On Monday morning the week began with checking in to the office at 8 am and using the CIVB system as I'd been trained to the week before. With the tutorial that I'd had on Friday I found the work much less arduous and it was also nice to have dodged another 5 am "lavage" start. Working on the computer the time passed quickly and I was looking forward to a dinner/tasting that night that Buba had invited me to at his house located just beside Thierry's, a day earlier. Buba is in charge of the vineyard work and helps coordinate all of the vineyard workers with Nathanael. He doesn't speak much english but with my broken french we manage to understand each other and seem to get along well. Buba's an interesting character - he just finished competing in a 6 day long run, taking 4'th place out of 80 participants. He'll also kill you if you forget to take your shoes off before entering his house. During my last dinner with Thierry I tried to explain about how I love to cook and am interesting in picking up some french techniques while I'm here, and Thierry let me know that Buba was an excellent "cuisiniere" so I was eager to see for myself and perhaps learn something.
After a short drive in the humble Peugeot I found myself at Buba's doorstep, and carefully removed my shoes before entering said sacred domicile, finding Buba busy cooking up a storm inside. The first surprise of the night was that the tasting was to be single blind, meaning that I'd know the list of wines that I'd be tasting but I would have to try to figure out which was which. I helped to prepare the tasting while Buba was occupied in the kitchen. The second surprise came when some of the other guests arrived and I was very pleased to meet a woman with a tattoo of a horse on her shoulder and a tall, athletic looking man who turned out to be the proprietors of Domaine de Chevalier, located in Pessac Leognan. Thierry arrived shortly afterward and the evening was off to a great start with a glass of the 2'nd white of Domaine Chevalier from the 2001 vintage. Interesting stuff! I didn't know that Sauvignon Blanc / Semillon combo could taste like this! Truffle and lemon, with some seashells on the nose and very elegant and crisp on the palate - this reminded me of a Hugel riesling with some age on it. The first course was a peanut coated fish dish served with foie gras on top and courgette puree. I wouldn't have necessarily thought of this combo in particular but I'd be willing to put foie gras on top of just about anything, and it also was very well prepared. The next course was sliced cote de boef with a sauce made from shallots, which was quite good, along with some mash potatoes. Dessert was a small chocolate cake with a molten center, followed by a cheese course along with some Mumm Champagne. All in all it was a very enjoyable evening and I was very happy to have had the chance to meet the owners of Domaine de Chevalier.
Tuesday was "Bastille Day" and a celebration of the french revolution, so there was no work that day. In the early evening while I was writing to friends on the computer I could hear Midoux begin to excitedly spout off his english phrases that we'd been working on to some poor, unfortunate soul who happened to pull in to the chateau. Figuring that I should go and try to save this person from Midoux's frenglish-laced rampage I met a wonderful woman from Houston, Texas, who was interested in a tour of the chateau. Having an education in architecture she echoed my own amazement at the detail of the castle and made a number of great observations that had escaped me until that point. On the second floor we eventually came across a "trap door" in the middle of the wooden floor and I decided that, as a good tour guide, I should probably look like I have more than a passing familiarity with the place and upon opening the door discovered a wooden staircase leading down a small, dark room. Summoning the best of my courage I descended down into the blackened room, feeling for a light switch on my way down and rejoicing when the thing that my hand was grasping turned out to actually be one, as opposed to any number of creepy crawlies that may have been living there. The now-illuminated room was filled with a "melange" of old junk and a number of interesting looking antiques. Standing in the small room with Susan now having a look for herself I got to enjoy a full 15 seconds of being quite pleased with myself before I suddenly noticed something black dart across one corner of the room. Susan hadn't yet noticed and not sure about how she would react I posed to her as delicately as I could: "ahem, are you afraid of bats?" Luckily, the answer was no but we hurriedly made our way back up the wooden staircase just the same. The tour was concluded shortly after and hearing of Susan's interest in visiting some chateau in St. Emilion I invited her to come with me the next day on a tour at Troplong Mondot, and she accepted.
