Vincent Alexis Discusses O'Ranch & Introduces Les Gaules De Bois

Chateau Barouillet - Vincent Alexis
France, Bergerac & Monbazillac in Pomport

Vincent Alexis is the eighth generation winemaker at Chateau Barouillet, responsible for 45 hectares that straddle both sides of the river Dordogne, 120km inland from Bordeaux. He joined his Father in 2010, first taking 6 hectares on as his ‘organic project’.
3 years later, with Vincent at the helm, all 45 hectares were certified organic. Now, ten years since he joined full time, biodynamic certification is on the cards for the whole operation.

Whilst upholding the reputation his dad and the generations before him have established, Vincent maintains an attitude of experimentation and a garage sensibility when it comes to new cuvees, excited into action with the encouragement of his right hand man, Romuald Cousy.

We caught up with Vincent to discuss two new wines that have just landed, and his struggle through the scorched 2020 harvest.

How are you today Vincent?
I’m fine, I’ve just been working out allocations for next year actually. We were not able to make much wine in 2020. But, I’m feeling good, we have good things ahead, and this year you’ve just received O’Ranch, which is my favourite orange wine we’ve made I think!

This is the first year we’ve been able to get some, what can you tell us about this one?
With this one, we really found a way to make our own style of orange wine.
We picked just half a hectare for O’Ranch. We harvest Ondenc and Muscadelle, two local grape varieties, and Chenin Blanc. All three are picked together and macerated together in amphora, for three months of skin contact. All the fermentations, alcoholic and malolactic are done with the skin contact.

We don't do any punchdowns or any pump overs, we let it go! Of course we try it and taste it a lot because we have to find the right moment to dig it out. That's one of the keys I think to have something really aromatic, but with not too much tannin. I don't like my orange wine too tannic. I think we found the right moment in 2019 to dig it out.

Everything is made by hand, the artisanal way. We dig it out all with a bucket! We don't even press it in a real press, we just push the grapes into a little grille, by hand, over a bucket. It's very slow! That way we keep the juice and extract very little tannin.

Another first for us, we’ve just received the Ambitio from your Les Gaules De Bois project - can you tell us about that project and the Ambitio?
This is a project I started in 2018 with Romuald Cousy, who works with me at Barouillet.
We wanted to make the light, easy drinking wines we love to drink, but are hard to produce in our region. We planned to visit other regions, and make wine with their grapes, back at our place. The 2019 became a 50/50 blend of Gamay & Merlot.

We went to Beaujolais, to buy Gamay from Jean Francois Dubourg, an organic winemaker in South Beaujolais. We got there early, about 7 o'clock in the morning, after a 4 hour drive, had picked everything and loaded the van by 11, and it was all in the tank by 4 that afternoon! It had a week of carbonic maceration. We really enjoyed the wine, it was really light, but we thought it could be a bit hard for people to understand, so we decided to make the blend.

Romuald used to have his own vineyards nearby in Duras, which he decided to stop as things became a bit complicated for him. 2019 was his last vintage from those vines. He made some destemmed Merlot, with just one or two punchdowns at the beginning of the ferment, but it was still really full bodied.

The Merlot had been aged for a year in old barrels, and the Gamay for a year in stainless steel. When they came together, it worked really really well, it has a lovely balance.
We added just 10 milligrammes of sulphur per litre before bottling, and that’s all we did with this one!

And the plan is to keep changing where you source the grapes each year?
Yeah we want to keep Les Gaules De Bois small, and to just build on relationships with winemakers. So in 2020 we went to the Alsace to pick Pinot & Riesling, then to Minervois in the South of France to pick Grenache. We’re hopefully making also a rose pet nat, and we’ve made another orange wine with Sauvignon Blanc from Duras, with one year of whole bunch maceration. It’s quite strange, really interesting.

How long has Romuald worked with you at Barouillet?
We met 10 years ago. He came to do work experience whilst he was studying, and then worked with us full time for two years before he started work in his own vineyard. He had his vines from 2016 to 2019, and then came back to Barouillet to be my right hand guy! It’s been amazing to have him helping out, we’ve been able to do so much more exciting stuff. 

Thanks to him, we’ve been able to turn to biodynamics. We’ve been working biodynamic since October, we made our first spraying of preparation 501, that kind of thing. Hopefully, by 2022 all the vineyards will be certified biodynamic. We’re super proud of it, it’s a rush to be there, to have all 45 hectares biodynamic.

