deep and we can we can
see it for everything just looking ataround you. We can have we can
have some wonderful monuments, we canhave some wonderful expression. Just less lessening
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the people talking because we are talkingCatalan here for a quite big part of
the people. And for sure weare French, so we are sharing Catalan
and French culture in the same time. I'm curious you grew up in a
wine making family and Catalan heritage wasFrench was like a bit is the food.
(05:26):
What influences are French water in Catalanin the in the food and growing
up. Can you give some examples, Yeah, for sure. In fact,
just to keep in mind, wewere several times invited here in Oco.
So the people from Spain arrived duringthe Eye Middle Age and the people
(05:46):
from Friends arrive around the seventeenth century. So we got several influences, especially
in the in the cooking, forexample, coming from Spain, we have
some classic one okay with rice orjust with no all. We have also
some specific influences from Friends, forexample with with the butter, the butter
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cooking because here the habit is tocook with olive oil. A lot of
different recipes okay, and nowadays wehave we have a big mix between Italian
influences and Spanish influences Catalan for sure, because this is we all Catalan cooking
and French influences. In terms ofCatalan cooking, for example, I will
(06:36):
give you some name, some specialname of some recipes like balls the piccolads.
I know that you are completely awareof the possibility to find some wonderful
meat balls everywhere in the world,but he in Rossio we have these ballers
balls the pecul at, which arecooked during all the year, and they
(07:00):
for example some good meat, goodmixed meat between veal, beef and pork,
and we are we are putting alittle bit of salt, a little
bit of pepper, a little bitof garlic. Because of garlic, it's
like the olive oil, one ofthe main ingredients in the in the cattle
and kitchen. And after that weare fried them and we can do a
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special accommodation with that. The traditionis to use some mushrooms like porcini mushrooms,
and to have also just a littlesauce made between gaelic and as the
time, onions, a little bitof tomento, and everything is completely reduced.
We are adding a main ingredient orso which is coming from our vines,
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which is called rancio sec I don'tknow if you remember that. You
taste it with me, some dryranteo and rosion and the dry rancho.
It's very very good ingredient for thekitchen. It can give a little bit
of kind of ran sea, ifI can say ran seats tie for for
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the for the recipe, and thissauce is already used for example with some
beans, white beans, or withsome stew like a little bit of potatoes,
a little bit of carol. Sodepending the period of the season,
for example, in the in thespring, we can have some potatoes and
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new potatoes coming from ocean for sure, and some carrots. And in the
autun for example, you can havesome white beans. So this is a
wonderful recipe. And we have severalrecipes which are mixing in the classic way
of products from the sea and productsfrom the ground. For example, in
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France you can do a wonderful chicken, roasty chicken. In Catalonia we are
doing a chicken with prams, okay, with a special sauce another time,
and with a special lion for thesauce. We have a special lion which
is called Peakada. I don't knowif you're aware on that, but piicad
is something another time amazing, basedon something always a little bit rancid.
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We are using some bread, someold bread, if I can say all
bread. We fried it in oliveoil, and we are doing exactly the
same with garlic, and we arecrushing everything together and we can add for
example, if you want the nameof this link, it's called pitakada.
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And this pikada can be used fora white sauce. For example, we
just almond. We adding some almondpowder fresh almond, completely crush it,
mix it with this special or pecada. Otherwise, if you want to do,
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for example, stew with a witha brown sauce for example, with
wine, you can add just inthe past it was cocoa beans and nowadays
it's black chocolate and even bitter chocolate. So we have some specialities in Oceo
which are really incredible. So withthese lambagambas chicken with prawns, it's really
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a mix between the eye detached ofthe prawns and and the crispiness in fact
of the skin of the chicken.And it's really really full of flavors and
really tasty. And for sure alwayswines to accommodate with entwo pere with with
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the food, cattle and foods makingme hungry. Crazy, Yeah, it's
crazy, crazy way. And whatis really crazy is you can change your
plate every day. We have alwaysa lot of colors. We are playing
a lot with the vegetables also andwith fruits also because in terms of a
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bit and the tradition, we aredoing a lot of sweet and sol recipes
and sweet and salt recipes, sousing some fruit or spices more or less
in the same idea as you canfind in naseia. So besides making us
hungry, it makes us curious tolearn more and come back and visit.
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Eric. You mentioned a word thatwe were going to dive into a little
later, but I thought maybe sinceyou brought it up, I want to
kind of go into it. It'swe're going to get in a little.
You mentioned the word rancio, whichI think warrants some explanation when you're discussing
the food because it can mean somethingelse in English rancia as a term.
(12:03):
I'd like you to explain it inthe term for wine making and food,
because it means something else in English. Yeah, for me, the problem
the translation, it's always a problembecause rancid is not really the right feelings
that you can have with a dryrantio, even with a sweet branchio.
For myself, the rancio expression,it's mainly the expression of I would say,
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we have a wide range of aromas. It can start with something like
a very rancid better with a kindof freshness which is nearly like a minty
freshness. Sorry, and we canhave at the end of your your evente
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we can have some very dry expressionof franchio, very strong expression like something
quite naughty. And we have alsosome wonderful space in us like coming like
specific. I can't remember now theEnglish world for that, but it's Finni
(13:15):
Greek in French, yeah exactly.Yeah, So with a rantio we can
have some special discovery because in fact, in the past the driver ranchio was
just dedicated for the kitchen because everyonewas not not a shame. But we
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add the bit to to to putout aside the style of wine just to
have an a primative, just tohave a drink as a privative, otherwise
just to use in the cooking.And nowadays a lot of somebody years all
over the world are looking for thestyle of wine because they are ones which
are some wonderful partners to pair witha special food. For example, we
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were talking about mushroom just previously.If you have travels or if you have
chantera, even some porcini, youwill be completely happy with with with a
pairing. If you have in anotherway some charcutary and mainly quite old sharcutary,
quite uh edgit sharcutary, it wouldbe wonderful because the fatness of the
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old charcutary will give you a wonderfulanswer to the to the wrongness and to
the very soft expression of the rancidstyle. And after that the spiciness of
the rancio would give a wonderful answerto the saltiness. For example, if
you have a piece of ham,salty ham, it would be good.
(14:50):
But in another way, if youhave a salty for example, anchovis okay,
which is traditional from here, fromColliure and uh basin as that is
a pig from Koreoona. So saltiaand chubies give you a little touch of
nutty expression, and the iriodine expressionwill give a wonderful answer to the expression
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of the of umami from the ranciostyle. So we can have something amazing
with or dry rancia. Well,you know, thank you for explaining it,
because that's a great gateway into talkingabout the wines, because it was
an expression that was fairly new.I know. To me, what about
you, David, I'd heard aboutyou before but never from this region exactly.
(15:35):
But it's very specific here absolutely,So a couple of things. Let's
step back a minute and talk aboutRussillon, the region and it's unique geography
that creates these microclimates. As wesaid, it's the smaller of the regions
of longer like Russalon, and there'sa specific it's got very specific geography and
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AOPs and of course we'll get intothe dry wines and then the bunder natural
show us plan that I think,but I think that it's really important to
insist on that acre area. It'sa very small amphitheater open to the military
and sea. It's a montaneous amphysiat, so we can say that the Vignyads
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is really nealed directly in this amphitheatre, and the Vignyod is between zero up
to roughly seven hundred eight hundred metersso figh. And everything is on slopes,
mainly eighty percent of the Vigneyod it'son slopes. And because we are
like you describe previously different valley,because we have three different rivers, because
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we have those mountains, we havean incredible region with for sure an expression
of the military and climate, butwith several different expressions of this military and
climate. So we have an incrediblepatchwork of tarhwar, of micro terroor and
myself terho expression is something amazing inOzio because we have different soils, perhaps
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one of the best expressions of thediversities that you can find in terms of
phagronomy for the soil and subsoil inthe world. Okay, we have also
the possibility to play it with adifferent altitude, the possibility to play with
the different exposures, playing for surewith also the environment. Because if we
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need to insist on that, Russianarea is one one of the more important
vineyard which is situated between the mountainand the sea. Okay. And the
same time, for example, ifyou want to go to have a bus
end of March beginning of April,you can do it and after one hour
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you can go to ski if youwant, so it's not a problem.
