Category: trips

Distillery Visit: Chateau de Maniban Armagnac at Chateau Castarede
I had the chance to visit the Chateau Castarede, a 17th Century estate/castle in the Bas Armagnac region where they produce armagnac. Florence Castarède was our host for the day. She says they're the oldest armagnac brand, but so too does Dartigalongue.

They make three armagnac labels:
- Armagnac Castarède
- Château de Maniban
- Nismes Delclou
They grow the grapes for their products, primarily Ugni Blanc and Colombard grapes. The region has the sandy soils full of fossils and shells of the former ocean floor.

They have two stills; one gas-powered, one wood-fueled.

While we were there, the cellarmaster was doing the annual inspection of the barrels of aging armagnac, tasting each one and noting whether or not it needed to be aerated.

Our brief visit there involved mostly a tour around the castle and then lots of time in their newest barrel room, where we spent a long time drinking barrels from our birth years. The older I get, the harder that is to find.
April 15, 2015
A Visit to a Cooperage in Armagnac

I had a chance to visit the cooper M. Gilles Bartholomo in the armagnac region of France. There was no sign out front and we were worried that we would miss it, but luckily a stack of air-drying barrel staves near the road clued us in.

This very small cooperage makes only barrels from local Gascony oak. On the property the staves are stacked up to air dry for between two and three years.

On the day we visited it had been raining, so we wondered if that would slow the drying process. It turns out that rain is a good thing: it washes out some of the tannins. You may be able to see in this picture a smear of dark brown tannins running off the stack of wood.

Wood that had been air drying longer had less of the tannin run-off in front of it. In front of one stack, there was a small puddle filled with tannin water. I convinced one of our hosts that she needed to taste it first lest it be poison, then I gave it a try: it was slightly woody but very tannic and drying on the tongue.

This facility produces a whopping 4 barrels per day, between 400 and 700 annually. The cooper says that contrary to rumor, there is no shortage of wood for barrels at the moment. Barrels cost 750 euros each.

The cooper says that most armagnac barrel buyers request a heavy toast to their barrels. (Remember that for French oak barrels, they are not charred like in bourbon, but toasted.)

All the excess sawdust from the process is sucked up in a ventilation system then deposited out into a shed, where a machine compresses it into fireplace logs.

April 14, 2015
Armagnac Baron De Lustrac Visit in Gascony, France

Armagnac Baron De Lustrac was unique among the 12 armagnac houses I visited in the fall of 2014. Most houses grow grapes or make wine or distill wine or age brandy, but Baron De Lustrac, or more accurately the company Millésimes et Tradition, they mostly bottle up single-vineyard, single-grape, single-vintage armagnacs that have been stored on the property where they were distilled.

Sometimes they do help with the on-site aging, performing tasks for the cask producers like aerating the brandy as is done in armagnac. The process seems weird but in armagnac small producers are often very, very small and may only make a barrel each year.

Baron de Lustrac has made a few vintages that are vintage blends from different vineyards, but this seems like the exception to their usual single-single-single scheme.

The property that I visited is really a bottling facility. Here they blend, filter, bring down to proof, and bottle by hand in a two-room garage. All the bottling is on-demand, so when someone calls in an order that's when they go to work.

On site, there aren't a mass of barrels rolled in from the farms where it's made (armagnac barrels don't move around much), but they're transferred to plastic containers to bring to here. Some are very small containers, as a customer may have requested a single special bottle from their birth year, etc.

Their reduction to bottle proof strategy is a lot faster than at other producers: On the day I visited they reduced a 48% ABV 30 liter barrel down to 40%, which requires 53 liters of water. The water is added in stages by half each time: 25 liters, then 12, 6, etc. over the course of one day. (Other producers we visited would reduce little by little over years, often with 'petite des eaux' – water that ages alongside the brandy.)

Here they also add caramel color before bottling but say it is only an amount that brings the bottle back to the color of the barreled armagnac before they added water to it.

We were able to try tiny sips of some very old armagnacs including a 1979 Baco, a 1973 Folle Blanche, a 1965 Folle Blanche, and a 1936 Folle Blanche that had been in barrel until 2009. Our host described as "the youngest old man I ever met."

April 8, 2015
Chateau De Laubade Armagnac Distillery Visit
I spent a great afternoon at Chateau De Laubade armagnac this past fall. Despite the huge fancy estate house, this wasn't much of a vineyard/winery/armagnac house until the 1970s. The property has a history as a research farm and is one of the southernmost properties in the Bas Armagnac.

The property has 260 acres (103 hectares) of vines: folle blanche, ugni blanc, colombard, and bcco. Their particular focus is on baco and folle blanche however, but you might not know it from their ratios: 50% ugni blanc, 35% baco, 15% folle blanche, and 8% colombard.

The region in which they're located, the Bas Armagnac, has sandy soil full of pebbles.

The estate property sits on a hill with a beautiful view of the surrounding forests and vineyards. They have even planted a small forest so that in 200 or so years they can make their own barrels on-site. That's some long-term thinking.

