Wine Tasting in the Côtes du Rhône

One of the advantages of living in Europe and having a French husband who's origins are right next to the Côtes du Rhône wine region is that we get amazing wine (and food).

Côtes du Rhône is an Appellation d'Origine Contrôlee (AOC).  That's fancy French speak for this stuff is really from where it says its from. The region is quite expansive as it is fed largely from the Rhône river.  The region is not entireley connected and consists of a northern region that starts from Vienne where one can find Côte- Rotie and continues down to the Côtes du Rhône area of Valence.
Just North of Côtes du Rhône is the Crozes-Hermitage region. It's here that the small village of Tain l'Hermitage is located -- about 10 minutes north of Valence.  Don't be fooled by this small village.  This place is packed with amazing Wineries representing the Crozes-Hermitage region including M. Chapoutier and Cave de Tain.

M. Chapoutier was an interesting visit as the bottles are all covered in braille.  The idea of this came when a friend of Mr. Chapoutier who is blind commented that it would be nice if wine labels were written in braille so that he could identify them.  The other story that is told is that one of the vineyards that belongs to Chapoutier had a blind member of the family who invented a short had version of Braille that is used on the bottles. Did I mention that Chapoutier is represented quite heavily on Maison Pic's wine list?

Wines in this region are grown and steep cliffs surrounding the river which is obviously harder to harvest.  The main grape varietal here is Syrah and Grenache noir.

The other awesome thing about Tain Hermitage is that it is the headquarters for Valrhona chocolate with a little boutique where there is all you can eat taste testing and now houses the Valrhona chocolate museum.  Valrhona is THE chocolate.. think of it as the Bugatti of the chocolate world.

Look behind the chairs! it's the vineyards

Heading south of Valence takes you to the Coteaux Du Tricastin region in Drome where we were staying.  There are plenty of small local wineries here to visit along the countryside.  While we were there, we visited two- one more "upscale" called Les Granges Neuves des Esplades. Wines from this region are usually Grenache Noir, Syrah and Mourvedre

The other- our personal favorite is a small, very local producer that is run by Fred.  Noelle from La Croix du Gres  (see here for blog posting on La Croix du Gres) phoned up Fred who doesn't usually give tours and set up a meeting.  There, Fred took us on a tour of the vineyards and into the winery.  Let me explain something about Val De Berre.  Who works on the vineyard- Fred, a friend and a friend's wife.  Yes three people care after the grapes, test the grapes, harvest the grapes and make the wine. This place is awesome!  Fred has been making wine his whole life.  His father was a wine maker and he spent most of his career working in vineyards in Châteauneuf-du-Pape before ending up at Vale de Berre.  

Val de berre's flour mill

The owner happened to have a big piece of land with a bunch of vines on it but it was never the owner's main enterprise.  Stuff like the flour mill which were already established and decided it would be a good idea to maybe make some wine. 

So that's where Fred came in.  Within two years of running his almost one man show at Val de Berre, Fred won a Gold Medal at the concours general agricole de Paris 2013 for his Chardonnay and a Silver medal for his "Sensation", a blend of 70% Grenache and 30% Syrah.   Our personal favorite though is the Merlot that he produces.
Val de Berre isn't fancy - there isn't a tasting room but we had a fabulous time standing in the parking lot in front of his storage room where he sells his boxes of wines to the locals.  It was wan amazing experience.  Did I mention how affordable the bottles were?  

Fred doesn't do all that fancy lab testing that we see in most of the wineries in California.  He does everything the old fashion way-  with his taste buds.  

I'd like to think that this is what real food is suppose to be.  This is what makes France so special when it comes to great food and wine.  It's people like Fred who are passionate about what they do and just gosh darn good at it. 

Our "tasting room"-the parking lot

Addresses: 
Val de Berre
+33 4 75 98 5134
Le Moulin
26230 Chantermerle les Grignan, France

Les Granges Neuves des Esplanades
+33 4 75 98 5109
Domaine de Grangeneuve
26230 Roussas, France

M. Chapoutier
+33 4 75 08 28 65
18 Avenue Docteur Paul Durand
26600 Tain L'Hermitage, France

Cave de Tain
+33 4 75 08 20 87
22 Route de Larnage
26600 Tain L'Hermitage, France

Valhrona
 +33 4 75 07 90 62
14 venue Du President Roosevelt
26600 Tain L'Hermitage, France