So this is a kind of paradise. It's Russio. It's really interesting nowadays
for a lot of Fernus, alot of newcomers in terms of vineyard because
we have we have this unique unicityand and something amazing in terms of possibility
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to do for terwars and for diversityof wines. And for sure you were
talking about ven Do natural FORTI fivesweet wines, but we have also someone
for dry ones and something also completelyincredible. I think, I believe completely
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sure that we that we are oneone of the unique plays in France to
have the possibility to revendicate all thevineyards in our p So the top of
quality is not really the case nowadaysin Ozon, because we are doing according
to the demand. We are doingalso some p g I. Okay,
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we have people a lot of pidoor roughly seventy percent of pideo and the
rest is PGI just to answer tothe demand, for example, for one
single variety, one special thing,one special vinification. So you need to
keep in mind that Rossio it's anamazing place to make a wide range of
wine and always a wine for thepleasure, okay, because for me ros
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between dry and fortify sweet wines,we have something incredible in terms of drinkability,
in terms of balance. For sure, we talk it also about climate,
but the climate here is something verygood for the body, is something
very pleasant for the tourists, okay, but it's sometimes too warm and sometimes
(19:51):
to dry and in Rossio we areproducing wines which are completely unexpected. For
example, white wines we are developed. We are developing a lot the production
of white ones with some specific varietiesand what is in credible, it's always
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the same thing using the old traditionalway of work, mixing this with new
technology for to have a maximum ofquality in the wines. And when we
have in mind that in Russian theproduction is one of the lowest that you
(20:32):
can find in the world. Becausewhen you started for the introduction, Melanie,
you said Langadog Chrossian region. Butif you are checking the langer Dog
production and the Russian production, wehave good complimentarities as you discover it by
yourself. But in terms of yield, the total average yield for Roussier production
(20:55):
is less sensative, little character.So it's nothing, okay. And it's
in terms of quality is putting reallyon the top the energy of Uzio.
So that's interesting. You know,I have a question for you. You
reference to the whine, we'd liketo start on the dry whites. I
think for our losteners it'll be interestingto deep dive into. You know,
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there's fifteen aopis. This is fromthe Vanderusalem site by the way, and
twenty four grape alreadis what are thestandout grape alreadys Starting with white wines that
our listeners would be thinking about lookingfor when they go to retailers and styles.
Yeah, in style for white wines. In fact, we have traditional
gravieties. We are using gravieties whichare really clean in terms of aromas or
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really fresh in terms of aromas.Also because sometimes we don't have to mini
acidity and thanks to the tea andthanks to the technology and the way of
work, we are able to pushthe freshness of the white, you know,
so the freshness can come come fromthe soil, sometimes from the altitude
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and from the berries. And interms of varieturs we are we are using
traditional one which is macabello okay,which is called also boha in Spain.
We are using more and more becausethis is a dominant gray variety in granacher
okay ranash white and gnashy gray withthe granasher gray is something amazing because we
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have a good rural expression. Wehave a good anicid flavors which is coming
a classic way for the granache.But because it's a pink Grenacher gray pink.
You can understand that we have structureand we have minerality also, and
it's a kind of power again,minerality and also a citruc miniverity and the
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good freshness things to that, andthe one with structure that means you can
you can bring them very quickly andthey are very pleasant like this, or
you can lay down with our problemand this. For that I said,
they are sometimes unexpected because everybody isthe world in the world's talking about Chardonnay
or Sauvignian blam or even Vonia.Okay, but when we are talking about
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gnash, for example, you canbe completely surprised, okay. So for
ocon what is really important. Alsowe're talking about a wide range of wine,
different colors, different aging, andyou need to remember that we can
play really with the versatility of ourold grapes, especially all grapes coming from
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old vines. Because you need tokeep in mind also that the vineyard in
Oco, it's at least fifty percentof the vineyard with at least fifteen years
old, okay, from fifteen yearsold to I would say more n eighty
years old for the vine. Soyou can expect some quintessence. And really
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when you have low yield, youcan put on the top each element of
the terror, each element of thegray varieties, each element of the benification.
And when I talk about technology forthe vinification, I'm not sure that
people can understand it. But themain improve movement that we got here in
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Roussillon was a cooling machine. Andin fact we were doing some wonderful ones
in a long time ago. Butnowadays we are able to make the best
and to keep them with our program. And this is really important. And
when I was talking about versatility,you need to understand, for example,
(24:48):
that all the family of the grenache, white gray and even black green ache
or hat an afflut able to beproduced also as a fortified sweet one.
So sorry for that, I forgotto to to introduce very quickly, or
is up to you if you want, I can introduce it right now.
(25:10):
What is a venda because is somethingquite unique. Well, we did want
to. We just wanted to justquickly touch on the dry whites first and
then any dry reds and then wewere going to segue they do natural so
we because we taste it. Becausewe did two seminars and one was one
was on the dry wines and andand the various microclimates, and we taste
(25:33):
it, and we have we'll haveour notes in front of us, and
we taste some interesting the white youknow, Macabeo, which shows the Catalan
influenced. There's Grenache blanc, asyou said, Grenache gree. There was
also Vermentino, which is role inthe south. And some were saying one
of the wines also had a Sauvignonblanc in it. The I can't see
the notes from here, it wasa coke Catalon blanc. Yeah, this
(25:55):
is not so usual to find some, so nowadays it would be much more
usual to find some Carnyan blam okayor Carnyan gree. Uh. This is
more unique, you know, thanthe Sovinian blam. And by itself,
for example, Carnyan blam or Karyangree brings to the wine a wonderful acidity,
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a natural acidity. And in thepast it was put on the side
because it was too acidic, butnowadays important, especially according to the global
warming, and for sure because ofglobal warming, for example, the production
of Servilian blam, which is nottraditional and as the time here is so
(26:41):
difficult because we have a lag ofacidity in fact at the end, So
just talking talking about the break thebreakdown of a different style of wines in
dry wines. So you need tokeep in mind that in the past we
were producing a lot of red winesin still dry wines. Nowadays we can
(27:04):
have we can share in two pieces, one piece for the PGI, one
piece for the video, for thePDEO. We're still going on with a
with a good production, a goodquantity uh raughly seventy percent of red wine.
We have ra of rose wine andthe rest is white. But for
(27:27):
the PGI we have something which iscompletely in the opposition because nowadays we are
increasing a lot of production because ofdemand for white wines abroad may need.
So we have roughly twenty five tothirty percent of white wine in PGI.
We have roughly exactly the same inrose wine rose wine which are nearly with
(27:52):
a full quantity consumed here. Thereis not a lot of exportation for rose
wine from Zo and the rest PGIis red, so that means less than
forty percent of the production of PGIis red. Keep in mind also something
very important talking about red and whitein Rossion First of all, the name
(28:14):
of Rossion is coming from the browncolor who in frames Okay, because we
have a lot of oxidized iron inthe in the in the several types of
soil, we have oxidize iron,and to produce white wine. Sometimes it's
too difficult because, for example,we can have some oxidized iron which which
(28:37):
can go through the skin of theof the berries, so difficult to make
a red nification avoiding this color.And on the other side, the production
of red wine when you have oxidizediron could be very pleasant because we insist
thanks to the aron, to thecolor of the black red violet teens.
(29:03):
So we need to keep in mindeverything about this plaus is. I'm curious
what causes that oxidized soil, thatred soil. Yeah, And when the
people arrive from the news of Friends, even from Langadog, when you arrive
from Langado, when you pass throughthe Cobia Mountain, you arrive and the
(29:26):
first solo that you are discovering hereis red. It's a red clay with
a lot of oxidized iron. Soit's for that people is calling Roussion.
And remember also something or perhaps Ican give you an information that is quite
important for me. The first implantationof wine in Roussion was done during the
(29:48):
seventh century before Christmas, and itwas done by the Greeks Correngian. And
when the Corinthians arrived arrived here inRoussion, they were looking for salt,
and in fact they found salt,but also iron, okay, and they
planted vineyard until the Eye Plateau nextto the biggest mountain of the Cannibo,
(30:15):
and one of the vineyards planted bythe Greek people was nearly around one thousand
and two hundred meters of ie.So this is really special when you are
thinking about that, you know,because iron pushed a lot of people to
climb to the mountain and to goto restract the iron itself to make some
(30:41):
weapons and one thing another time perhapsinteresting for you you I don't know.