Though the wood is harvested elsewhere, they dry staves on the property for use in their barrels. These are air-dried for 3 years. Each year they make 70-100 new casks. The oak is all local and they help select the trees that will be used. The oak they like has wide grain and lots of tannins. This gives their armagnac lots of color so they don't have to use any coloring caramel in the bottled armagnac.

This year (the end of 2014), they'll be distilling for 32 days. This is a little less than usual due to a smaller harvest.

As is standard in armagnac, each year they combine the barrels for the year, often reduce it with water, then redistribute it to barrels. The barrels "never ever move", just the liquid inside them.

They have 7 aging warehouses onsite of various sizes, holding around 3000 casks in total. Some are rather huge, and some are tiny barns.

They do release some pre-1974 vintages from before they were in the armagnac business: these barrels were purchased. Their own still dates to 1975. They have just one continuous armagnac still and they distill 24/7 (as is normal) from October to December.

They distill different grapes to different proofs:
- Folle Blanche is distilled to 54-56% ABV
- Ugni Blanc is distilled to 56-59%
- Baco is distilled to 60-something
Every year they try distilling and keep raising the proof until they find the right one.

Here they have about a 2.5% angels' share.

The property is also notable because they hire artists-in-residence to build sculptures and installations on the property. The most recent was a cool little cottage dedicated to the angels' share with hoops and barrel staves suspended over water.

I'm hoping one day they decide to do writer-in-residence programs instead 🙂
April 7, 2015
De Montal Armagnac Distillery Visit
This fall I visited 12 armagnac houses in France. Some produce armagnac by blending aged eau de vie, some buy eau de vie and age it, some distill and age, some make wine, distill, and age, and some do all of it.

De Montal is produced by a coop of grape growers called CPG for Compagnie des Produits de Gascogne, located in Nogaro. De Montal is a brand they make produced for the export market. The company is made of 60 members, all grape growers in the Bas Armagnac region.

Distilling at De Montal

The facility is a huge operation and they make a lot of table wine. The still room is pretty big as well, with three continuous armagnac stills named Athos, Porthos and Aramis for the three musketeers, with a bust of D'Artagnan watching over them.

This year they were producing 5000 hectoliters of spirit. They distill the spirit up to 61-62% ABV in their stills for all their brands made on-site.

They say there is no law about the size of barrels in armagnac, unlike in tequila for example. Thus their 3 stars is aged all in big vats rather than barrels.

Here are some notes on stuff I tried, I believe all at 40% ABV:
- 3 Stars: Ages in huge barrels, never typical 400L armagnac barrels. 3 stars has the same age statement as VS but is typically of lower quality and used for cooking.
- VS: May age a bit in small barrels but mostly in large vats
- VSOP: 7-8 years, tastes like cognac
- XO: Around 15 years old: honey/cinnamon toast, woody
- 1995 vintage: similar notes
- 1985: buttery, more fruit, forest herbs, tastes more like armagnac
- 1975: herbs in honey, very good
April 2, 2015
Domaine De Pellehaut Armagnac Distillery Visit
My visit to Domaine de Pellehaut armagnac was super quick, and so also is this post.

The production facility is actually pretty huge. They grow vines, make wine, distill, and age on site.

They produce armagnac from the Tenareze region exclusively. Though they own the vines, they don't own the stills: they are serviced by one of the famous roving distillers. These distillers pull up, distill the wine, and move along to the next place.

Cows on the property, which are housed adjacent to the winery, are fed grape scraps to eat.

We tried a bunch of cognacs in the tasting room. Here are some notes that you will probably not find useful.
- L'Age de Glace (ice age): 3 year old armagnac made to be served on ice.
- 10 year old folle blanche: woody, french oak, balsam
- Reserve De Gaston: There is a different blend of this in the USA, but the version I tasted had lots of umami and meaty notes with butter and allspice
- 1989 Ugni Blanc 50% ABV: Tasty, rancio, wood in great balance
- 1983 Ugni Blanc 48% ABV: All over the place
March 31, 2015
Janneau Armagnac Distillery Visit

Maison Janneau armagnac is located near the town of Condom. It is the #1 exported brand of cognac, and it was purchased 10 days before my visit.

The brand was founded in 1851. In the 1970s it was sold to Martell cognac, then Martell was sold to Seagrams, then when Seagrams broke up it was sold to an Italian importer, then just sold to Spirits France. It is not currently for sale in the US, but that could certainly change.

Making Armagnac at Janneau

Janneau does not own vineyards. They purchase wine from about 20 different producers and distill it themselves. They purchase wine from all the top four grape varietals grown in both the Bas Armagnac and Tenareze regions.

They have both a typical armagnac column/continuous still and pot stills. They are one of just 3 armagnac houses that uses pot stills. They say that double pot still distillation is better for young armagnac.

The pot still for the first distillation is a huge 100 hectoliters still. It produces 40 hectoliters of spirit at 32% ABV after the first distillation.

