I wonder if AI can recognise a Pommy, 'Moral Victory'?
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Try this one?
"Winemaker Maxime Chapoutier would be arrested if he tried to sell two of his newest wines in his native France."There would likely be outrage about these wines in France, and that would be a good thing," he says. "Sometimes you need to be provocative to drive change."
The two bottles in question, one white and one red, would be illegal in France because they are made from a blend of French and Australian base wines.
Under both French and European Union law it is forbidden to make a wine that combines EU and non-EU fruit. In France in particular, authorities take such things very seriously.
The French wine industry has a celebrated word called "terroir", which applies to all the environmental factors that effect vines growing in a vineyard, such the soil, the climate, and the elevation. As a result, wines from a specific place are held in the highest esteem.
Add a strict appellation or classification system for France's wine regions, and the thought of blending French and Australian wine to create a global hybrid would horrify many French wine lovers.
Yet Maxime has done just this, and it is all thanks to one word - Brexit."
Thanks, ND.
Helen and I did a few wine tours in France, about ten years ago and when we were outed as Aussies on any tour, it was made very clear to us (and everyone else on the tours) that all "Vin de France" has to be just that!
The term AOP comes to mind, but don't quote me on that.
Some of their famous Champers are somewhat over-rated, in my humble opinion.
............and at the risk of being banished to the 'Pronunciation' thread :
AUSTRALIA, it's NOT pronounced "Mo-ee"!
Was listening to the radio while driving today. They were talking about wine and the grape that it is made from. Seems it has been dryer than normal in a few of the wine making areas in the EU. This has as a knock on resulted in a lower grape harvest. Concerned that this may be ongoing due to climate change they have been scouring gardens looking for lost grape varieties
What was more interesting was the next part of the story. Seems that most European grape varieties were wiped out many years ago due to a disease that arrived from the USA
As a result they imported varieties of grape that were resistant to the disease and allowed new wines to be produced and older ones based on the previous grapes of course ceased to be made. What they made was similar but not the same
What they are looking for are rare survivors of the old grape varieties so they can see if they can grow in the dryer conditions that used to exist
So that rule about EU content when the grape varieties are imported …..
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There is a historic vineyard / winery in western Vic that never got phylloxera and experts used to come to see the vines in the original nursery block. AFAIK some of these varieties are still unidentified.
The public aren't permitted to walk around the nursery these days.
They had the only Pinot Meunier in Australia for decades. Meunier is a major ingredient in real champagne styles.
Apparently someone has worked out that they also have the oldest Pinot Noir vines in the world because they dodged phylloxera.
I know the family well and proudly designed and built the '1867' front gates and entrance some years ago.
DL
'Terroir' is one thing but 'vintage' is another.
Some of the famous French champagne houses used to sell 'non-vintage' bottles of the stuff at a fraction of the price of bottles with a year on the label. Dunno if they still do.
This meant they could blend across years to get the taste they were looking for.
Enjoyed many of them
Dunno if it's still made but Great Western 'champagne' as it was called was huge in Oz.
Made with the traditional 'method champagnoise' amazingly. which involved disgorging and recorking over a period of time, etc.
I met the Scottish woman whose job at Seppelts, in Great Western, was to co-ordinate transport and storage of special crates of all the bottles during the maturation period.This was around the time it could no longer be called 'champagne'.
The volume was so vast that some of it was warehoused as far away as Brisbane before coming back to Great Western for the final cork and labelling.
Used to be about $6 a bottle back in the day.
cheers, DL