Merry Christmas !!!

Staub - Cast Iron made in France

STAUB gathers people around good food in the kitchen and at the table. Each of their heirloom pieces comes with a story. Born in Alsace, a French region known for its craftsmanship and cuisine, their  cast iron cookware bring a taste of authenticity to every meal. Just look for the STAUB seal on every product. The name is a promise to you that you’re cooking with the best of France…wherever your kitchen may be.

Foodies, amateur chefs, tour guests : we can visit Staub on a "Wine tour" or "Wine and Villages tour" when we are near Turckheim.

Checkout a recent Facebook post with a Staub video here.

Google Business site

Not sure why Google "gives" you another website or as they call it Business Site, but here is ours.
Some posts from that site on a row.

Costs of French wine property per hectare (ha) in different regions in 2017

With a big thanks to iDEALwine and Safer:

En 2017, le prix des vignes de toutes les catégories de vins ont progressé :

• +2,3% pour les AOP
• +4,2% pour les AOP hors Champagne (en Champagne, le gain est plus modeste : +0,8%)
• +8,1% pour les eaux-de-vie
• +3% pour les hors AOP

La hausse générale est le fruit de plusieurs bassins régionaux :

• +7,2% en Alsace
• +5,5% dans le Rhône (ici, presque toutes les appellations progressent, y compris les plus réputées)
• +4,9% en Bourgogne-Beaujolais-Savoie-Jura (les grands et premiers crus bourguignons poursuivent leur envolée)
• +3,8% en Val de Loire-Centre (due en grande partie à Sancerre et Saint-Nicolas-de-Bourgueil)
• +3,1% en Bordeaux-Aquitaine (du fait des appellations bordelaises les plus prestigieuses, Pomerol, Saint-Estèphe, Saint-Emilion)
• +0,8% en Champagne (une hausse modérée du fait d’un repli de la Côte des Blancs)
• +8,1% en Charentes-Cognac (du fait des exportations record en 2017)

La valeur du patrimoine foncier viticole AOP (69,4 milliards d’euros, +2,3%) est concentrée à 86% dans trois bassins qui ne couvrent pourtant que 45% des surfaces : la Champagne, qui représente à elle seule 55% de la valeur du total, plus de 38M€ (et seulement 7% des surfaces plantées), devant Bordeaux (12,7M€, +18%) (pour 28% des surfaces) et le bassin Bourgogne-Beaujolais-Savoie-Jura (8,8 7M€), pour 10% des surfaces.

Entre 1997 et 2017, le prix moyen national des vignes AOP a été multiplié par 2,5 (en valeur constante).  Le premier facteur d’augmentation du prix des vignes reste la baisse des taux d’intérêts, associé à une augmentation du revenu viticole. Le prix des vignes hors AOP, qui avait nettement diminué entre 2000 et 2010, remonte depuis 2010. Une remontée qui peut s’expliquer en partie par le dynamisme du Languedoc sur ce segment (qui représente 70% des surfaces hors AOP) et aussi par l’arrachage et la replantation de cépages plus qualitatifs.

LE PRIX MOYEN DES VIGNES DES PRINCIPALES APPELLATIONS EN 2017

La méthodologie choisie tend à lisser l’évolution des prix, en éliminant les transactions les plus élevées et les transactions les moins élevées.

A Bordeaux

(prix d’un hectare de vigne, évolution par rapport à l’année précédente)

Pauillac : 2 000 000 €/ha1 (-0,79%)
Saint-Estèphe : 450 000 €/ha (+17,49%)
Saint-Julien : 1 200 000  €/ha (-0,79%)
Moulis : 80 000 €/ha (-0,7%)
Listrac : 75 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Pessac-Léognan :  450 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Sauternes : 30 000 €/ha (-15%)
Pomerol : 1 500 000 €/ha (+14,5%)
Saint-Emilion : 250 000 €/ha (+7,85%)
Fronsac : 30 000 €/ha (-15%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations de Bordeaux

En Bourgogne

Les grands crus : 6 000 000 €/ha (+8%)
Les premiers crus blancs : 1 536 000 €/ha (+4,1%)
Les premiers crus rouges : 650 000 €/ha (+2,3%)
Chablis : 164 000 €/ha (+4,99%)
Chablis premier cru : 350 000 €/ha (+0,3%)
Mâcon blanc : 65 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Pouilly-Fuissé : 240 000 €/ha (-0,8%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations de Bourgogne