I also during the Middle Age,for example, we were very famous thanks
to the wines, thanks to thethen do natural forty five sweet ones.
It was a wonderful money to changewith the other the land. And the
(31:02):
second money which was used was theweapons, okay, and the weapons,
the Catialan weapons. The Catalan walkfor the iron was known all over the
Miditerrant Sea. So important to toto to link always the iron, the
(31:22):
wine and the and the and theculture of the Rosian area. Thank you
so much for that explanation. Ithink it's important because it is such a
distinguishing factor. Let's do talk aboutthe Van Door natural which is the other
masterclass, and I think it's importantwe learned you know, this region Rusalem.
The vendors are like the gems andit's like they represent eighty percent of
(31:47):
sweet wine production of France and sixtypercent worldwide. Thank you vander Rusalean and
Eric, so big topic and fascinatingrange. Yeah, this is this is
incredible in fact, when you whenyou have in the memory that the fortification
was born here in Rossion thanks toa guy who was called Arnald the Villanova.
(32:08):
He was during the Middle Age,during the thirteenth century, the end
of the thirteenth century. And thisman was a very book, very big
doctor. He was a private doctorof the king of Majorca, because at
that time we were under the Kingdomof Majorca, and it was more or
(32:29):
less I'm pretty sure that everyone isaware of who was Leonardo Vinci. Okay,
and Leonardo Vinci did more or lessthe same things, and another Villanova
made also. That means it wasa doctor. He did a lot to
(32:49):
improve the medicine all over. Friends. It was the first one in Europe
to write some books of getetic andsome book of gastronomy, praying between food
and wine another time, if Ican insist on that, Sorry for that,
but I'm very proud of my region, you know, and I can
insist on that. You need tounderstand that our region was really with a
(33:17):
big culture for the cuisine and forthe moment of the tasting. At that
moment, it was normal to itwith some spoon and some knife and some
food, with a plate and withglasses in front of us to drink the
wine. Keep in mind that whenwe became French during the seventeenth century,
(33:42):
when the King of Friends came here, it was completely surprised to see that,
because at that period in France itwas always the abbey to it with
the end and with the bread,taking the food directly by hand, and
just drinking wind or water in ain a special in a special I don't
(34:06):
know the word of that. Sorry, Like it was a glass, it
was used as a glass, butit wasn't at that moment glass. Okay,
so this is important to keep it. So coming back on a villanova
who received his wonderful know how inknowledges from a guy who was also very
(34:27):
important in the North Africa. Hewas an Arabic guy and that guy gave
to another bit of another the alembic. So another bit of another was the
first one in Occiden to use thealembic to create for sure distillation, to
use the distillate as a medicine.And he has the idea, yes,
(34:52):
he had, sorry the idea toto mix this distillate with amrsty infermin dition,
and so he created the fortification andby the fortification for sure the wines
were was also a wonderful medicine,but also something very stable to able to
(35:14):
to to be transported with our problem. Okay, So nowadays, just to
summarize very quickly, what is aven donatural? Ven donatur really is a
wine made with traditional way by italls from grandache, white gray black from
(35:35):
macabur, from maldazil, roon,from muskat small vein or musical lexander.
So he has a traditional gray whereit is used for ven donatually, and
ven donatually is immersed that we aredoing like in a classic way to do
a dry wine. But at onemoment you need to stop the lcoholic fermentation.
(35:57):
So this is important to in mind. Always ALCOHOLI fementation, always a
production of alcohol by the fermentation itself. And when you need to stop it,
you add alcohol, a pure andneutral alcohol coming nowadays from vinix origin,
(36:19):
and you kill the YaST and youkeep a part of the natural sugar
without fementing. So like that wecan balance with our problem because we have
nowadays eight centre of know how withthis technique, so we can balance with
our problem the sugar, the resultsugar, the alcohol produced and added,
(36:40):
and the balance between acidity and structure. So ven Donatural nowadays is a wonderful
range of non oxidized wine and oxidizedwine. So when I say non oxidized,
everybody can understand that we are keepingreally the yends of the wine in
(37:04):
a bottle. That means when you'reopening a bottle, if you put a
white, rosy or red wine,it would be completely white, rosy or
red with all the main characteristic ofa white, rosy or red plus for
sure always your sugar, which ishelp a lot for the balance and which
(37:24):
is like, is not a sweetwine? Sorry to say that, but
the question of sweet wine for mesometimes is used in a bad way.
For me, it's a vendoorm naturallyis a real wine. For sure,
we have a kind of sweetness,but it's not just sweetness. We have
a lot of wonderful feeling, alot of wonderful balance, and is still
(37:46):
a wine. So you can useit as a real wine from the primitive
to during a meal, after themeal, just reading a wonderful book,
or just taking a sip to recoveryour health, or I don't know what.
So it's the wines ven do naturallyare amazing. So keep in mind
(38:07):
we have the non oxidized style andon the other side we have the traditional
wine which are completely with oxidation.So remember what I said previously. Another
millainother was during the Middle Aage andwe talked about money to a change,
and the ven doornaturally was a wonderfulmoney for those changes. And at that
(38:31):
moment it was forbidden for us togo through the Caribbean mountains, so the
unique way was to go through theseas themeterrant sea by boat and people discover
it. The management of the oxidationat that moment, because the barrows or
the corners which were inside the boatand the barrows or the conners which were
(38:58):
on the top of the of theboat were completely different at the air level.
On the top it was with akind of oxidation with for example,
from a young black fruit, itbecame something a little bit jemmy in something
expressing some terreflection notes, some cocoabeans, some coffee beans, some roasted
(39:23):
expressions, special spices, and soon and so on. So keep in
mind also that the oxidation is anillness, and we are managing since already
eight cent years ago and nowadays theven donaturial with oxidation are in one side
amber style, so they are mainlycoming from white origin. And on the
(39:46):
other side we can have threely tawnyred colored wines which are coming mainly from
red origin. And to get theoxidation we have some big, big ways
to do. We can we canuse for example, some classic concrete tank,
we can use some wooden continess,We can use different sides of conness.
(40:12):
We can make the oxidation inside thecellars or adds the cellars, uh
something a little bit more incredible whenwe are outside. For example, we
can use some sumigen glass glass contness. Uh and here sorry to say that,
but here sometimes we are we havea mix uh in the in the
(40:35):
sentence because people understand that this oxidationoutside with sumigen, but in fact is
mainly a destriction of the wine thanan oxidation, because we don't have any
change with the with the oxygen ofthe air. We have just a destriction
by the photon of the light andthe changement of temperatures. So the color
(40:58):
is going down. The arabs arecompletely changing. And for sure, like
all the way of edging and maturation, because I'm talking about maturation much more
sometimes than edging. The way ofmaturation are really different, and each one
is bringing something to the vendor notto reluxidized. And it's not abuse that
(41:24):
we can find for example just asingle QB made with a bombard there,
or single qv made with just borroweror just a concrete tank. So sometimes
we have a big mix to makethe main expression and the more beautiful expression
of the vintage. Because when weare talking about oxidized wine, sometimes we
(41:50):
are talking about all vintages and weare lucky in once on because for example,
we can go down until the eighteenseventy year, always available for cells
in some cellars. Otherwise, wehave also the traditional way to make some
blend between different vintages. And forsure we can have some very very old
(42:14):
wines. Nowadays, if I cansummarize in just one sentence, we have
non oxidized wines which are really pleasantI would say new consumers or people who
love the freshness and the direct pleasure. And on the other side we have
(42:35):
wines which are much more for conaicurcewith oxidative style. Uh, and where
you will find always something amazing.They are wines I would say, against
the analogy, and they are reallymagic wines. So do not hesitate to
to try those wines because they havethe expression of a full culture, wonderful
(43:00):
story. And remember that a centuryof know how is the style of wine.
