TDF 2010 Stage 8: Station des Rousses to Morzine-Avoriaz

So it turned out the Tour organizers were having a little fun at my expense. I got a call early Sunday morning from the chief commissaire telling me my services as lead car driver wouldn’t be necessary. Rather, they’d decided my presence at the arrive was of the utmost importance, therefore suggesting that I head straight to the city, without delay, to prepare for the finish line festivities.

Just as I was putting the wetlands of North Jersey behind me and about to take the plunge into the darkness that precedes the reemergence into Manhattan, the second call came. This time the commissaire had deputized the job. "Monsieur McDuff, of course the race this year is not really coming to New York. We sincerely hope, though, that you'll still continue with your planned celebrations. Bon courage!"

Damn straight I wasn't turning back. There was a ride through the Jura, where Saturday's stage took place and Sunday's started, to commemorate. So, even with the lure of an appearance by the peloton off the docket, I headed to 67 Wine, where natural wine buyer Ben Wood had invited me to show off a few goodies symbolic of the weekend's stages.

For openers, we poured "L'Uva Arbosiana" from Pascal and Evelyne Clairet's Domaine de la Tournelle, brought into the US by Jenny & François. The non-vintage "L'Uva Arbosiana" (this batch is entirely from 2008 fruit) is a completely unsulfured cuvée of Ploussard that undergoes a 30-day-long carbonic maceration. A real eye-opener for the crowd in attendance, light and bright in color, crisp, firm and snappy in texture, ever fresh and just a tad smoky on the palate. Kind of like the first stiff climb after many days of riding the flat lands. Something bracing to open up the legs, lungs and mind.

A little downhill relief — cool breeze and easy rolling — came next, via a taste of the 2007 Arbois Chardonnay from Gérard Villet, part of the Savio Soares portfolio. Its telltale sponti, wild yeast aromas were followed up by fresh, crunch fruit and a cascade of minerality not unlike what you might expect to emerge from the springs flowing beneath Les Monts Jura, through which Sunday's stage traversed.

The 2004 L'Étoile Savagnin from Domaine de Montbourgeau (Rosenthal) rounded things out, a real sting in the tail, the final hors catégorie climb that no one quite knew was coming. All afternoon, it had people raising eyebrows and scratching their heads, trying to put a finger on what it reminded them of and, even more so, trying to decide just how they felt about it. Definitely polarizing juice, with its Manzanilla-like nose, piercing acidity, and stony, spicy, pungent palate attack.

Three delicious wines in honor of the first attack on the high mountains in this year's Tour.

Given that the day's events kept me from posting according to previously planned schedule, I'm going to break form and give a shout out to Sunday's winner. At this point, I'm guessing everyone that's following the race has seen it, read it or heard it. If I'm wrong, though, and you're the one that still doesn't know, then quick, close your eyes.

Andy Schleck, crossing the line victorious on the mountaintop finish into Morzine-Avoriaz, his first ever stage win in the Tour de France.
(Photo courtesty of Fotoreporter Sirotti.)

While the field sprints of the flat stages may provide adrenalin-pumping excitement and there's certainly been no shortage of drama in the first week of this year's Tour, it's always the mountains, at least for this fan of La Grande Boucle, that bring the fireworks. And we're just getting started....

Up next: A rest day recap perhaps, then it's into the high Alps of the Haute-Savoie we go.

Intro only...

On The (Yellow) Star

On a recent evening, shared with a few good friends over a few good bottles and some food, of course, one wine in particular raised not only my eyebrows but also an excellent question. "What is L'Étoile?" We were drinking a bottle of L'Étoile Savagnin from Domaine de Montbourgeau at the time, and it was my friend Bill who asked the question(s). He wasn't asking what it means — "L'Étoile" is French for "the star" — but rather, "Is that the AOC? Is it a place?" I answered in the affirmative to part one but realized that I couldn't quite explain, off the top of my head, the origins of or reasoning behind its name.


A quick Google Maps search points to a town in France called L'Étoile that's located about 150 kilometers due north of Paris, very much not in the Jura, which is the region where AOC L'Étoile is located. As it turns out, though, there's another small town called L'Étoile in the heart of the Jura. While the AOC takes its name from this commune, "L'Étoile" also refers to two of the area's distinct regional characteristics: a series of five hills surrounding the village that, with the help of a little imagination, form the five arms of a star, and from the fossilized remains of invertebrate starfish ("crinoïdes" or "pentacrines") that are common to the soil in the vineyards of L'Étoile, situated on what were seabeds many millennia ago.

The AOC boundaries encompass roughly 75-80 hectares, about 50 hectares of which are under vine. Split that between 30 farmers and 26 different wineries (21 estates, 2 co-ops and 3 négociants) and you'll start to get a sense of at least one of the reasons that so little wine from L'Étoile reaches the US market. The AOC allows for the production of white wines only, primarily from Chardonnay and Savagnin, which respectively account for 90% and 10% of overall plantations, though small amounts of Ploussard (vinified as white wine) are also tolerated.

Now that we've done at least some justice to the questions, let's move on to the wine that raised them... and raised my eyebrows....

L'Étoile Savagnin, Domaine de Montbourgeau (Nicole Dériaux) 2002
$37. 13% alcohol. Cork. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchant, New York, NY.

There's surprisingly little information available about this cuvée of Savagnin from Domaine de Montbourgeau, not even a mention on the producer's own website. Though Nicole Dériaux apparently carries on the oxidative winemaking practices used by her father, Jean Gros, and traditional to the Jura, this is not obviously oxidative wine. Its color is a waxy yellow in the glass and it does eventually reveal background flavors of hazelnuts and walnuts, but those are typical characteristics of Savagnin and strike me, in this case, as more primary than oxidation-induced flavor elements.

In any event, I'm splitting hairs. The wine is deliciously captivating. One eyebrow arched when I put nose to glass, finding subtle yet piercing aromas of turmeric and coriander, coupled with powerful minerality. The other eyebrow went up at the first sip, where those same curry spices blossomed in the wine's mouth aromas, magnified and amplified by very energetic, muscular mouthfeel and nervy acidity. Both eyebrows stayed up when the wine conjured an unmistakable aroma and flavor memory: Singapore Chow Mei Fun. I kid you not, the association was fixed, stamped indelibly in my mind.

I'm not sure whether Bill planned it or whether the stars (no pun intended) had simply aligned, but the wine proved a compelling match to just about all of the food he'd lined up for the evening. A great contrast to the salty, fatty savor of thinly sliced Jambon de Bayonne, which brought out the spice and minerality in the wine. It worked equally well with a hunk of Morbier, which just happens to come from nearby Franche-Comté and to be an only slightly less classic match than Comté itself. Here it was the pleasantly funky nuttiness of the cheese playing with the similarly wild, outdoorsy characteristics of the wine. And damn if it didn't prove a fine match with roast chicken, too.


Aside from mentions of "Singapore Chow Mei Fun" and "yellow," my notes are dominated by one other key phrase. "Buy." Priced in the high $30s, this is by no means inexpensive but it's money well spent for a wine that should develop extremely well in the cellar and that already delivers compelling pleasure. In one of those odd synchronicities in the wine blogging world, my cohort DoBi just wrote up Montbourgeau's regular bottling of L'Étoile, paired it with Chex Mix in homage to Dr. Vino's impossible food and wine pairings, and even took a picture that's very similar to my own. As Jeremy says, "Not everyone will like this wine." But that's okay, I do, so there'll be more for me.

Intro only...