(Note: a ‘**’ (e.g. Lavinia**) indicates that you can find the address on my web: producers here, and restaurants/shops here.)

 □ Producers

Château Mourgues du Grès, Costières de Nimes (**)
Château Mourgues du Grès is owned by Anne and François Collard. François is oenologist and has previously worked at Château Lafite-Rothschild. Their sun-drenched 35 hectares property is close to the Rhône river and has deservedly received quite a lot of attention for their wines with plenty of character and personality. They are often seen in Paris wine bars.

Cellier du Mas Montel/Mas Granier, Sommières (**)
Mas Montel makes both Vin de Pays d’Oc and AC Coteaux du Languedoc. It is very nice and good value for money wines, for example the Cuvée Jéricho, a Vin de Pays made from 80% Syrah fermented in maceration carbonique (uncrushed grapes fermenting, similar to what is done in Beaujolais). Easy to drink with lots of fruit and berries in the character.

Domaine du Vieux Chêne, Roussillon (**)
This is a large property covering some 110 hectares just outside of Rivesaltes. Denis Sarda-Bobo makes a fresh and fruit Muscat de Rivesaltes (100% Muscat Petits Grains) and some very powerful dry red wines, the best from 100% Syrah.

Read about more of our favourite producers and find the contact details on my Producer Page.

Bits and pieces - News from the Wine World

Gallo and C:ie Rhodanienne starts collaboration
E&J Gallo and La Compagine Rhodanienne has started a collaboration to sell Rhone wine in the US. Gallo is the world’s second largest wine company and C:ie Rhodanienne is a large producer in the southern Rhône valley. The wine will be sold under the brand Pont d’Avignon in 1500 wine shops and 800 restaurants. It is made primarily from Syrah and has been vinified in collaboration with Gallo wine technicians. This follows another Gallo co-operation with a French wine producer (Sieurs d’Arques) to sell French wine in the US called Red Bicyclette (Chardonnay, Merlot and Syrah).

This month’s absolutely necessary wine gadget (oh, well)
Chaser Wine is a pill that promises that you can drink wine in the evening and then “wake up in the morning feeling refreshed and ready to start your day”. They ask “what … if the odd (!) glass of wine leaves you feeling less than 100% in the morning?”. And the answer is: Buy their pills! More info: http://www.doublechaser.co.uk/. Maybe they can turn water into wine too.

The Vine by Clive Coates ceases publication after 20 years
Clive Coates has decided to stop publishing his newsletter The Vine after 20 years of existence. It has been a private newsletter focused on the great French wines. Coates has published several books on e.g. Bourgogne and Bordeaux, always extremely thorough and detailed. He will now settle down in a cottage in Burgundy!

Australia’s own wine lake
Australia is expected to have a ”wine lake” of 1.9 million hectolitres of unsold wine by mid-year. This is due the recent big harvests and the fall in exports, according to a report by Citigroup Smith Barney. The prices of Cabernet Sauvignon have already fallen by 15-30%.

Bollinger buys Ayala
Bollinger buys the neighbouring house of Ayala in Aÿ in Champagne. Ayala produces 450,000 bottles per year. Bollinger already owns Champagne Montvilliers, Langlois-Château in Loire, Chanson Père & Fils i Burgundy and Mentzendorff in England. They are also part owner of Cognac Delamain and Tapanappa in Australia.

Château Brown bought by Mau
The Mau family, one of the major négociants in Bordeaux, has bought Château Brown in Pessac-Léognan. Brown has 50 ha, 28 of which are planted with red grapes and 4.5 with white. Mau already owns Château Preuillac in Médoc and Château Ducla in Entre-Deux-Mers and Bordeaux supérieur

Chilean wine exports grow more than expected
Chilean wine exports reached $821 M for last year. That well exceeds the target set of $800 M. It represents a growth of 25% in value and 20% in volume.

Hillary Clinton backs the creation of a new American wine district
In a letter to the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau Clinton supports the proposal to create a new AVA (American Viticultural Area) called Niagara Escarpment If granted it would become the ninth AVA in New York but would include no more than seven wineries. New York is today the third largest wine producing state in the US, after California and Washington.