En Champagne

Côte des Blancs : 1 472 200 €/ha (-4,7%)
Côte d’Epernay, Grande Montagne : 1 188 900 €/ha (-0,19%)
Autres régions (Marne) : 1 040 000 €/ha (+1,17%)
Aube : 1 004 100 €/ha (+2,52%)

Plus d’informations sur les régions de Champagne

Dans le Rhône

Saint-Joseph : 120 000 €/ha (+9%)
Hermitage : 1 100 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Cornas : 450 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Crozes-Hermitage : 120 000 €/ha (+8,21%)
Châteauneuf-du-Pape : 405 000 €/ha (+3%)
Gigondas : 180 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Vacqueyras : 90 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Ventoux : 20 000 €/ha (+10,5%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations du Rhône

Dans la Loire

Sancerre : 160 000 €/ha (+9,44%)
Pouilly-Fumé : 155 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Bourgueil : 20 000 €/ha (1%)
Chinon : 22 000 €/ha (-1%)
Montlouis-sur-Loire : 9 000 €/ha (+11,1%)
Vouvray : 21 000 (-1%)
Saumur : 14 000 €/ha (+2,9%)
Touraine : 8 000 €/ha (-1,2%)
Anjou : 14 000 €/ha (+6,87%)
Saumur (Maine-et-Loire) : 19 000 €/ha (-1%)
Saumur-Champigny : 58 000 €/ha (0%) (un chiffre qui ne prend pas en compte le rachat du Clos Rougeard par Martin et Olivier Bouygues en 2017, ce qui traduit des choix méthodologiques spécifiques.)
Muscadet : 10 000 €/ha (-1%)
Muscadet Sèvre-et-Maine : 12 000 €/ha (-0,8%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations de Loire

En Alsace

Alsace (Bas-Rhin) : 106 000 €/ha (+6,1%)
Alsace (Haut-Rhin) : 153 600 €/ha (+6,7%)

Plus d’informations sur les régions d’Alsace

Dans le Jura

Arbois : 36 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Château-Chalon : 55 000 €/ha (-0,7%)
Côtes du Jura : 27 000 €/ha (+3%)
L’Etoile : 23 000 €/ha (+3,6%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations du Jura

Dans le Sud-Ouest

Jurançon : 40 000 €/ha (-0,7%)
Madiran (Pyrénées-Atlantiques) : 15 000 €/ha (-0,7%)
Madiran (Hautes-Pyrénées) : 18 000 €/ha (-0,5%)
Madiran (Gers) : 16 000 €/ha (-0,6%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations du Sud-Ouest

Dans le Languedoc -Roussillon

Fitou : 11 000 €/ha (-0,9%)
Languedoc – Pic Saint-Loup : 40 000 €/ha (+4,44%)
Languedoc – Terrasses du Larzac : 20 000 €/ha (+16,96%)
Saint-Chinian : 12 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Faugères : 16 000 €/ha (-0,6%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations du Languedoc-Roussillon

En Provence

Cassis : 100 000 €/ha (-0,8%)
Bellet : 245 000 €/ha (-0,8%)

Plus d’informations sur les appellations de Provence

En Corse

Calvi : 18 000 €/ha (-28,6%)
Patrimonio et Coteaux du Cap Corse : 40 000 €/ha (-0,7%)
Ajaccio : 25 000 €/ha (+23,8%)
Vin de Corse (Figari, Sartène, Porto-Vecchio) : 25 000 €/ha (-0,8%)

1 Prix moyen (€ constants /ha) ; variation 2017/2016. Source : Safer

What a private tour does not mean !

The advantage of a private tour is that you/we can adjust and tune many things beforehand. 

For wine tours we can pick a theme (just Rieslings for example) and/or specific area in Alsace, Burgundy or Tuscany.

At village tours we can skip a village or change a village I normally go to for another one.

But (future) customers please understand that booking a private tour does NOT mean tthat you can change everything on the tour day itself.

For wine tastings at the better wineries,  I must make appointments some time before. We can NOT just drop in everywhere as we please.  

