Monday, December 30, 2013

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!

Hope you guys had a blast and had an awesome NYE !!!



From Wine Time Forever 's team

Sunday, December 29, 2013

Champagne for New Year !!!

Almost New Year Eve!!!
  


Time for Champagne !!!!

What do you now about Champagne ? 

It is a sparkling wine, YES !
BUT why doesn't it taste like any other sparkling in the world ?

To be call "Champagne" it have to me made in the french region Champagne and the wine growers have to respect a lot of things with the vine and how to mature it.

First : The Champagne region : 

Realy close to Paris
You can go to Reims easily by car or train(90 miles)
 
You can see the 5different areas where you can make Champagne :

Montagne de Reims
Vallée de la Marne
Côte des Blancs
Coteaux du Sézannais
Les vignobles de l'Aube




Cepage or grappe variety  :

The Champagne can only make with this 3 varieties of grappe :



      Pinot Meunier 




                                     Pinot Noir








                                                       Chardonnay






Champagne are the only one who can mix red and with grappe to produce white and rosé.

Champagnisation

How the wine become sparkling ?

We will not explain all chimical detail, BUT how to create bubbles into the wine.
Here are the big differences to make Champagne :
1- Grappe Harvest or Vendange
2 - Pressing or Pressurage
3 - Settling of the juce or Debourbage
same for still wine THEN
4 - Bottling or Tirage
Add a liqueur de tirage (sugar + yeast)
5 - A alcoholic fermentation in bottle call "prise de mousse"
6 - Bottle aging
The bottle is place on a "pupitre" and riddling it often to obtain all the deposit into the bottle-neck
7 - Disgorgement or Degorgement 
Take out the deposit : freeze the part with the deposit. When you open the bottle, it get ou with the pression
8 -Dosage of liqueur
Replace the deposit by a liqueur (wine and sugar), the quantity of sugar will define if the Champagne is brut, sec, demi sec ou doux

 The different types of Champagne

But

Demi-Sec

Rosé

*Brut Nature or Extra Brut
this Champagne is made with the minimum of sugar required for the "Champagnisation".

*Blanc de Blanc
white champagne made only with white grappes (Chardonnay)

*Blanc de Noir
white Champagne made only with red grappes (Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir)


ENJOY
AND SEE YOU NEXT YEAR !!!


Sunday, December 22, 2013

Winter time !




Make less noise winers !!
It's time to sleep for vineyards...

In France, our vineyards are now falling into an hibernation  cycle ! It's means that the vineyards will be living with their reserves of starch until March.

So how is it working ?

In fact, the sap goes back into the roots to withstand the extreme of cold. 
Amazing fact : did you you know thar the plant can survive until -15°C?!
 




If you're in Bordeaux this week or in any other big city in France, you guys all shall go to the Christmas market and try the famous "Vin Chaud" to warm you up ! We have tasted the one from Alsace this week in Bordeaux and all we can say is GO FOR it !! Plus, you can keep this adorable glass for only 1€ ! 








We wish you guys a Merry Christmas, have fun with your family, and…. 
don't forget to drink wine of course !!!



Sunday, December 15, 2013

Tasting Method


You like Wine but you never know how to say what you like or dislike in it ?
This Week we want to give you the words to describe what you see, what you smell and what you taste. 


Color                  Smell                Taste            So What ? 

There are different steps in wine tasting and it is important to respect each one of them.

Color

The first step for wine tasting, is to check the color of the wine in your glass. Tilt up your glass and try to say what you see.
NB : As the wine mature, the color change in a natural progression from light to dark shade.




► Red Wine  

Thanks to the grape skins, you have the wine tannin. This is the most important taste difference with the white wine.
There are different shade you can discern. 

Purple-Red is a common color for young, often immature wines. 
If the wine has a Ruby dye, it means this is a wine in the way of maturity. 
The Garnet color indicates a wine at peak of their maturity
Mahogany color means that the wine has a considerable age but it also can be too old sometimes. 


► White Wine 

A white wine with pales yellow/green shade is a young wine.
The Light yellow color is typical of dry wine. 
When a wine is older it will develop a shade of gold. It means that the wine is richer and more complex. 


Smell

Second step: examine the smell of the wine. 

Take your glass and put your nose into the glass to make a full sniff. Think about what you smell.

Then make your wine slowly move and make a second full sniff. In the second nose, you will smell more things. 

Try to put words in what you feel. If you notice fruity smells like Citrus or Raspberry it probably means that this is a young wine. 

Conversely, if you smell something more complex like oak or bushmeat this is an older one.

When do you actually drink the wine? That's next…

Taste

At least you will taste the wine. You will pick up flavor from wine if you swish it around in your mouth. You have to pay attention to the sensation you feel. Try to express what you feel with words.  
You can find four tastes in wine tasting : Sugar, Acidity, Salted and bitter.  There's a typical character in each wine from every specific terroir.
Degustation in the mouth is made by three steps. The first one is named "attaque". Wine express itself at the begin. Then this is the "milieu de bouche". At the end you will feel tannins astringent or not. 


Words for Wine Tasting


Flabby : Without structure, too soft.
Corky : defective cork in the bottle, unplaisant smell
Insipid : Lack of character and acidity

BodyThe weight and substance of the wine in the mouth. 
FruityThe aroma and flavour of fresh grapes found in fine young wines. It will be lower with age.
Woody : Flavour of oak resulting to long storage in barrels. We can found it in Spanish and Australian wines.



Thursday, December 5, 2013

The "Olfactif route"

Improve your skills...

As a playful and funny way to improve your skills in wine tasting. We propose you to nose out a secret called "Le parcours olfactif" "olfactif route". This concept has been developed by an ingenious woman from Burgundy. The idea is to develop your skills and familiarize your nose with smells from red & white wines. You will also learn how to detect defect from wines such as a corked wine.




This concept is going to arrive in Bordeaux and we will tell you where you can find out this olfactif route. This is a perfect idea to have a great moment with your friends, with your family and even with your childs because this concept also have a special barrel with smells for kids.

Sunday, December 1, 2013

Bottle shapes


How to recognize different shapes of bottle ? 

Hello winers ! 


Have you ever been in a supermarket, grocery store or wine cellar to buy a bottle of wine ? 
I'm sure yes ! 
But have you ever ask yourself why there are so much different shapes of bottle ? 

This week we‘re going to simplify your life. We want to show you each form of bottle and where they come from. We want to make you able to say " I can tell it is a "Bordeaux" just by looking at the shape of the bottle."

Bottle of Bordeaux : "La Bordelaise"
Until the 17th Century, bottles were fragile, expansive and not very convenient. Thanks to the British,  Bordeaux Bottle changed and became the current cylindric one. 

Bottle of Burgundy : "La Bourguignonne" 
High, with soft should, thin neck and lighly cone-shaped. The Burgundy one is larger than the Bottle of Bordeaux. There are different color, green is the most used. 

Bottle of Alsace : "L'Alsacienne" 
This bottle is taller than the other, fancy and thin. This specific shape is protected by an edict from 1955.

Bottle of Provence : "La Provençale" 
There are two different shape of bottle for the Côte de provence appellation. 
The first one is with "flûtes à Corset" closer at the middle of the bottle and the other one has a shape of an equilateral triangle. Sometime, the Côte de Provence use the Bordeaux bottle shape


And remember : Drink responsibly (or this could happen to you) ! :