So I think, uh, it'scompulsory for me to go home with
uh with this production because nowadays,unfortunately the sweet wine in the world are
quite difficult to sell. But thosewine as a place for all the table
(43:25):
for all the people we love wine. Yeah, Melanie, I found the
van of natural is fascinating because there'sso many there's so many different ways to
make it, and there's also somany different styles of it. Yeah,
that that there's a there's a hugebreadth of diversity in the wines. And
I thought that was really interesting.And I want to point out that,
(43:47):
you know, Eric, you've beentalking about the fact that it's a fortified
wine, but it's very different fromport because it's actually the fortification happens while
the wine is still fermenting to stopthe fermentation, and it's not added after
the fermentation. And so that's athat's a take huge different in the fact
that what's been the natural apartment.Yeah, it happens during I fermentation.
(44:07):
Yeah, it's happen during implementation forboth of them port and and and then
do naturel But one thing important,the port was creating during the eighteenth century.
Okay, that means five century afterthe the creation of the fortification in
os On. After that, keepin mind that we have different laws for
(44:29):
sure for the production in the worldwe have more or less the same aim.
But in the reality, when youhave a look in the details,
we have a different level for thecomplusory motivity, for the barriers for the
crop. Okay, we have differentalcohol use because for examp for Port it's
(44:49):
your real spirit seventy LBV seventy percentLBV, and for r area then do
natureal. It's a pure and ucturalalcohol from vinic origin, and for sure
because it's ninety six percent eight andall just e anol. The four percent
on the side is just water.The quantity of alcohol added for the donut
(45:12):
real is a very small amount,between five to ten percent of the of
the volume of the mast that youare walking on, and for the Port
it it could be more much morethan that. Another big difference for me,
it's an LBV final BV for Portthat is higher than the LBV for
(45:35):
then not your average. For thedonatural it's a sixteen sixteen point five person
volume, and for Port is atleast twenty one, okay, twenty two.
So this is another world for me, and another thing very important.
When you are using neutral alcohol,we have a marriage which is made immediately
(45:59):
after one. If you want tohave a drink directly on the tank just
produced, you can do it forthe naturally, but you need to wait
a little bit because the spirit asfor sure a part of our cohore,
but also nonalcohol, and it needsto wait a little bit. That we
have step by step kind of fusion, you know, but for sure keep
(46:23):
in mind at the end them isthe same and at the end the profile
would be very close one to one, you know. You know I'd like
to do is explain some of thedifferent styles because we tasted them and so
(46:43):
that again our listeners can seek themout, whether they're dining out or some
ways can pick them out. Thevery specific styles starting with more. Yeah,
yeah, we have we have specificstyles. So you're talking about one
specific appilation, MARIU just perhaps veryquickly to to to to say the name,
(47:06):
to describe the name of each appilationthat you can find in Rosso they
are just a pideo. So thebiggest production of musk fortified musica in the
world is called Musica Rivesalt is producingRossio and made just with muscat gray varieties.
It's a white origin without oxidation.Normally. After that we have Result,
(47:29):
which is a very typical appellation,also quite important also in different way,
so mainly in red without ocidation,just a few in rose, and
we have a lot in number styleand and a little bit less in trily
origin for Mari. Mari is avery small appellation dedicated only to the to
(47:52):
the to the village of the Marieand Marie U has more less the same
ideas than the reversult. But wefind red which is called groner. We
find white without oxidation also, andwe have amber and trially okay. And
(48:14):
to finish for the different appellation wehave banues and banes, gangrue so and
gangree as the one of the biggestpossibility to produce so in white rosy red
without oxidation and amber and trially withoxidation. And one thing about just to
(48:35):
come back on what you said previously, so when you have a look on
the on the production of those fortyfive sweet ones, those ben do naturally
for sure. The great varieties areexactly the same. The way of nification
is exactly the same for the worldhere. But what is changing a lot
(48:57):
is the terror. For example,when you are talking Mari, it's a
black schist Okay is next to theCarbia Mountain, on the south face of
the Carbia Mountain, and it's reallywith a very big wideness in terms of
environment with the Gariga which is mainlybay bay trees, mainly juniper trees a
(49:21):
lot of while LeVander a lot ofsage. So between the law, the
low yield, the aromas from thegariga, and the expression of the grenache
itself, because the grenache is theking bar it all there and the way
of work. With a neutural alcohol, you can respect the full elements of
(49:44):
what is making the terror. Thistur can be completely different. In Baluus,
you see just facing the yeah banuesfacing the sea with great shists,
not black, so completely different.In terms of expression of soil, let's
conser tuation a little, if Ican say it, a little bit more
(50:05):
feminine, very delicate, very saltintern of expression, obstructure, and for
sure the sea, the sea withseaweed expression, with fresh air coming from
the sea, with saltiness. Sothis can be incredible, you know,
And for sure it's always it's alwaysthe same idea. We can do always
(50:30):
some specific details according the production ofven donaturine roco, according the gravariety,
use according the way of work,because for sure you can you when I
told you that we are doing likein a dry one and one moment,
we are stopping the arcaliformentation. Itdepends what you are doing before to stop
(50:50):
the lcal iiflementation. If you're doinga gery pressing, for example for a
white wine or just skin melceerration orjust a motification on the solid phase.
It's changing, always a style.So imagine you can have differences thanks to
the tailor. You can have differencesthanks to the gravities, you can have
(51:13):
differences thanks to the venification, thanksto the way of aging. And this
way of aging is making at leastfifty percent of the quality of the wine.
You know. Eric, you've givenus such a great explanation on all
the wines of Rusalan, especially theVan du Natural, which we're really eye
opening to us. It's fascinating andwe encourage everybody to consider visiting Rousson and
(51:39):
looking for the wines in their retailstores or on restaurant menus their great discovery.
Again, we've been speaking with EricArasil, who is with von de
Russlan, and if you would loveto learn more about this region and the
wines, you can visit Rousillon WineDot. It's a great site, very
(52:01):
good with information. Eric. Thankyou for joining us on the Connected Table.
My pleasure. Thank you very muchfor to invite me. And this
is another edition of the Connected Table. We hope you enjoyed it. We
hope you will follow us as wecontinue to travel and share our discoveries with
you, our listeners. You canfind us on Instagram at the Connected Table.
(52:21):
Check out all our shows on morethan thirty five podcasts, including streamed
at the connective table dot com andalways. Our message is stay in,
say you'll be curious. Thank you,
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(00:22):
W FOURCY Radio. Welcome to theConnected Table Live. We're your hosts,
(00:44):
Melanie Young and David Ransom. You'reinsatiably curious culinary couple. We bring you
the fascinating people we meet around theworld who lead the industry in wine,
spirits, food and hospitality. Weenjoy sharing their stories with you and inspiration
from the people we meet and thedestinations we visit, and we're doing that
(01:07):
today with a very special edition ofThe Connected Table. Right David, absolutely,
Melanie. Recently we had the greatpleasure of going on our first actually
wine tour of Langadoc Russion in southwestFrance, which is a very big area
and region. We're familiar with thewines, but we never had the chance
(01:30):
to really deep dive in. Whatwere your impressions, David Well, I
thought it was a fascinating region,again, a region we've known from Afar
but had never actually been to experienceit firsthand. And I was pretty fascinated
with pretty much everything I saw.It's a beautiful region geographically, and the
wines are not only some of thebest I think in France, but they're
(01:51):
really coming along in popularity as wellthese days, which is really nice to
see. And as we said,the region is called Langadoc Rusion, but
they're very separate and distinct. Andtoday we are going to spotlight Russillon,
which is the more southerly and smallerof the two regions, located just north
of the Spanish border in the departmentof the Pyrenees Oriental in fact that it
(02:15):
borders the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean coastto the south, and then there are
these three rivers that run through thearea, the tech Agli and the tech
and some mountains to the north wherethere is Langadoc, and there's some really
important cities there as well, Perpignonin Montpelier. It's rich in history,
and we are so honored to havesomeone who's an expert and native to Russion
(02:38):
join us today. His name isEric Arazil. He's born into a wine
growing family and a small village justin the heart of the Aspray region.
