Wine-making in the Jura

Hi

Today is Liberation Day in France and a Bank Holiday. Mummy (M) and Daddy (D) are playing in threeconcerts at Schools/local towns. M plays the flute and D the trombone, so already I'm pretty musical. Can't wait to have a go myself. Still no sign of me emerging into the big wide world, but I'm beginning to get a bit restive and M has her bag packed. D is likely to be in the vines on the other side of town when I decide to venture forth and the hospital is 20 miles away, so it could be a close-run thing.... The names are narrowing down too, and so I may not be called Cadwallader or Cressida. Pity, as I was getting to like them.

Thought that I might bring you up to speed on wines in the Jura which, as with every other wine region in France, have their own individuality.Firstly here is where we live http://www.maplandia.com/france/franche-comte/jura/lons-le-saunier/mesnay/ next to the church in Mesnay. Daddy has vines here and at Pupillin, just south of Arbois. Because his wines are in the Appelation area, his wines will be AOC Arbois and AOC Arbois-Pupillin.

The Jura is a department of Franche-Comte, famous for its gorgeous cheese Comté, and it adjoins Switzerland. The Jura mountains dominate the department and Arbois is in the foothills approx 1000ft above sea level. For this reason, the winters are cold with plenty of snow and climatic conditions differ from most other wine-growing regions. As a result their grape varieties are, in the main, unique to the Jura, resulting in fine wines unlike any others.Here is a good guide:
www.jurawine.com/jura-pdf.pdf. Daddy has Savignin, Poulsard, Chardonnay and Trousseau.

M & D still haven't decided on a brand-name for their wines and so GP will continue to call it Ashby Wines for the time being (Hughes Beguet- HB is hache-bé in French). Suggestions on a postcard or by email to patrice@hughesbeguet.com, welcome.
Ashby Organic Wines will probably offer something along these lines:
WHITE
Sparkling White, Light White, Serious White
RED
Light Red, Serious Red
YELLOW
Dessert Yellow, Mellow Yellow

Because it's Year One it isn't strictly organic yet, but Mummy and Daddy are very much into the whole organic and bio-dynamic culture and so they are only putting into the vines and soil what qualifies for organic status. Apparently Organic wine gives you less of a hangover which is good news for GP!

I might get one more post in before I emerge. Clover is a hot favourite at the moment, marginally preferable to Cressida. Should I be a boy, the jury is still out on names, with Auntie Vicky rather dismissing Cyprien, a former front-runner. Ashby seems OK to GP!

Summoned by bells

Dramatis Personae: Me (Ashby for the moment), Mummy/Caroline (M), Daddy/Patrice (D), Grandpa and co-writer (GP),Grandma (GM), Mami (MM), Papi (PP)
Hi
HBHB here again(Haricot Bean Hughes Beguet)hence Grandpa's idea to christen me Ashby as that was becoming a mouthful. Still no decision on names as no-one knows, not even me, what variety I'll be. Apparently my cousin, due a week later, is kicking Christelle, Daddy's sister, like mad and he's a boy. All I do is politely hiccup, so I suspect that I'm a girl. We'll see...

I live in Mesnay, adjacent to Arbois which is one of the famous Jura wine-producing regions and looks like a picture from a chocolate box. M and D moved into the house next to the church in November. It's an old stone house with a massive cellar down precipitous steps- probably 18th Century (some houses in the village are 16th C). The inside has been modernised, but not finished and so one takes one's life in one's hands going up the stairs with no banister or handrail and no banisters around the landing. I suspect that it will be finished before I am able to practise sky-diving from the balcony!

Being next to the Church and being French, the bells ring 24/7. As if that weren't enough, just in case you hadn't caught the number of rings on the hour, they repeat them a minute later. I don't notice them much at the moment - hopefully that will continue. Working in the vines nearby, GP found it rather pleasant, in the sunshine, to have one's time controlled by bells- took him back to his school days.

Daddy has 4 plots of vines in and around Arbois. This being his first year, he had difficulty in acquiring the vines and they weren't his until January/February. Everyone else around had been working on their vines since November and so D was automatically 2/3 months behind. He is also a Maths teacher at a local school part-time until the income starts to grow, and so this created extra pressures on his time.

Firstly one has to remove the string supporting last year's harvest and tie it up neatly. Then the vines have to be pruned to leave two main shoots about 60cm/2 ft long. Then the dead wood has to be prised, kicking and screaming, from the wires. Boy, do the triffid-like tendrils put up some resistance.