You said you’ve been unable to make much wine in 2020, was it the heat for you, like others?Yeah, when we harvested the whites, the weather was okay, not too dry, the soil was not too dry. So the alcohol degree on the whites is correct, but on the red it increased really fast. Not what we were after! We had some Merlot with about 17% potential alcohol! We’ve had to blend in some whites but the red we are able to produce this year will be low. We’ve made a little more white, and orange. In 2019 we made 15 hectolitres of orange wine, which we’ve increased in 2020 to about 21 to 22 hectolitres.

Did you have to pick earlier?
We've tried to but lots of the grapes were not good. They were really tannic and still tasting green, not ripe enough. So we picked things at maturity and had to blend in the white. The Cabernet Sauvignon, which is quite late normally, we were able to pick earlier. We’ve been able to use that to balance the high alcohol of the Merlot.

We didn’t have any rain, from the middle of July to October. Through August, the heat was 40 degrees nearly everyday. It was terrible. Terribly dry, and hot. We had a lot of sunburn on the grapes, lots without even any juice. So yeah, it was really complicated.

I’m the eight generation here, and it’s crazy how early we have to pick now. We started harvest for Splash on August 14th, and harvest continued until October 10th, so we finished very early, for us. My Father used to start picking in November!

We’ve actually torn up some vines that were just not good enough, and are watching some new ones that will hopefully give more yields in the future. We’ve lost about 40% of the harvest. I’m hoping this will be the smallest a vintage ever gets. We were able to just make about 16 hectolitres per hectare which for us, is very small.

But, I’m excited for the future, the new vines are looking good, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how the biodynamic practices express themselves in the wines. I’m really missing the wine fairs this year though. Travelling to meet people, to see you guys. It’s nice to have this extra time in the vineyards, but I really do miss the travel, that chance to try new stuff with the winemakers.

NEW IN STOCK

NEW - 2019 - VDF - Gaules de Bois - Gamay, Merlot

NEW - 2019 - VDF - O'ranch - Ondenc, Muscadelle, Chenin

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Following The Line: Gamay & Ploughing with Rémi Sédès

Rémi Sédès
France, Nantes, Coteaux d’Ancenis

Like the beloved Shire horses he uses in the vineyards, Remi Sedes likes to take things slowly. For him, his work as a winemaker is as much a lifestyle choice as a profession. He relishes his time outside, and avoids working with machines. As he puts it; he might as well get a job in a factory listening to machinery if he were to sit driving a tractor around the vineyard all day.

Hailing from the Jura, he studied agronomy when he arrived in the area to live closer to his wife's family in Nantes. He earned his white stripes with Vincent Caillé, followed with a brief stint in Bordeaux to grapple with reds, before setting up to take things at his own pace in 2013.

Speaking to him in the early days of the pandemic, he was thankful for the opportunity to slow down further. "Actually, I like the way things are now. There is a lot less speed and stress, people have slowed down. I can concentrate better on my work in the vineyard and I feel calmer overall."

It's in character then that Remi prefers not to rush his wines to market, and has just released his 2018 Gamay; Cuvees Noe & Trait. 

Rémi is a Gamay specialist, and this was a key factor in choosing to work in Ancenis, north-east of Nantes. The soil is micro granite - which suits Gamay particularly well - with a mix of clay, sand and limon underneath. Gamay is vigorous, and the acidity in these soils help to reduce yields.

Remi takes Gamay very seriously, his have real structure and finesse. The approach changed a little in 2018, being the year he felt confident to give sulphur the boot, and decided to soften the edges of his reds.

What can you tell us about 2018 Remi?

"That summer I had to put up a big fight against mildew due to loads of rain, that’s what I was worried about the entire time. But, the harvest ended up really good, the mildew didn't affect the buds. The year before our yields had been so low, things really bounced back for 2018. It ended up as a very good year, in terms of quantity and maturity."

"For the Gamay in '18, I wanted shorter macerations - just 15 days on the Trait Gamay while for Noé the maceration was 3-4 weeks. They were bottled without sulphur in May 2019.”

How is your mare, Tocade getting on? When we last spoke you were hopeful there might be a successor?

"Tocade is well, she is pregnant! She will hopefully give birth in May. This autumn we had to plough the vines with a very good plough I found back home in the Jura, it did a great job. So I'm happy."