The name Ariso. We learned hisCatalan, and I was surprised that the
Catalan influenced in this area, veryclose to Spain and therefore Catalina. Yeah,
so we'll talk about that as well. So Eric grew up in the
(03:01):
area and studied analogy and became aconsulting anologist at the four K Laboratory for
several years and then advanced. Hiscurrent position now is an export director and
he's with the basically Von der Russalan, which is what it's called in short
(03:22):
as the co director of the organizationthat hosted our trip, and it's called
the civ Or Conseil Interprofessional de vonde Russalon. So he's co director and
export manager and he's been there forlike twenty years or something. So he
lets some fascinating masterclasses that we're goingto discuss and just kind of give all
of you our listeners a kind ofa great spotlight on Russlan and why you
(03:45):
should be looking at these wines andvisiting this region Benvenu, Eric, Hello,
how are you all? Oh,we're very good. We enjoyed meeting
you. Yeah, I'm really happyto be with you. So I think
you describe already a lot who Iam and what I am doing and uh
and where is So this area isa fascinating place for for the wine,
(04:13):
for sure, and uh and foreverything Okay, because it's full of story,
a wonderful culture. You talking aboutthe Catalan position. Uh. For
sure. Gerpina is one of themain city for the north Catalonia. Okay.
Is a is a brother or sistercity of Barcelona, which is just
(04:33):
in the southern Spain. So inoon we have a we have a wonderful
expression of everything, our culture.It's really deep and we can we can
see it for everything just looking ataround you. We can have we can
have some wonderful monuments, we canhave some wonderful expression. Just less lessening
(05:00):
the people talking because we are talkingCatalan here for a quite big part of
the people. And for sure weare French, so we are sharing Catalan
and French culture in the same time. I'm curious you grew up in a
wine making family and Catalan heritage wasFrench was like a bit is the food.
(05:26):
What influences are French water in Catalanin the in the food and growing
up. Can you give some examples, Yeah, for sure. In fact,
just to keep in mind, wewere several times invited here in Oco.
So the people from Spain arrived duringthe Eye Middle Age and the people
(05:46):
from Friends arrive around the seventeenth century. So we got several influences, especially
in the in the cooking, forexample, coming from Spain, we have
some classic one okay with rice orjust with no all. We have also
some specific influences from Friends, forexample with with the butter, the butter
(06:12):
cooking because here the habit is tocook with olive oil. A lot of
different recipes okay, and nowadays wehave we have a big mix between Italian
influences and Spanish influences Catalan for sure, because this is we all Catalan cooking
and French influences. In terms ofCatalan cooking, for example, I will
(06:36):
give you some name, some specialname of some recipes like balls the piccolads.
I know that you are completely awareof the possibility to find some wonderful
meat balls everywhere in the world,but he in Rossio we have these ballers
balls the pecul at, which arecooked during all the year, and they
(07:00):
for example some good meat, goodmixed meat between veal, beef and pork,
and we are we are putting alittle bit of salt, a little
bit of pepper, a little bitof garlic. Because of garlic, it's
like the olive oil, one ofthe main ingredients in the in the cattle
and kitchen. And after that weare fried them and we can do a
(07:26):
special accommodation with that. The traditionis to use some mushrooms like porcini mushrooms,
and to have also just a littlesauce made between gaelic and as the
time, onions, a little bitof tomento, and everything is completely reduced.
We are adding a main ingredient orso which is coming from our vines,
(07:49):
which is called rancio sec I don'tknow if you remember that. You
taste it with me, some dryranteo and rosion and the dry rancho.
It's very very good ingredient for thekitchen. It can give a little bit
of kind of ran sea, ifI can say ran seats tie for for
(08:13):
the for the recipe, and thissauce is already used for example with some
beans, white beans, or withsome stew like a little bit of potatoes,
a little bit of carol. Sodepending the period of the season,
for example, in the in thespring, we can have some potatoes and
(08:33):
new potatoes coming from ocean for sure, and some carrots. And in the
autun for example, you can havesome white beans. So this is a
wonderful recipe. And we have severalrecipes which are mixing in the classic way
of products from the sea and productsfrom the ground. For example, in
(08:56):
France you can do a wonderful chicken, roasty chicken. In Catalonia we are
doing a chicken with prams, okay, with a special sauce another time,
and with a special lion for thesauce. We have a special lion which
is called Peakada. I don't knowif you're aware on that, but piicad
is something another time amazing, basedon something always a little bit rancid.
(09:22):
We are using some bread, someold bread, if I can say all
bread. We fried it in oliveoil, and we are doing exactly the
same with garlic, and we arecrushing everything together and we can add for
example, if you want the nameof this link, it's called pitakada.
(09:43):
And this pikada can be used fora white sauce. For example, we
just almond. We adding some almondpowder fresh almond, completely crush it,
mix it with this special or pecada. Otherwise, if you want to do,
(10:03):
for example, stew with a witha brown sauce for example, with
wine, you can add just inthe past it was cocoa beans and nowadays
it's black chocolate and even bitter chocolate. So we have some specialities in Oceo
which are really incredible. So withthese lambagambas chicken with prawns, it's really
(10:31):
a mix between the eye detached ofthe prawns and and the crispiness in fact
of the skin of the chicken.And it's really really full of flavors and
really tasty. And for sure alwayswines to accommodate with entwo pere with with
(10:52):
the food, cattle and foods makingme hungry. Crazy, Yeah, it's
crazy, crazy way. And whatis really crazy is you can change your
plate every day. We have alwaysa lot of colors. We are playing
a lot with the vegetables also andwith fruits also because in terms of a
(11:16):
bit and the tradition, we aredoing a lot of sweet and sol recipes
and sweet and salt recipes, sousing some fruit or spices more or less
in the same idea as you canfind in naseia. So besides making us
hungry, it makes us curious tolearn more and come back and visit.
(11:41):
Eric. You mentioned a word thatwe were going to dive into a little
later, but I thought maybe sinceyou brought it up, I want to
kind of go into it. It'swe're going to get in a little.
You mentioned the word rancio, whichI think warrants some explanation when you're discussing
the food because it can mean somethingelse in English rancia as a term.
(12:03):
I'd like you to explain it inthe term for wine making and food,
because it means something else in English. Yeah, for me, the problem
the translation, it's always a problembecause rancid is not really the right feelings
that you can have with a dryrantio, even with a sweet branchio.
For myself, the rancio expression,it's mainly the expression of I would say,
(12:31):
we have a wide range of aromas. It can start with something like
a very rancid better with a kindof freshness which is nearly like a minty
freshness. Sorry, and we canhave at the end of your your evente
(12:52):
we can have some very dry expressionof franchio, very strong expression like something
quite naughty. And we have alsosome wonderful space in us like coming like
specific. I can't remember now theEnglish world for that, but it's Finni
(13:15):
Greek in French, yeah exactly.Yeah, So with a rantio we can
have some special discovery because in fact, in the past the driver ranchio was
just dedicated for the kitchen because everyonewas not not a shame. But we
(13:37):
add the bit to to to putout aside the style of wine just to
have an a primative, just tohave a drink as a privative, otherwise
just to use in the cooking.And nowadays a lot of somebody years all
over the world are looking for thestyle of wine because they are ones which
are some wonderful partners to pair witha special food. For example, we
(14:03):
were talking about mushroom just previously.If you have travels or if you have
chantera, even some porcini, youwill be completely happy with with with a
pairing. If you have in anotherway some charcutary and mainly quite old sharcutary,
quite uh edgit sharcutary, it wouldbe wonderful because the fatness of the
(14:28):
old charcutary will give you a wonderfulanswer to the to the wrongness and to
the very soft expression of the rancidstyle. And after that the spiciness of
the rancio would give a wonderful answerto the saltiness. For example, if
you have a piece of ham,salty ham, it would be good.
(14:50):
But in another way, if youhave a salty for example, anchovis okay,
which is traditional from here, fromColliure and uh basin as that is
a pig from Koreoona. So saltiaand chubies give you a little touch of
nutty expression, and the iriodine expressionwill give a wonderful answer to the expression
(15:13):
of the of umami from the ranciostyle. So we can have something amazing
with or dry rancia. Well,you know, thank you for explaining it,
because that's a great gateway into talkingabout the wines, because it was
an expression that was fairly new.I know. To me, what about
you, David, I'd heard aboutyou before but never from this region exactly.
