It's all kicking off...............

I'm just back from my hols on the Riviera with Mummy, Daddy, GP and Granny.It was pretty hot, as you may be able to tell from the attached photo, but it was good to get some sand-castling experience, particularly on the destruction side. 


And just 5 days later, today, Daddy is bottling his 2010 wine which is the first to carry the official AB (Organic) label (en conversion). Unfortunately some of the Savagnin hasn't quite completed its malolactic fermentation and so that will be bottled later, but it still means some 6000 additional bottles. Good job Daddy has sold over half his 2009 vintage or space would be pretty tight. 


So the good news is that 4,500 litres will be emptied from the vats. The additional good news, albeit with certain logistical complications, is that on Saturday we start the 2011 vendanges, and that is likely to produce 9,000 litres (12k bottles) of what is probably going to be be a cracking vintage with all that early sun, and hence advanced harvest. Lots of extra barrels and two more vats will be brought into action- hope it's enough....


So picking starts on Saturday 3 September and will continue on the Sunday, then a gap of two weeks and a further picking weekend on 17/18th, with some mid-week picking along the way. Still places for both weekends, even with Auntie Vicky arriving in a party of 6 from the UK. As usual Mami is in charge of catering, and as I now have quite an appetite, I am looking forward to it.


In the meantime GP is now an official importer of Hughes Beguet wines, so get in touch if you want to sample some- tjh@ismltd.co.uk 


I'll let you know how the picking went later this month. Sorry to hear that the UK hasn't had as good a summer as we have. Our fruit and veg have been very productive, but I suppose that's why we grow grapes in a sunny valley. It's beginning to make sense.


A bientot


Basti xxx

Two years nearer taking control of the empire...

Well, next Tuesday anyway when I celebrate my deuxieme anniversaire. I'm pretty grown up now and can play the piano, the mouthorgan, and a large funnel into which I fit Daddy's trombone mouthpiece. All the right notes but not necessarily........

I'm at nursery at the moment so GP who is over here with Granny can get on with the blog- more dereliction of duty, I have to report, but you can't choose your grandparents apparently.

On the empire front, loads of good news. Firstly a 1/3 page photo of Daddy in the national edition of Le Point http://alturl.com/ztvcu which resulted in a number of orders from a number of countries. Next an article and photo in Cuisines et Vins and finally a plaque recognising the Cote de Feule (Red) as one of the top 12 Jura wines of the year. Given that an increasing amount of time is having to be set aside for Sales and Marketing, all this publicity helps, but rest assured- plenty of bottles still available. A further feather in the cap is the inclusion of 3 of Daddy's wines on the list of the local Michelin 2-star restaurant- not bad considering that it was only his first year of production.

Which leads us on to the 2010 vintage- officially "en conversion à Bio" and so recognised as being produced organically. The first bottling takes place at the end of the month- 3 reds and some oaked whites from 2009, thereby increasing yet further the choice. As if that weren't enough a semi-macvin, a rather delicious sherry-like concoction of grape juice and brandy or marc as it is called in the Jura (and pronounced mar) is about to hit the shelves. Not officially macvin as that requires the marc to be left another 12m in oak but pretty jolly good all the same. Sounds Scottish but is in fact a shortening of marc-vin and has been around since the 1300's.

Well, I hear you cry, what about 2011? Well the Jura has pretty well mirrored the South of England with little rain and plenty of heat- 27° here on Sunday and Monday. The vine flowers came out 3 weeks earlier than last year and the grapes should be harvested 100 days after that, so harvest is looking like the end of August/beginning of September. At present the grapes are very tiny but the danger of a frost at full moon in May seems to have passed. This was the ruination of many crops in years ending in 1 ranging from 1941 onwards and even this year a number of growers were hit. Why there should seem to be a 10-year climate cycle in the Jura is one of God's mysteries! A thorough soaking has occurred over the last 36 hours which has been much-needed. Hopefully it will have abated by tomorrow, Ascension Day, renowned for storms hereabouts (!) as I am hoping to go on a bateau having read all about them in various books. Not thick on the ground here in the mountains, but apparently some about an hour's drive away.