Next the posts need to be checked. D had to replace about 120 which means carrying sledge hammers and iron poles up 30 degree slopes and banging the new acacia posts into the stony ground. Then the wires need to be tightened to allow the vines to be attached firmly. In the Jura there is not as much sun as, say, in the South of France and the vines need attaching in a special way to maximise sunlight and bud growth. Normally attachment is not too arduous but, because D got the vines late, some shoots were decent-sized branches and these needed bending into U-shapes over the second wire before being attached to the lower wire. Apparently the sap travels automatically to the end of the shoot but will also hang around at the top, so a U-turn will maximise distribution. Already you can see the sap dripping from the shoots.

Bending and tying is what M, D, GP, GM, MM and PP got to do during April. Each vine shoot segment needs careful bending to stop it snapping. Each emerging bud on the shoot, though miniscule, already contains the leaves and grapes that will emerge over the summer. Bending, twisting the shoots under/over/under, often led to snapping and the buds being knocked off, which in turn led to GP using language that I hadn't heard before- it must be English, although mention was made of Anglo-Saxon.

Then the attachment of the vines is done with a neat tool which twists the thin wire using a spring-device which you pull away from the vine. D has a left-handed one- wonder whether I'll be left-handed?

During the school holidays D, MM and PP managed to finish the tying (GP and GM had returned to Kent) on the 20,000 vines which should produce the equivalent of 20,000 bottles, but D still has to prepare his lesson-plans for next term, so he's working quite hard at the moment.... He's hoping to get a little tractor to go between the rows next month, which will mulch, strim, spray, rotovate. Unfortunately some of his rows are on such steep slopes that he will have to continue to tend these vines by hand, which is a shame.

Aaah, I hear the 12 o'clock bells, and yes, there they are again in confirmation. I think I'll have a little snooze. Hope Mummy isn't going to rush around too much like she normally does.

No suggestions for the name of the Hughes Beguet Wine brand yet- suggestions welcome at patrice@hughesbeguet.com

Heir or heiress to a wine empire?

Hi. I'm new to blogging. In fact I'm new to just about everything. My name, is, at the moment, Bean but that's going to change in about a month's time, when I'm born, when it will become something like Cressida or Cadwallader depending on what variety I turn out to be. I got the name Bean because I was apparently the size of a haricot bean when Mummy and Daddy first visited the doctor. Mummy can vouch for the fact that I've grown since then. They're ploughing through name books at the moment- one has 10,000 French names in it (did I mention that I live in France?) but have really no idea yet. I think Cadwallader/Cressida is a joke....?

I'm enlisting Grandpa (GP) to help me with my blog until I'm old enough to take over. That will probably be when I become a grumpy teenager and GP becomes a grumpy old man, so this is likely to be the zenith of our blog co-operation.

OK, some background. Mummy (Caroline) met Daddy (Patrice)at Besancon University where they were playing in the orchestra and they got married 4 years ago this week at Lympne Castle where they were joined by a considerable number of friends and family from both sides of La Manche/English Channel. Daddy decided however that he really wanted to produce wine. I don't know what wine tastes like yet because Mummy hasn't had any since I appeared on the scene. I'll let you know. Anyway he gave up his job as an IT consultant and became a student again at Montpellier University where they moved to from Paris. Mummy was an HR Manager down there. After 2 years in Languedoc Roussillon Daddy qualified as an Oeneologist and 9 months ago they moved to Arbois in the Jura (between Dijon and Switzerland). They have now acquired 20,000 vines which are likely to occupy all of the time they don't devote to me, for the next 20 years.

I'll talk you through the stages in wine production over the next few weeks as GP and Grandma, along with Mami and Papi, Mummy, Daddy and lots of friends have spent many hours in the vines over the last few weeks.

Mummy and Daddy, apart from having to decide what to name me, also have to decide what brand name to use for their wines which, most probably, will be sold mainly within the Jura. GP has suggested Ashby Wines with a sub title of "HB Vins du Jura". HB stands for Hughes Beguet, my surname to be, and in French HB is approximately Ash Bay, hence Ashby. Their website is http://www.hughesbeguet.com/ and when Daddy has time they will be seeking suggestions on the website for a name. In the meantime any sensible suggestions welcome patrice@hughesbeguet.com.

I am due to make my appearance on 9 June which is 41 weeks, which is the French calculation. Apparently if Mummy had me in the UK I would be due on 2 June, 40 weeks, so already I'm confused. Apparently we're going to speak English in the house and French outside, but that probably won't worry me for a few months yet. I rather hope I'm a boy and can help Daddy in the vines and take over the Empire, but I suspect that if I'm a girl, I will probably do the same anyway. Fancy having one's life planned out before it's even begun!

GP is uploading a couple of shots of some vines, one with Ashby vines (and Daddy's hut) in the distance and another from a bedroom window. There are some wonderful views of the church next to the house from the local vines (Did I mention the bells-next time) which I will post shortly, probably with some snaps of me, in person. I can't wait to see you.