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ON THE WINE ROADS OF
FRANCE WITH
CHARLES NEAL
A 2006 Excursion
Page 3 |
Monsieur Beraut of Pellehaut.
Not only good wines, but excellent Armagnac, too.
Then over to the Fezas' family winery...Chiroulet.
Philippe Fezas shows off some good cooperage.
Back to Chez Simone for serious wine tasting and some fine vittles.
Bubbly from Robert Plageoles.
There was quite a range of wines to taste...
Veronique sliced some jambon...
Bernard then came out of the kitchen to see what we were
tasting...
Foie gras and pepper jelly.
Cured salmon.
Bernard then busted some eggs and prepared a truffled egg dish...
Bernard then prepared oven-roasted foie gras...
Much to the delight of Fronton's top winemaker, Frederic
Ribes.
You know those French...
Someone then produced a bottle of Bott-Geyl Pinot Gris to pair with the foie
gras...
When we'd had our fill of foie gras, Bernard brought out a
main course...
Then dessert...
Of course, we needed to taste more wines...
The next morning we were back on the road, having a long drive
cross-country to Costires de Nmes.
Charles insisted we listen to some cultured American CD.
What a bunch of trash-talkin' jive turkeys!
Some hours later we arrived at the chteau Clotte-Fontane.
We had a nice little lunch and had some tastes of various
Clotte-Fontane wines. I think the wines have improved nicely over the past
few years.
We had a look at two batches of ros. It seems the Provenal market
prefers the pale, onion skin-colored pink wine, while other markets prefer the
slightly darker colored ros.
After lunch we had a stroll outside and into the winery...
Until the next time....
We then drove to Chteau Saint Cyrgues...
Guy de Mercurio, vigneronne
From here we drove to the small coastal town of Cassis.
The French pronounce is "kah-see" and the final "s" is
silent.
Cassis rhymes with Paris, don't you see?
We ventured back into the hills to meet Didier Simonini, of the Chteau Barbanau.
They have vines in the appellation of Cassis as well as making Ctes de
Provence wines.
We had a nice dinner featuring wines of the estate.
Garbanzo beans...aioli...peppers....
And a good bottle of Cassis!
Dessert.
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