Wine competition in Brussels
For the twelwth consecutieve year the ‘Concours Mondial de Bruxelles’ will take place between March 31 and April 2. This time it will be in Ostende (but it’s still the Concours de Bruxelles!). 200 professional wine tasters (BKWine included!) from 48 different countries with taste and judge between 4000 and 5000 wines. The best wines will then be published in the wine guide «Les 1001 vins médaillés du Concours de Bruxelles». More information: www.concoursmondial.be

Crémant de Bourgogne celebrates 30 years
It is now 30 years since the appellation Crémant de Bourgogne was created. Today they produce 8 million bottles annually of Crémant de Bourgogne which according to BIVB represents 12% of the regional appellation. Surely not an occasion to celebrate with champ…

”Rhône Original”, a new collaboration between five major Rhône producers
Five leading producers of Rhône wine have created ”Rhône Original” in order to promote the marketing and the image of Rhône wines internationally. The five producers are Ferraton Père et fils, la Maison Gabriel Meffre, Michel Chapoutier, Les Grandes Serres and les Vignobles Du Peloux. Together they already sell more than 50% of their production outside of France.

Systembolaget – the Swedish monopoly – sold less wine in 2004
Wine sales at the Swedish monopoly Systembolaget decreased withy 2.1% in 2004. The decline is relatively even across the country so it seems that the radical decrease in southern Sweden due to heavy cross border trading has stabilised.

Wine auctions exceed $100M in 2004
For the first time since 1999 the big wine auction houses in the US and in England turned over in excess of $100M. Total sales reached $109M, plus some $18.5 on internet auctions. Biggest of all was Christie’s with $36M. All according to a survey by the Wine Spectator.

Biodynamics – moving ahead
There’s quite a lot of ”buzz” around biodynamics in the wine industry today: e.g. the first book that treats the subject has just been published (see new our book reviews page) and we often write about it ourselves. So what is it? It goes several steps further than “organic” and is founded on principles invented by Rudolf Steiner. Sometimes it seems to be more a question of belief and magic than science but often the “bio” producers make very good wine. Here’s some reading on the subject:

- Institut Technique de l'agriculture biologique: http://www.itab.asso.fr/
- Centre National de Ressources en Agriculture Biologique:  http://www.agribio.com/
- G. Humbrecht, Un grand pas vers la biodynamie: http://humbrecht.free.fr/pfaffenheim/biodynamique.html
-  Syndicat International des Vignerons en Culture Bio-Dynamique: http://www.biodyvin.com/
- Laboratoire d'Analyse Microbiologique des Sols (about soil analysis! Also in english): http://www.lams-21.com/index.htm
- Demeter Association, Inc.: http://www.demeter-usa.org/
- Demeter France: http://www.demeter.fr.st/ 
- A long link list on bio-dynamics: http://www.eco-bio.info/liens.html
- Nature et Progrès, another organisation that does certification: http://www.natureetprogres.org/
- Quebec's biodynamic organisation:  http://www.biodynamie.qc.ca/biodynamie/index.nsf
- About bio-dynamic products: http://biogassendi.ifrance.com/biogassendi/reglesbio.htm
- "Living with the moon", a moon calendar: http://www.calendrier-lunaire.fr/page_vivre_avec.html

Swedish, Norwegian and Belgian victory in the world’s first international gastronomic photo competition
Les Lauriers Beaujolais de la Photographie Gastronomique, the international food photo competition held at the Bocuse d’Or in Lyon recently, was won by Bjorn Lindberg from Sweden (the public’s prize), Terje Svendsen, Norway (the chefs’ prize) and Tony Le Duc, Belgium (the press prize). Pictures: http://www.bkwine.com/wine_pictures/mixed/lauriersbeaujolais/index.htm . The official web site with the competition contributions: http://lauriers.beaujolais.com/ 

No German ice wine this year?
2004 being an abundant year, many producers had saved some grapes on the vines in the hope of producing eiswein, the very rare and expensive sweet German wine. But since the winter has been rather warm, and ice wine can only be harvested when temperatures fall below -7 centigrade, it seems doubtful if much eiswein will be made after all.