(15:35):
But it's very specific here absolutely,So a couple of things. Let's
step back a minute and talk aboutRussillon, the region and it's unique geography
that creates these microclimates. As wesaid, it's the smaller of the regions
of longer like Russalon, and there'sa specific it's got very specific geography and
(15:56):
AOPs and of course we'll get intothe dry wines and then the bunder natural
show us plan that I think,but I think that it's really important to
insist on that acre area. It'sa very small amphitheater open to the military
and sea. It's a montaneous amphysiat, so we can say that the Vignyads
(16:18):
is really nealed directly in this amphitheatre, and the Vignyod is between zero up
to roughly seven hundred eight hundred metersso figh. And everything is on slopes,
mainly eighty percent of the Vigneyod it'son slopes. And because we are
like you describe previously different valley,because we have three different rivers, because
(16:40):
we have those mountains, we havean incredible region with for sure an expression
of the military and climate, butwith several different expressions of this military and
climate. So we have an incrediblepatchwork of tarhwar, of micro terroor and
myself terho expression is something amazing inOzio because we have different soils, perhaps
(17:06):
one of the best expressions of thediversities that you can find in terms of
phagronomy for the soil and subsoil inthe world. Okay, we have also
the possibility to play it with adifferent altitude, the possibility to play with
the different exposures, playing for surewith also the environment. Because if we
(17:29):
need to insist on that, Russianarea is one one of the more important
vineyard which is situated between the mountainand the sea. Okay. And the
same time, for example, ifyou want to go to have a bus
end of March beginning of April,you can do it and after one hour
(17:53):
you can go to ski if youwant, so it's not a problem.
So this is a kind of paradise. It's Russio. It's really interesting nowadays
for a lot of Fernus, alot of newcomers in terms of vineyard because
we have we have this unique unicityand and something amazing in terms of possibility
(18:15):
to do for terwars and for diversityof wines. And for sure you were
talking about ven Do natural FORTI fivesweet wines, but we have also someone
for dry ones and something also completelyincredible. I think, I believe completely
(18:36):
sure that we that we are oneone of the unique plays in France to
have the possibility to revendicate all thevineyards in our p So the top of
quality is not really the case nowadaysin Ozon, because we are doing according
to the demand. We are doingalso some p g I. Okay,
(18:59):
we have people a lot of pidoor roughly seventy percent of pideo and the
rest is PGI just to answer tothe demand, for example, for one
single variety, one special thing,one special vinification. So you need to
keep in mind that Rossio it's anamazing place to make a wide range of
wine and always a wine for thepleasure, okay, because for me ros
(19:26):
between dry and fortify sweet wines,we have something incredible in terms of drinkability,
in terms of balance. For sure, we talk it also about climate,
but the climate here is something verygood for the body, is something
very pleasant for the tourists, okay, but it's sometimes too warm and sometimes
(19:51):
to dry and in Rossio we areproducing wines which are completely unexpected. For
example, white wines we are developed. We are developing a lot the production
of white ones with some specific varietiesand what is in credible, it's always
(20:12):
the same thing using the old traditionalway of work, mixing this with new
technology for to have a maximum ofquality in the wines. And when we
have in mind that in Russian theproduction is one of the lowest that you
(20:32):
can find in the world. Becausewhen you started for the introduction, Melanie,
you said Langadog Chrossian region. Butif you are checking the langer Dog
production and the Russian production, wehave good complimentarities as you discover it by
yourself. But in terms of yield, the total average yield for Roussier production
(20:55):
is less sensative, little character.So it's nothing, okay. And it's
in terms of quality is putting reallyon the top the energy of Uzio.
So that's interesting. You know,I have a question for you. You
reference to the whine, we'd liketo start on the dry whites. I
think for our losteners it'll be interestingto deep dive into. You know,
(21:18):
there's fifteen aopis. This is fromthe Vanderusalem site by the way, and
twenty four grape alreadis what are thestandout grape alreadys Starting with white wines that
our listeners would be thinking about lookingfor when they go to retailers and styles.
Yeah, in style for white wines. In fact, we have traditional
gravieties. We are using gravieties whichare really clean in terms of aromas or
(21:45):
really fresh in terms of aromas.Also because sometimes we don't have to mini
acidity and thanks to the tea andthanks to the technology and the way of
work, we are able to pushthe freshness of the white, you know,
so the freshness can come come fromthe soil, sometimes from the altitude
(22:07):
and from the berries. And interms of varieturs we are we are using
traditional one which is macabello okay,which is called also boha in Spain.
We are using more and more becausethis is a dominant gray variety in granacher
okay ranash white and gnashy gray withthe granasher gray is something amazing because we
(22:30):
have a good rural expression. Wehave a good anicid flavors which is coming
a classic way for the granache.But because it's a pink Grenacher gray pink.
You can understand that we have structureand we have minerality also, and
it's a kind of power again,minerality and also a citruc miniverity and the
(22:53):
good freshness things to that, andthe one with structure that means you can
you can bring them very quickly andthey are very pleasant like this, or
you can lay down with our problemand this. For that I said,
they are sometimes unexpected because everybody isthe world in the world's talking about Chardonnay
or Sauvignian blam or even Vonia.Okay, but when we are talking about
(23:18):
gnash, for example, you canbe completely surprised, okay. So for
ocon what is really important. Alsowe're talking about a wide range of wine,
different colors, different aging, andyou need to remember that we can
play really with the versatility of ourold grapes, especially all grapes coming from
(23:45):
old vines. Because you need tokeep in mind also that the vineyard in
Oco, it's at least fifty percentof the vineyard with at least fifteen years
old, okay, from fifteen yearsold to I would say more n eighty
years old for the vine. Soyou can expect some quintessence. And really
(24:06):
when you have low yield, youcan put on the top each element of
the terror, each element of thegray varieties, each element of the benification.
And when I talk about technology forthe vinification, I'm not sure that
people can understand it. But themain improve movement that we got here in
(24:26):
Roussillon was a cooling machine. Andin fact we were doing some wonderful ones
in a long time ago. Butnowadays we are able to make the best
and to keep them with our program. And this is really important. And
when I was talking about versatility,you need to understand, for example,
(24:48):
that all the family of the grenache, white gray and even black green ache
or hat an afflut able to beproduced also as a fortified sweet one.
So sorry for that, I forgotto to to introduce very quickly, or
is up to you if you want, I can introduce it right now.
(25:10):
What is a venda because is somethingquite unique. Well, we did want
to. We just wanted to justquickly touch on the dry whites first and
then any dry reds and then wewere going to segue they do natural so
we because we taste it. Becausewe did two seminars and one was one
was on the dry wines and andand the various microclimates, and we taste
(25:33):
it, and we have we'll haveour notes in front of us, and
we taste some interesting the white youknow, Macabeo, which shows the Catalan
influenced. There's Grenache blanc, asyou said, Grenache gree. There was
also Vermentino, which is role inthe south. And some were saying one
of the wines also had a Sauvignonblanc in it. The I can't see
the notes from here, it wasa coke Catalon blanc. Yeah, this
(25:55):
is not so usual to find some, so nowadays it would be much more
usual to find some Carnyan blam okayor Carnyan gree. Uh. This is
more unique, you know, thanthe Sovinian blam. And by itself,
for example, Carnyan blam or Karyangree brings to the wine a wonderful acidity,
(26:19):
a natural acidity. And in thepast it was put on the side
because it was too acidic, butnowadays important, especially according to the global
warming, and for sure because ofglobal warming, for example, the production
of Servilian blam, which is nottraditional and as the time here is so
(26:41):
difficult because we have a lag ofacidity in fact at the end, So
just talking talking about the break thebreakdown of a different style of wines in
dry wines. So you need tokeep in mind that in the past we
were producing a lot of red winesin still dry wines. Nowadays we can
(27:04):
have we can share in two pieces, one piece for the PGI, one
piece for the video, for thePDEO. We're still going on with a
with a good production, a goodquantity uh raughly seventy percent of red wine.
