Châteaux against Clos

Châteaux against Clos, aristocrates against Wine grower, Protestant rigour against catholic spirit … set those two prestigious French wine regions. It’s a nice scene of the Babette’s dinner, the « fairytale » of Karen Blixen. In the XIXth Century, a catholic cooker, escaping from Versailles, becomes a maid at two bishop’s daughters, in a Norvegian port. She won the lottery and prepares a french dinner for the sad lutherian community which is around the two sisters. And when an old man delivers the food arrived from France by boat, one of her takes a bottle and scared, asks : “What’s inside of this, Babette ? This isn’t wine, I hope ?” Babette answers with a smile : “wine, Madame, oh, no ! It’s a clos-vougeot 1846 ». Served on Cailles on sarcophage, it will make happy the assembly of crows, assembled at the table. The dinner frees deep down passions and erases long lived hatred. The Bourgogne at work. Is Bourgogne wine (Burgundy in English) a catholic wine ? Bordeaux a protestant one ? this idea was developed some years ago. Though the polemic is created, this published article received cold welcome in the world of owners of Bordeaux wine. It is a bit of a shame because the idea is nevertheless interesting. When you look back at History and images, you can’t help yourself noticing that the opposition exists. The two most prestigious french wine regions. Tiped over wines when they are very well made, on nourishing earth. Incomparable wine, we say. Those two long ignored themselves. Not the same customers, not the same markets. Not the same to name it. The generic name of a city for one, of a region for the other. Maybe because the harbour of Bordeaux played an important role in the development of this wine region, opening the access to British islands. Deep down in the centre of the country, Bourgogne used roads and rivers to conquer the North, Paris, Popes in Avignon, then Rome. Long time far beyond Bordeaux, Bourgogne has a lot to thank to bishops who revealed the soil. At the XIIth century, Benedictines explore the soil, look at the ones producing the best wine. It’s a big decision because transport costs so much by road at those times that they have to try to sell the same quantity but more at a more expensive price, so to say : to produce quality. Progressively, bishops close parcels more qualitative than others. They build a hierarchy of the soil, draw a real mosaic that they limit with stones. A true puzzle. Today again, you still notice it by the hundreds of names. That is specifically a concept of Bourgogne which designs the soil it belongs to, its declivity, its exposure to sun and wind. Anything that signs a wine, makes it different from the aside parcel. Bishops made of a region, a religion. In 1395, Philippe le Hardi, duke of Burgundy, wants a unique vine plant. That will make a big distinction between Bourgogne and Bordeaux which can received 5 different vine plants, that allows to adapt to different weather changes. The duke wants Gamay to be uprooted for the profit of the Pinot noir (personally I like Gamay too !). But it was to please better the pope, the king and some other lords with the best and precious wines of the kingdom. The duke was well inspired. Pinot is a wonderful vine plant. Ultra sensitive to the climate and soil, it hates the yield and approximative cutting. But it can produce the best wine when it’s not loosing its substance nor soul with dilution. Experts say there is a real aromatic purity, extremely good wines when all conditions are there. Taking profit of the commercial net of the cistercians, Bourgogne is being sold in north of Europe, Paris and its region, at court, where its first rival is not yet Bordeaux but Champagne, which produces a light red wine, fruty, equaly made with Pinot noir. Bourgogne makes drink as well popes and cardinals and during wars of religion, vine growers know which side to stay. At this time, Bordeaux is not well known. The benefit of its growth came from Aliénor d’Aquitaine. Separated from Louis VII, the beautiful Aliénor married the king-to-be Henri II of England. And Bordeaux exploded. Thanks to their fidelity to the Anglois, they obtained that the wine of the hinterland, where Gaillac and Cahors made an intrusion, do not have an access to the harbour of Bordeaux before November 11th. It allows the Bordeaux to ship their production to the british islands and north of Europe. The grape vines, mostly on the hill of Saint-Emilion, cover up the Graves, poor earth of the region, at the south of Bordeaux. Then the ones of Medoc, at the north. The privilege will stay until the Revolution. More than 500 years, so Bordeaux made a fortune and invest on the land. The aristocrats buy land, assemble them in big domains, relude to actual properties. This makes today again this strong contrast with Bourgogne : on one side, a patchwork of tiny parcels, on the other side seas of vineyards. For example, the Romanée-Conti, most important cru vintage of Bourgogne is 1,85 hectare and is selling 6000 bottles a year. Château Margaux exceeds 85 hectares, Lafite the 100 hectares. Each is selling at least 200 000 bottles of its best wine. So Bordeaux makes drink the protestant land of England, Holland and Flanders. It helps modeling its wine. England loves the strict Cabernet-Sauvignon. From the XVIIth century, dealers and brokers establish themselves in Bordeaux to ease the exchanges : Holland, Flanders, then England. The newcomers, ancestors of the actual houses, are a strong community in Bordeaux. They buy domains from the old aristocracy. Transactions are numbered compared to Bourgogne, where the link with earth is not so aristocratic, more peasant. Vineyards start to be sold to bankers, then industrials, insurance companies when Bourgogne stays property of families. Tendency seems to change a bit though marginal. When a property is ready to be sold, families who are financialy strong, know the fact very quickly and react, buying it. So the wine stays burgundian. On the atlantic coast, dealers bet on the taste of the wine. They adapt it to the taste of their foreign customers, imposing long cuvage, in order to obtain more concentrated wine, adapted to travel. The regular frequency of England gave maybe to Bordeaux a less demonstrative taste. Dark and strong wine, when Pinot noir offers an open and sensual wine. Nose wine against mouth wine. Light wine against well-built wine. The uses reinforce those representations. The traditional glass of Bourgogne is round. The Bordeaux one is straight like a tulip, narrowed at the edge. The bottle is temperate and easy to stack. The Bourgogne one is big-bellied, sometimes with a thicker edge for the Grand Crus. One could represent a bishop. The other one a paunchy capuchin. Same opposition with the service. Bordeaux cultivates the aristocratic art of decantation at the candle. Some see in this act a transposition of a spirit of purity to God : we clarify the wine, we make it transparent. Bourgogne, for its side, is not afraid to put the bottle on the table, if possible with the protective dust. Same divergences with the calories with the meal. Butter against duck fat. Sauced meat against roast meat. But sometimes roles are reversed. Around Bordeaux, the new castles are very bright, very flashy when some of the properties of Côtes-de-Nuits inherit the austerity of cistercian bishops. Pinot noir can have a bad teenage time, closed. Its most refined crus are not accessible to beginners. So all this is not that simple ? Let’s go back in the wine-cellar and taste again to go deeply into the question. I heard it through the grapevine