How was the rest of 2020?

"We’d had a very rainy winter in 2019, which was unusual here but great for the soil to build up water reserves for the hotter months that came in 2020. We had a very hot summer, 37, 38 degrees celsius. But the vines had drunk well over winter and it ended up being a very easy year for them. The fermentations went very smoothly. 

I'll actually be bottling the 2020 rose next month and it is tasting very, very, very, very, very good!"

NOW IN STOCK

2019 - Muscadet Côteaux De La Loire - Michto - Melon de B - 12.78

NEW 2018 - Coteaux d’Ancenis - Cuvée Noé - Gamay - 12.78

NEW 2018 - Coteaux d’Ancenis - Trait Gamay - Gamay - 13.25

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A Chat with Rémi Sédès

Rémi Sédès

Coteaux d’Ancenis, Nantes, France

Hailing from the Jura, Rémi studied agronomy when he arrived in the area to live with his Nantes-born wife. He worked for a couple of years with Vincent Caillé, and then spent time honing his red winemaking skills in Bordeaux before setting up on his own in 2013.

Part of winemaking for Rémi is a lifestyle choice; he wants to work outdoors, in the fresh air, and not with machines – his Shire horses are an important part of his winemaking process.

Rémi is a Gamay specialist, and this was a key factor in choosing to work in Ancenis – where half of production in the area is red. The soil is micro granite - which suits Gamay particularly well - with a mix of clay, sand and limon underneath.


Tell us about your 2018 harvest: What were your challenges? What went particularly well?
In June/July last year I had to put up a big fight against mildew due to loads of rain. It's better if your sprayer doesn't break, or you'll lose the fight big time! This is what I was worried about the entire time.
The harvest ended up really good as all the efforts paid off and the mildew didn't affect the buds. There was also very little harvest in 2017, so as a result the grapes in 2018 were even better.


What do you anticipate for the 2019 harvest?
This year we've had big frost in early April. Usually you get two hours of cold air mass but we've had six to seven hours. The buds look beautiful for now, so fingers crossed.

What are you drinking at the moment?
My own rosé, which is still in the tank, as I didn't have money to bottle it yet! Other than that I love a white wine from Sicily called Porta del Vento.

What can you tell us about your future plans?
Tocade my horse is expecting a foal. Also, I want to restructure two new hectares which I've acquired. They are empty at the moment I want to plant fruit trees to bring more biodiversity.

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A Chat with Cyrille Vuillod

La Dernière Goutte

Vaux-en-Beaujolais, Beaujolais, France

Cyrille Vuillod comes from the Hautes-Alpes and, before turning to wine-making, worked in the mountains as a ski instructor. His life in wine started in 2011 working under Jean-Claude Lapalu for three years. In 2012 he produced his first vintage in his own cellar.


Tell us about your 2018 harvest: What were your challenges? What went particularly well?

It was hot but not as hot as 2017. The biggest challenge was that the heat was making the wine more alcoholic than it was meant to be. I also had to get more grapes from a friend in the North of Beaujolais.


Your wines are organically farmed without any added sulphur. Have you always worked this way?

I have used sulphur for the first three years and stopped once I had the confidence to do it. I have always worked organically but without any certification. Now I also work biodynamically.


How did you find your current vineyards? Why in Beaujolais?

I have been harvesting there for 20 years and I have loads of friends in the area.


Are there any new winemaking techniques or tools you’d like to experiment with?

For the last few years I have been experimenting with amphora and concrete eggs. I have also started making white wine. I always like try out new things. The other thing is that the climate is constantly changing and each year there is a new way on how deal with the challenges, so us winemakers help each other out to be on top of the latest techniques. The end result is always unpredictable.


Your favourite vintage to date?

2014 and 2016 were my favourite, but completely different vintages.

Now in stock

White

NEW 2018 Boire Désir - Chardonnay
In their third year of organic conversion. Chardonnay planted on clay and limestone. Vinified in 80% new barrels. Working with a cooper in Burgundy using three kinds of oak, steamed very gently to avoid a toasty flavour.


Red

NEW 2018 La Baleine Ivre - Gamay
30-year-old vines of Gamay on pink granite and sand. Eight days' maceration in fibreglass.

NEW 2017 Gamay De Bonheur - Gamay
A parcel between La Baleine and Sang neuf, on pink granite. Carbo for 20 days. Ageing in old barrels for eight months.