We have ra of rose wine andthe rest is white. But for
(27:27):
the PGI we have something which iscompletely in the opposition because nowadays we are
increasing a lot of production because ofdemand for white wines abroad may need.
So we have roughly twenty five tothirty percent of white wine in PGI.
We have roughly exactly the same inrose wine rose wine which are nearly with
(27:52):
a full quantity consumed here. Thereis not a lot of exportation for rose
wine from Zo and the rest PGIis red, so that means less than
forty percent of the production of PGIis red. Keep in mind also something
very important talking about red and whitein Rossion First of all, the name
(28:14):
of Rossion is coming from the browncolor who in frames Okay, because we
have a lot of oxidized iron inthe in the in the several types of
soil, we have oxidize iron,and to produce white wine. Sometimes it's
too difficult because, for example,we can have some oxidized iron which which
(28:37):
can go through the skin of theof the berries, so difficult to make
a red nification avoiding this color.And on the other side, the production
of red wine when you have oxidizediron could be very pleasant because we insist
thanks to the aron, to thecolor of the black red violet teens.
(29:03):
So we need to keep in mindeverything about this plaus is. I'm curious
what causes that oxidized soil, thatred soil. Yeah, And when the
people arrive from the news of Friends, even from Langadog, when you arrive
from Langado, when you pass throughthe Cobia Mountain, you arrive and the
(29:26):
first solo that you are discovering hereis red. It's a red clay with
a lot of oxidized iron. Soit's for that people is calling Roussion.
And remember also something or perhaps Ican give you an information that is quite
important for me. The first implantationof wine in Roussion was done during the
(29:48):
seventh century before Christmas, and itwas done by the Greeks Correngian. And
when the Corinthians arrived arrived here inRoussion, they were looking for salt,
and in fact they found salt,but also iron, okay, and they
planted vineyard until the Eye Plateau nextto the biggest mountain of the Cannibo,
(30:15):
and one of the vineyards planted bythe Greek people was nearly around one thousand
and two hundred meters of ie.So this is really special when you are
thinking about that, you know,because iron pushed a lot of people to
climb to the mountain and to goto restract the iron itself to make some
(30:41):
weapons and one thing another time perhapsinteresting for you you I don't know.
I also during the Middle Age,for example, we were very famous thanks
to the wines, thanks to thethen do natural forty five sweet ones.
It was a wonderful money to changewith the other the land. And the
(31:02):
second money which was used was theweapons, okay, and the weapons,
the Catialan weapons. The Catalan walkfor the iron was known all over the
Miditerrant Sea. So important to toto to link always the iron, the
(31:22):
wine and the and the and theculture of the Rosian area. Thank you
so much for that explanation. Ithink it's important because it is such a
distinguishing factor. Let's do talk aboutthe Van Door natural which is the other
masterclass, and I think it's importantwe learned you know, this region Rusalem.
The vendors are like the gems andit's like they represent eighty percent of
(31:47):
sweet wine production of France and sixtypercent worldwide. Thank you vander Rusalean and
Eric, so big topic and fascinatingrange. Yeah, this is this is
incredible in fact, when you whenyou have in the memory that the fortification
was born here in Rossion thanks toa guy who was called Arnald the Villanova.
(32:08):
He was during the Middle Age,during the thirteenth century, the end
of the thirteenth century. And thisman was a very book, very big
doctor. He was a private doctorof the king of Majorca, because at
that time we were under the Kingdomof Majorca, and it was more or
(32:29):
less I'm pretty sure that everyone isaware of who was Leonardo Vinci. Okay,
and Leonardo Vinci did more or lessthe same things, and another Villanova
made also. That means it wasa doctor. He did a lot to
(32:49):
improve the medicine all over. Friends. It was the first one in Europe
to write some books of getetic andsome book of gastronomy, praying between food
and wine another time, if Ican insist on that, Sorry for that,
but I'm very proud of my region, you know, and I can
insist on that. You need tounderstand that our region was really with a
(33:17):
big culture for the cuisine and forthe moment of the tasting. At that
moment, it was normal to itwith some spoon and some knife and some
food, with a plate and withglasses in front of us to drink the
wine. Keep in mind that whenwe became French during the seventeenth century,
(33:42):
when the King of Friends came here, it was completely surprised to see that,
because at that period in France itwas always the abbey to it with
the end and with the bread,taking the food directly by hand, and
just drinking wind or water in ain a special in a special I don't
(34:06):
know the word of that. Sorry, Like it was a glass, it
was used as a glass, butit wasn't at that moment glass. Okay,
so this is important to keep it. So coming back on a villanova
who received his wonderful know how inknowledges from a guy who was also very
(34:27):
important in the North Africa. Hewas an Arabic guy and that guy gave
to another bit of another the alembic. So another bit of another was the
first one in Occiden to use thealembic to create for sure distillation, to
use the distillate as a medicine.And he has the idea, yes,
(34:52):
he had, sorry the idea toto mix this distillate with amrsty infermin dition,
and so he created the fortification andby the fortification for sure the wines
were was also a wonderful medicine,but also something very stable to able to
(35:14):
to to be transported with our problem. Okay, So nowadays, just to
summarize very quickly, what is aven donatural? Ven donatur really is a
wine made with traditional way by italls from grandache, white gray black from
(35:35):
macabur, from maldazil, roon,from muskat small vein or musical lexander.
So he has a traditional gray whereit is used for ven donatually, and
ven donatually is immersed that we aredoing like in a classic way to do
a dry wine. But at onemoment you need to stop the lcoholic fermentation.
(35:57):
So this is important to in mind. Always ALCOHOLI fementation, always a
production of alcohol by the fermentation itself. And when you need to stop it,
you add alcohol, a pure andneutral alcohol coming nowadays from vinix origin,
(36:19):
and you kill the YaST and youkeep a part of the natural sugar
without fementing. So like that wecan balance with our problem because we have
nowadays eight centre of know how withthis technique, so we can balance with
our problem the sugar, the resultsugar, the alcohol produced and added,
(36:40):
and the balance between acidity and structure. So ven Donatural nowadays is a wonderful
range of non oxidized wine and oxidizedwine. So when I say non oxidized,
everybody can understand that we are keepingreally the yends of the wine in
(37:04):
a bottle. That means when you'reopening a bottle, if you put a
white, rosy or red wine,it would be completely white, rosy or
red with all the main characteristic ofa white, rosy or red plus for
sure always your sugar, which ishelp a lot for the balance and which
(37:24):
is like, is not a sweetwine? Sorry to say that, but
the question of sweet wine for mesometimes is used in a bad way.
For me, it's a vendoorm naturallyis a real wine. For sure,
we have a kind of sweetness,but it's not just sweetness. We have
a lot of wonderful feeling, alot of wonderful balance, and is still
(37:46):
a wine. So you can useit as a real wine from the primitive
to during a meal, after themeal, just reading a wonderful book,
or just taking a sip to recoveryour health, or I don't know what.
So it's the wines ven do naturallyare amazing. So keep in mind
(38:07):
we have the non oxidized style andon the other side we have the traditional
wine which are completely with oxidation.So remember what I said previously. Another
millainother was during the Middle Aage andwe talked about money to a change,
and the ven doornaturally was a wonderfulmoney for those changes. And at that
(38:31):
moment it was forbidden for us togo through the Caribbean mountains, so the
unique way was to go through theseas themeterrant sea by boat and people discover
it. The management of the oxidationat that moment, because the barrows or
the corners which were inside the boatand the barrows or the conners which were
(38:58):
on the top of the of theboat were completely different at the air level.
On the top it was with akind of oxidation with for example,
from a young black fruit, itbecame something a little bit jemmy in something
expressing some terreflection notes, some cocoabeans, some coffee beans, some roasted
(39:23):
expressions, special spices, and soon and so on. So keep in
mind also that the oxidation is anillness, and we are managing since already
eight cent years ago and nowadays theven donaturial with oxidation are in one side
amber style, so they are mainlycoming from white origin. And on the
(39:46):
other side we can have threely tawnyred colored wines which are coming mainly from
red origin. And to get theoxidation we have some big, big ways
to do. We can we canuse for example, some classic concrete tank,
we can use some wooden continess,We can use different sides of conness.