On Wednesday morning I was up at 8 am and after getting ready for my tour, met Susan in the courtyard at 9:10 am and then headed off to Troplong Mondot for 10:00 am. I brought my trusty book "The Wine Atlas" along since it has an exquisitely detailed map of St. Emilion with the location of most grand cru chateau. We drove along the winding hillside to the South-East of the town with Susan in the driver seat and me studying the map and successfully managed to get ourselves to the stunningly beautiful chateau just in time for our tour. Since Troplong Mondot is closed to the public I'd been coaching Susan the day before on how to look like she was critically assessing a wine with the routine of looking, swirling, sniffing, tasting, and spitting (while looking contemplative) that wine journalists seem to do as effortlessly as breathing - it was great fun. After circling the chateau and finally locating the door to the "bureau" we made our way inside and after announcing myself we were greeted a few minutes later by a rather standoffish lady who was not looking pleased to see us and let me know that although Sylvie had requested a technical tour, she was not technical, and that was that. We were briskly led through the office to the chai, observed the bottling line, and then to the cellar where the 08 vintage was being aged in mostly new oak barrels. The architecture of the chateau was a gorgeous marriage of the ancient with the ultra-modern, and it was a prime location to observe the surrounding hillside and town of St. Emilion. I asked a few questions, some of which our gracious host made no bones about letting me know that she thought I already knew the answer to, until it was time to taste the '04 Troplong Mondot. I was quite excited to taste the wine since, unlike our host, I was very impressed with it when I had a chance to taste the '08 vintage at the UGC tasting just a few weeks prior and the '05 vintage last year. Both times it came out near the top of the pile. The '04 we tasted didn't blow me away like the other two had, which was unsurprising given the relative strengths of the vintages, but it was still a very good (more traditionally styled) wine that could potentially be excellent with more time. Susan did wonderfully and could have easily been confused with british wine critic Jancis Robinson, only with far better teeth. Our chilly hostess warmed slightly during the ensuing conversation of vintages during our tasting but overall I was still unimpressed. Our visit ended shortly afterward and Susan let me in on an expression her mother used to use that would have worked quite well - "who licked the sugar off your candy?" Susan was great company so I decided to invite her to the rest of planned tastings in St. Emilion the next day.
On Thursday I was up and ready to go in much the same fashion as the day before, as on this day we had tastings at both Angelus and Figeac. First up was Angelus, and arriving a comfortable 10 minutes before the scheduled tour we had the opportunity to enjoy a stroll around the beautiful property, snapping pictures where we could. This time it was a group tour and so I was joined by a group of American tourists who seemed to have hired a high powered english woman as a tour guide. Lots of money judging from their recounting of recent, trophy-wine laden dinner parties, but I'm not sure how much wine sense. Unlike our host from the previous day, the lady guiding us through the property at Angelus couldn't have been friendlier or more welcoming, which was a nice switch. Evidently nobody had licked the sugar off of her candy just yet, and I was glad for it. At the conclusion of the tour we had the chance to meet the estate manager Hubert de Boüard, which was nice, and a taste of the '04 vintage which I found impressive.
Next was Figeac. I found it interesting that, counter to the overall trend in St. Emilion and the right bank region, the terroir of the property on which Figeac sits (neighboring Cheval Blanc) is actually better suited to Cabernet Sauvignon as opposed to Merlot. For this reason Figeac stands out as having a Cabernet dominated blend in an appellation of Merlot-based wine. For this tour we were again blessed with a very humble and down to earth guide who seemed thrilled to have us, which made for another very pleasant tour of the beautiful property. It was also quite interesting to learn that the biggest market for Figeac is actually Asia. This should have immediately prompted a question from me about whether they purposely tailor their wines so as not to throw a sediment as we do, but it just didn't occur to me at the time, sadly. With an almost identical format as the last two tours we observed the bottling process, the chai, the cellar, and at the end of the tour we had the opportunity to taste the '99 vintage. The '99 Figeac was a nice change from the tighter and more tannic and primary wines of the previous tours offering up (if memory serves) notes of incense, tobacco, damp earth, set in a background of red fruit.
Friday provided a break from the touring of the previous two days, not that I needed one. After the usual work of CIVB was finished I decided to head to downtown Bordeaux later that night to enjoy my weekly visit to the old converted church housing Cinema Utopia. This week it was Woody Allen's "Whatever Works" and I enjoyed a beer in the patio area outside the theater before heading in to see the film. Some of Woody Allen's films, I love (see: Annie Hall), and others not so much. I would have to place "Whatever Works" solidly in the former category though as I found myself really enjoying it throughout. Afterward (following some recommendations) I walked over to the Opera House area and inside Le Regent for a drink at the Orangerie. L'Orangerie is a very swanky, gorgeously decorated little bar that was practically empty. Scouring the wine list I located exactly what I was looking for - a glass of Sauternes. Listed simply as "Sauternes," I was convinced after tasting it that I'd had before from the '01 vintage from the fact that it needed far more air time than I could possibly give it, the 15 euro price tag, and sense memory. It was an experience and I'm glad to have had it.