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Spring is here at last and the buds have burst
At last it feels as if Spring has arrived and in the vineyards, things are moving quickly.
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A Vouvray producer to look out for – Domaine d’Orfeuilles
Domaine d’Orfeuilles is an estate that has been in the Herivault family for more than 2 centuries.
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Keeping in local – Mathieu Cosme’s sparkling Vouvray
We try to source our food and wine locally wherever possible and it can’t get much more local than this.
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Wine education – assessing frost damage in the vineyards
As the weeks go by, we have a clearer idea of the level of frost damage in individual parcels here in the Loire.
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Understanding French wine labels. Part one – Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée.
French wine labels can be tricky to understand. The combination of unfamiliar vocabulary and a different language can make it difficult.
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Life in the Loire in 2021 – Goodbye to François Pinon.
The news filtered through quickly. It does in the wine world. Everyone knows everyone.
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Domaine d’Orfeuilles – Silex d’Orfeuilles 2018
A relatively new wine to us this is a lovely Vouvray that you should look out for. Some of Domaine d’Orfeuille’s wines are available in the US.
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We’re off. The 2020 harvest in Vouvray has begun.
The official go-ahead for harvest in the Vouvray appellation has been given but several growers requested permission to start a little earlier
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Le Van – a mobile wine bar in our village!
We have a mobile wine bar that comes to the village every Wednesday evening. The wines are interesting and include wines from the Loire and elsewhere in France.
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Technical vocabulary de-mystified – Floraison
So, we’re off again here in the Loire. We have floraison or flowering in the vines!
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Wine education – working the soil
Growers who choose not to use chemicals to control weeds underneath the vines ‘work’ the soil mechanically or occasionally use a horse.
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What’s been going on in the vineyards in February?
Unprecedented temperatures in the Loire valley this past two weeks have had growers pruning in their shorts and dreading an early budburst. The older generation can’t remember a February when the temperatures have been this high for so long.