(40:12):
We can make the oxidation inside thecellars or adds the cellars, uh
something a little bit more incredible whenwe are outside. For example, we
can use some sumigen glass glass contness. Uh and here sorry to say that,
but here sometimes we are we havea mix uh in the in the
(40:35):
sentence because people understand that this oxidationoutside with sumigen, but in fact is
mainly a destriction of the wine thanan oxidation, because we don't have any
change with the with the oxygen ofthe air. We have just a destriction
by the photon of the light andthe changement of temperatures. So the color
(40:58):
is going down. The arabs arecompletely changing. And for sure, like
all the way of edging and maturation, because I'm talking about maturation much more
sometimes than edging. The way ofmaturation are really different, and each one
is bringing something to the vendor notto reluxidized. And it's not abuse that
(41:24):
we can find for example just asingle QB made with a bombard there,
or single qv made with just borroweror just a concrete tank. So sometimes
we have a big mix to makethe main expression and the more beautiful expression
of the vintage. Because when weare talking about oxidized wine, sometimes we
(41:50):
are talking about all vintages and weare lucky in once on because for example,
we can go down until the eighteenseventy year, always available for cells
in some cellars. Otherwise, wehave also the traditional way to make some
blend between different vintages. And forsure we can have some very very old
(42:14):
wines. Nowadays, if I cansummarize in just one sentence, we have
non oxidized wines which are really pleasantI would say new consumers or people who
love the freshness and the direct pleasure. And on the other side we have
(42:35):
wines which are much more for conaicurcewith oxidative style. Uh, and where
you will find always something amazing.They are wines I would say, against
the analogy, and they are reallymagic wines. So do not hesitate to
to try those wines because they havethe expression of a full culture, wonderful
(43:00):
story. And remember that a centuryof know how is the style of wine.
So I think, uh, it'scompulsory for me to go home with
uh with this production because nowadays,unfortunately the sweet wine in the world are
quite difficult to sell. But thosewine as a place for all the table
(43:25):
for all the people we love wine. Yeah, Melanie, I found the
van of natural is fascinating because there'sso many there's so many different ways to
make it, and there's also somany different styles of it. Yeah,
that that there's a there's a hugebreadth of diversity in the wines. And
I thought that was really interesting.And I want to point out that,
(43:47):
you know, Eric, you've beentalking about the fact that it's a fortified
wine, but it's very different fromport because it's actually the fortification happens while
the wine is still fermenting to stopthe fermentation, and it's not added after
the fermentation. And so that's athat's a take huge different in the fact
that what's been the natural apartment.Yeah, it happens during I fermentation.
(44:07):
Yeah, it's happen during implementation forboth of them port and and and then
do naturel But one thing important,the port was creating during the eighteenth century.
Okay, that means five century afterthe the creation of the fortification in
os On. After that, keepin mind that we have different laws for
(44:29):
sure for the production in the worldwe have more or less the same aim.
But in the reality, when youhave a look in the details,
we have a different level for thecomplusory motivity, for the barriers for the
crop. Okay, we have differentalcohol use because for examp for Port it's
(44:49):
your real spirit seventy LBV seventy percentLBV, and for r area then do
natureal. It's a pure and ucturalalcohol from vinic origin, and for sure
because it's ninety six percent eight andall just e anol. The four percent
on the side is just water.The quantity of alcohol added for the donut
(45:12):
real is a very small amount,between five to ten percent of the of
the volume of the mast that youare walking on, and for the Port
it it could be more much morethan that. Another big difference for me,
it's an LBV final BV for Portthat is higher than the LBV for
(45:35):
then not your average. For thedonatural it's a sixteen sixteen point five person
volume, and for Port is atleast twenty one, okay, twenty two.
So this is another world for me, and another thing very important.
When you are using neutral alcohol,we have a marriage which is made immediately
(45:59):
after one. If you want tohave a drink directly on the tank just
produced, you can do it forthe naturally, but you need to wait
a little bit because the spirit asfor sure a part of our cohore,
but also nonalcohol, and it needsto wait a little bit. That we
have step by step kind of fusion, you know, but for sure keep
(46:23):
in mind at the end them isthe same and at the end the profile
would be very close one to one, you know. You know I'd like
to do is explain some of thedifferent styles because we tasted them and so
(46:43):
that again our listeners can seek themout, whether they're dining out or some
ways can pick them out. Thevery specific styles starting with more. Yeah,
yeah, we have we have specificstyles. So you're talking about one
specific appilation, MARIU just perhaps veryquickly to to to to say the name,
(47:06):
to describe the name of each appilationthat you can find in Rosso they
are just a pideo. So thebiggest production of musk fortified musica in the
world is called Musica Rivesalt is producingRossio and made just with muscat gray varieties.
It's a white origin without oxidation.Normally. After that we have Result,
(47:29):
which is a very typical appellation,also quite important also in different way,
so mainly in red without ocidation,just a few in rose, and
we have a lot in number styleand and a little bit less in trily
origin for Mari. Mari is avery small appellation dedicated only to the to
(47:52):
the to the village of the Marieand Marie U has more less the same
ideas than the reversult. But wefind red which is called groner. We
find white without oxidation also, andwe have amber and trially okay. And
(48:14):
to finish for the different appellation wehave banues and banes, gangrue so and
gangree as the one of the biggestpossibility to produce so in white rosy red
without oxidation and amber and trially withoxidation. And one thing about just to
(48:35):
come back on what you said previously, so when you have a look on
the on the production of those fortyfive sweet ones, those ben do naturally
for sure. The great varieties areexactly the same. The way of nification
is exactly the same for the worldhere. But what is changing a lot
(48:57):
is the terror. For example,when you are talking Mari, it's a
black schist Okay is next to theCarbia Mountain, on the south face of
the Carbia Mountain, and it's reallywith a very big wideness in terms of
environment with the Gariga which is mainlybay bay trees, mainly juniper trees a
(49:21):
lot of while LeVander a lot ofsage. So between the law, the
low yield, the aromas from thegariga, and the expression of the grenache
itself, because the grenache is theking bar it all there and the way
of work. With a neutural alcohol, you can respect the full elements of
(49:44):
what is making the terror. Thistur can be completely different. In Baluus,
you see just facing the yeah banuesfacing the sea with great shists,
not black, so completely different.In terms of expression of soil, let's
conser tuation a little, if Ican say it, a little bit more
(50:05):
feminine, very delicate, very saltintern of expression, obstructure, and for
sure the sea, the sea withseaweed expression, with fresh air coming from
the sea, with saltiness. Sothis can be incredible, you know,
And for sure it's always it's alwaysthe same idea. We can do always
(50:30):
some specific details according the production ofven donaturine roco, according the gravariety,
use according the way of work,because for sure you can you when I
told you that we are doing likein a dry one and one moment,
we are stopping the arcaliformentation. Itdepends what you are doing before to stop
(50:50):
the lcal iiflementation. If you're doinga gery pressing, for example for a
white wine or just skin melceerration orjust a motification on the solid phase.
It's changing, always a style.So imagine you can have differences thanks to
the tailor. You can have differencesthanks to the gravities, you can have
(51:13):
differences thanks to the venification, thanksto the way of aging. And this
way of aging is making at leastfifty percent of the quality of the wine.
You know. Eric, you've givenus such a great explanation on all
the wines of Rusalan, especially theVan du Natural, which we're really eye
opening to us. It's fascinating andwe encourage everybody to consider visiting Rousson and
(51:39):
looking for the wines in their retailstores or on restaurant menus their great discovery.
Again, we've been speaking with EricArasil, who is with von de
Russlan, and if you would loveto learn more about this region and the
wines, you can visit Rousillon WineDot. It's a great site, very
(52:01):
good with information. Eric. Thankyou for joining us on the Connected Table.
My pleasure. Thank you very muchfor to invite me. And this
is another edition of the Connected Table. We hope you enjoyed it. We
hope you will follow us as wecontinue to travel and share our discoveries with
you, our listeners. You canfind us on Instagram at the Connected Table.
(52:21):
Check out all our shows on morethan thirty five podcasts, including streamed
at the connective table dot com andalways. Our message is stay in,
say you'll be curious. Thank you,
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