On a  “Wine & Villages tour” we normally do one extensive wine tasting. Now I can change things and add one more tasting on such a tour, but I cannot do 3 or 4. And the other way around : “If” tasting appointments are made by me , we reserved time at those wineries. We cannot just not show up then. They are waiting for us and cancelled other visitors.

The same goes for lunch restaurants. 

I make reservations before based on quality and price. I often reserve a table at a Michelin starred restaurant. We cannot just not show up then, because “the weather is so nice” and people want to sit outside. The restaurant is waiting for us and cancelled other customers because of our reservation.

Cheers to some great tours coming up!

Join us on a tour or tasting

JoliSoleil organizes wine tours and wine tastings in or near Gerardmer, in the Netherlands and in California.

Cast iron stoves and wood burning

Wood burning has gotten a bad reputation in Holland, because of pollution and "fine dust". Here where I live in France, it is what you do to stay warm and cook in winter though. And if there is one thing I have learned over the years, is that you should not fight nature but comply with it. 

Forests everywhere, wood everywhere.....This is what people have been doing here for centuries. Dry wood....right size..right temperature. .

Only heating my radiators with fuel costs me a fortune and the big space in the farm still stays chilly. Warming up the cast iron in the Rayburn woodstove in the kitchen and in the chimney of the big fire place in the main room gives a nice warmth that stays for 16-24 hours without adding new wood. That means you normally pick up in the morning where you have left in the evening. And it stays comfy. Of course we also roast and bbq in the big fire place.

Eau de Vie (and Marc de Vie) in Alsace and Burgundy

Water of Life

One of the lesser-known spirit categories is eau-de-vie. Most people will have tried one, and often without realising as various countries’ national drinks are classified as eau-de-vie, such as Raki from Turkey and European Slivovitz.

Confusingly, eau-de-vie (French for ‘water of life’) is a term used in French to mean ‘spirit’. But in English-speaking countries, it refers to brandies made with fruit other than grapes.
Not all will use the term on the label – common types of eau-de-vie include Romanian Tuică, Schnapps from Germany, Hungarian Pálinka and Ceylon Arrack from Sri Lanka.

So: An eau de vie is a clear, colourless fruit brandy that is produced by means of fermentation and double distillation. The fruit flavour is typically very light.

History

They tell a tale in the broad, pine-clad Ville Valley, which cuts into the foothills of the Vosges beneath the frowning fortress of Haut-Koenigsbourg. In the 17th century, they say, an Alsatian monk boiled up some fermented cherries to produce an elixir he hoped would provide a cure for cholera.
He called it ''eau de vie'' or ''water of life.''

Well, maybe. What is certain is that for several hundred years, this valley and others in Alsace have been producing clear, unsweetened fruit brandies called eaux de vie, which are not to be confused with liqueurs like creme de banane.

Eaux de vie do not cure cholera (or anything else, for that matter), but at their best they rank among the world's great after-dinner drinks -- evocatively perfumed, rich, pure and explosively flavorful, almost like biting into a perfectly ripe raspberry or Bartlett pear.
So great is the intensity of aroma and flavor that you have a virtual orchard in your glass. Leave that glass sitting out, emptied but unwashed, and 48 hours later a faint scent of fresh fruit will linger in the air.


How is it made?

It is made in a similar way to Cognac and other grape brandies. The method varies, but usually the fruit is pressed to extract its juice, fermented with the help of yeast (which can be either commercially produced, or by using naturally occurring strains within the fruit) to create an alcoholic liquid, and then distilling it.
Eau-de-vie are usually unaged, and are usually bottled soon after production to preserve aroma and flavour.

Pomace brandy is a liquor distilled from pomace that is left over from winemaking, after the grapes are pressed. It is called marc in both English and French. So you could say that "marc" is a special kind of Eau de Vie.

At Windholz in Ribeaville

Tasting Eau de Vie or a Marc at a wine tour

Many Alsatian and Burgundy wineries produce Eau de Vie and/or Marc next to their wines.

Apart from that there are some specialized distillers in the area's.

Don't forget to ask us for a smell and sip, while we are on the road tasting wines with you.
We also love to mark your "marc".

At Windholz in Ribeaville