I have received a number of pressies already including a sandpit and paddling pool which were great on Sunday and Monday. Yesterday Mami and Papi came over to lunch which was fun and they brought over a huge toy work bench with plenty of tools which make authentic noises. My favourite is the chainsaw but my efforts with the small peach tree on the terrace don't seem to be appreciated. Mummy's classes in non-aggressive parenting seem to be working though and so far I have avoided a walloping!

The solar panels are working well and we were all very cosy this winter - there is bags of hot water even with the gas off for the last few weeks. GP and Granny leave this weekend and then Auntie Vicky arrives for a couple of days so plenty of English being spoken. Q "Are you a boy or a girl?" A. "Garçon" gets the Brits confused! The next time I see GP and Granny in August I'll be teaching them French! We hope to have a holiday together in Provence near the sea and so my sand-castle practice will stand me in good stead.

GP has just become an official importer of Hughes Béguet Wines into the UK so feel free to place huge orders or recommend him. He has generously/foolishly agreed to waive any fees and so you are buying at imported prices, unfortunately slightly more than the French price as a result of UK duty. God bless Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs!

à bientôt for now

Lots of love

Basti xxx, nearly 2.

Percée 2011

Well, firstly many apologies for the delay in this post and secondly a belated Bonne Année to my reader(s?). This collaboration has become a bit one-sided with GP needing a good Expletives deleted-Ed. Anyway here we are in 2011 and everything is going swimmingly.

Since I last wrote the 2010 wine is maturing nicely in the various vats and barrels chez nous and Daddy is very optimistic. It's been pretty cold in the Jura but is likely to get worse before it gets better. The pruning was delayed because of snow but D is catching up and Mummy has been doing some tying. Still some way to go what with trying to sell the stuff as well, a problem that didn't exist last year when we had no bottles.

Well, I've now sailed past my 18 months mark and am becoming quite the little man by all accounts. I have discovered technology and have learnt that if I press various buttons on the PC or extract various plugs from sockets, I can make Mummy and Daddy very quickly sit up and take notice. My vocabulary has improved dramatically as a result, albeit I suspect that not all those words will be welcome at Nursery when I get there.

You might remember that I had become pretty good at impressions before Christmas and I have now extended my repertoire somewhat to repeating words (well, they're pretty nearly words), and am apparently bi-lingual in the couple of dozen I have now mastered. I have absolutely no idea what bi-lingual is, of course, but have begun to realise that Closing curtains and Fermer-ing les rideaux are pretty much the same thing. Seems a bit unnecessary all this duplication, but it seems as though it's what they want and so I try to please. Anyway I shut the rideaux or ferme les curtains to order. Another achievement is my Larry Adler impression on Daddy's harmonica, which always has to end in a burst of applause that I usually have to initiate. Carnegie Hall may have to wait a couple of years, but I think that I have definitely got it- absolument!

Visited Blighty over Christmas only to find it even colder than over here. Good to see all the rellies and to get my first taste of turkey and Christmas pudding (not together, you understand). Wasn't allowed brandy butter, but it's on my list for the future given the way everyone else wolfed it down. Granny and GP were very pleased to see us all and I tried not to keep everyone awake at night, largely successfully. Everyone was worried about my hands getting cold playing on the swings and slides in the village, but as I keep trying to tell them, gloves are for wimps.

Brief visit to hospital immediately on my return, for 5 days, which was a surprise and having recovered I then caught chickenpox. Am firmly on the mend, I hope! Rather interrupted the Percée which is allegedly the largest wine gathering in the world, ridiculously held in February, when the new Vin Jaune is released on an unsuspecting public. The crust is ceremoniously pierced and a good deal of wine is consumed. Daddy will have some in 2015 or thereabouts - hope it's worth the wait. This year the festivities (and the arrival of 30,000 people from around the world) occurred in Arbois (previous occasion 1998) and Mummy and Daddy sold a fair amount of wine whilst dishing out nearly 100 bottles to the multitudes. Even got their photo on a blog www.leblogdolif.com/ and a pic, shown at the top.

Snow here at present which is preventing tying after some very spring-like weather which even I knew wasn't going to last. Roll-on summer.

Well that's all folks, as various cartoon characters used to say. I'll try to catch up with you again shortly. Now back to all this speaking malarkey so that I can have a proper say in this column. Merci and bye-bye -trip off the tongue.

Bisous from Basti xxx