Bourgogne supports the tsunami victims
A group of Burgundy producers have contributed their own personal bottles to a charity auction to support the Asian tsunami victims. BIVB (the growers’ association) contributed an additional 200 bottles. The bottles were auctioned both on ebay and at an auction in Nuits-St-Georges on January 22.

The Norway monopoly (Vinmonopolet) gets its own bribery scandal
14 people in Norway are suspected of bribery. An investigation has been launched headed by an ex-chief of police. Read more in Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/work/feeds/ap/2005/01/24/ap1775932.html

2004 biggest harvest since 12 years
Onivins estimates that the 2004 harvest will reach 287 million hectolitres, up 9.5% from 2003. It is the biggest harvest since 1992 when 296 M hl was made.

Wine fair in Fenouillede in Languedoc-Roussillon 28 Feb – 1 March
For the fifth time there is a Fenouilledes wine fair showing the wines also of Peyreperuses. With names like that they might need some promotion. But they seem very active so it will probably soon be a much better known name. salon@fenouilledes-selection.com, www.fenouilledes-selection.com

USA will drink more wine than France by 2008 predicts a new study
A study prepared for Vinexpo predicts that the consumption of wine in the US will go up by 28.6% and in France will decrease with 7.4%. That will make USA the biggest wine consumer (in total, not per capita), Italy (with a relatively stable consumption) will stay in second place and France will move to third place. The total wine production is estimated to rise by 6.4% to reach 275 M hl. More info: http://www.expatica.com/,  http://www.journee-vinicole.com/

French wine ad law, Loi Evin, to be loosened up
The French Senate has accepted a proposal that will permit wine ads to mention things like the colour of the wine and its taste (“olfactory and gustatory characteristics”). Before being accepted the proposal has to pass the National Assembly too but no difficulties are expected there.

Swedish finance minister Nuder meets with EU commissioner to discuss the monopoly and taxation
The Swedish finance minister Nuder met recently with the commissioner Laszlo Kovacs responsible for taxation and customs issues. They agreed that there is a need to find a solution to the “distortions” created by the large differences in taxation of alcohol. We have not heard that there was any agreement on what needed to be done though. According to just-drinks.com.

Ontario might abolish the monopoly
At last a monopoly that might be abolished. According to Canadian press the province of Ontario is considering abolishing the retail monopoly for alcoholic drinks. Maybe an initiative to watch in the Nordic countries?

The 2002 Mouton-Rothschild label designed by Ilya Kabakov
Without much noise the label for the 2002 Mouton-Rothschild has been presented. It is designed by the Ukraine born and Russia educated artist Ilya Kabakov. He now lives in New York and is best known for his installations. Visit the web sites on you own risk (they are both rather irritatingly Flash sites): Mouton: http://www.bpdr.com/ , the artist: http://www.ilya-emilia-kabakov.com

2.5 million hl French wine to be distilled?
Denis Verdier, head of Confédération des Caves Viticoles Français and also president of Onivins (the quasi-governmental wine organisation), in other words a wine heavy weight, has proposed that 2.5 million hectolitres of wine should be sent to distillation, 2 million litres of which would be AOC-wine – the first time AOC wine would be distilled in this way. The purpose is to remove the oversupply created by the big harvest 2004 and older stock in order to keep prices up and avoid more financial troubles for some producers. It remains to be seen if the proposal is accepted (well, someone has to pay for it of course). Read more in The Times: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1458297,00.html

 □ Wine-On-Line
Some wine sites worth having a look at:

Send us suggestions for sites to be included here: winebrief@bkwine.com.

 □ Some interesting events:

- - France:

- - Sweden:

- - UK, Belgium, Switzerland, Spain, Denmark,...:

Any suggestions for events to add here? Send me an email on winebrief@bkwine.com