酒入歧途

最近在NM的Wine Journal看的文章, 想跟大家分享.

Sweet Music From Olivier Bernstein

“One day I realised my job was boring compared to my passion,”

“In 2002 I was 35-years old and I decided that I would try to make my own wine. I had no money, so we went to the South of France in Roussillon and bought 8-hectares at a cheap price. The first vintage was in 2003, Mas de la Devèze and we sold 99% of wine abroad.”

“I had studied for one year in Burgundy and did a brief stage with Henri Jayer for the 2002 vintage. I talked to many people in the region but it took a long time to get the ten crus together. I wanted to buy the grapes and vinify the crus myself. I wanted to go into the vineyard and do the green harvest and the harvest, the two most crucial periods during the growing season.”
It should be said that Olivier had set himself a challenge by only farming Premier and Grand Crus with old vines i.e. not the kind of land that vignerons devolve responsibility for easily.

“In the first year, 2007, I only made 33 barrels. The press came [including Allen Meadows] and said that the wine was great, the importers came and 2007 sold out, so we have increased in 2008 with 50 barrels. The idea is to choose old vines. I farm just one plot of young vines between 10-12 years and all the others are 40 years or more. Three plots are 80-years old: Cazetieres, Champeau and Mazis-Chambertin. The idea is to obtain ripe fruits and ripe tannins, which allows us to drink the wines earlier and not wait for ten years. I want fruit that is ripe but still with some acidity. People call our company a micro-négoçiant, but we just try to control the vineyard and the vinification.”

“We vinify in Gevrey: a simple vinification. The fruit is completely de-stemmed and since the fruit is ripe, we only macerate for 18-days depending on the cru, so it’s not a long maceration and a very light pigeage. We do an enormous amount of triage in the vineyard, two sorting in the cellar so we keep only the perfect berries. We use whole berries and with the 2008s I’m experimenting with 50% stems. We raise the wines in new barrels, but not for a long period of time as I am not interested in the wood. For example, the Meursault Charmes spent only 10 months in barrel. I buy the wood myself two years earlier and dry them myself as the way they are dried is important. Many coopers dry them artificially. We take the oak from Bercay forest from a cooper Stéphane Chassin. For me he is the best tonnelière. The aim is the communication between oxygen and wine, which helps the wines structure…the taste of the wood is not the aim at all. We bottle cru by cru...I want to capture the fruit immediately and bottle by hand. We want to do something special with no compromise so if we believe the wine is not good enough then we don’t bottle it. I prefer to sell it elsewhere.”

Olivier Bernstein

人生有幾多個十年?