The spirit is then split up and put into smaller stills for the second distillation. Each of the 25 hectoliters stills is filled with 20 hectoliters of spirit. During distillation, the first 50 liters are heads, then the heart is 700 liters at around 70-72% ABV, then the tails are 600 liters. In total, 100 hectoliters of wine produces 1400 liters of eau de vie using the pot stills.

Heads and tails are redistilled with the next batch, not discarded.

Dilution and Aeration of Armagnac

Armagnac needs a lot of aeration during aging, according to my hosts. The distiller says that the aeration doesn't diminish the aroma or blow off much of the alcohol in the aging spirit, but it helps homogenize together the brandy while aging. (In armagnac, standard procedure is to combine aging barrels' contents together and redistribute them each year, rather than letting the barrels get empty as they evaporate due to the angels' share.) As far as I can tell, this is pretty unusual or at least not discussed in other spirits.

Brandy typically comes off the still at 70% ABV when they double distill in pot stills. They dilute it to 65% before putting it in the barrel (when they single distill, they distill it up to 65% and don't need to dilute). They reduce the proof by 5% ABV each year until it reaches 50% ABV in three years, then decide how to use it – for which bottling. Each year when they do this they purposefully aerate the armagnac.

We happened to be there as they were dumping out some barrels to redistribute – they pour the brandy through a metal grate to help it aerate.

Aging and Bottling

Janneau's headquarters are quite amazing: It looks like an office with a garage entrance next to it, but then they gave us the tour. The structure is actually a gigantic barn with huge ceilings. We went down to the basement level where there were barrels aging beneath the ground floor offices, then another level beneath that. It was built, out of wood as far as I can tell, in 1851.

We also visited a large and newer warehouse with metal racks for the barrels.

One of the unique characteristics about armagnac is that often the aging facilities are combined with the offices and are centrally located. (There are more examples of this I'll talk about in other armagnac distillery visits from this trip.) Some aging warehouses are right near the centers of town – crazy given the amount of flammable liquids stored inside.

Janneau produces two different lines; the classic and the single-distillery line. Confusingly, the single-distillery line is all double distilled armagnac. But this allowed us to taste some comparisons: I tried an 18 year old single- and double-distilled armagnac blend versus an all double-distilled bottling. The one with some single-distilled armagnac had more body and texture, while the double distilled was thinner with more woody notes including allspice.

For my second armagnac distillery visited, this was pretty overwhelming in a good way.

March 25, 2015
Distillery Visit: Molinari Sambuca in Colfelice Italy
In the fall of 2014 I had a really terrific visit to the distilleries for Molinari Sambuca and Limoncello di Capri, both located south of Rome in Italy.

History Lesson

Molinari Sambuca is an anise liqueur originally created in Civitavecchia, a port city north of Rome. Much like Schiedam in the Netherlands where the spices that came on ships ended up in local spirits (juniper for genever and other ingredients for liqueurs in that case), star anise reaching Civitavecchia wound up in in local spirits and gave birth to the category of sambuca.

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

Molinari was not the first brand of sambuca on the market- that honor belongs to Luigi Manzi and his Sambuca Manzi going back to 1851; also in Civitavecchia.

However it was Molinari Sambuca, created by Angelo Molinary in 1945, that became world famous (and is still the best-selling sambuca in the world). During the "La Dolce Vita" era in Italy the brand purchased TV ads and it became the second-best selling spirit in Italy after Aperol.

Today there are two Molinari distilleries. One is still in Civitavecchia (though they say the facility is now more for administration and a small production line) and the other is Colfelice, about a 1 hour drive south of Rome, where they make the majority of the product.

The company is still run by family members. Only one person per generation knows the exact recipe for Molinari, but after one of them was kidnapped and held for ransom many years ago they decided that they should also keep a copy in a vault.

Making Molinari

The primarily flavor of Molinari comes from star anise that is imported from southeast China. To prepare it, the fruits are harvested, the seeds are blanched to stabilize them, they are then partially crushed and essential oils are extracted through water distillation. I believe this all happens in China, though some refinement of the essential oils may occur locally. Most of the essential oil from star anise comes from the seeds.

*Note: I somehow lost most of my photos from the trip so I'm using those of Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing.

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

There are other secret ingredients in Molinari. (Wikipedia notes that licorice and elderflowers are often found in sambuca but I'm not sure what's in this one.)

The sugar used for Molinari is non-GMO sugar derived from sugar beets. They say it has a high solubility which makes it good for use in liquids.

The base alcohol is distilled from wheat (they purchase, rather than distill it). Often that wheat is grown in France but it is distilled in Italy.

To make Molinari they combine demineralized water at 60-75 degrees Celsius with sugar so that it dissolves. They wait for it to cool then add 96% ABV alcohol and essential oils.

The mixture rests for 5 days in large tanks. It is then filtered with a 3 micron cellulose filter at room temperature. (Chill-filtering sambuca would cause the louche effect and remove many of those essential oils they just added.)

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

Molinari Caffe

Molinari Caffe has been made since 2003 but it was just reintroduced to the US market this winter.

It is made primarily with two kinds of coffee: Aribica (from the Domonican Republic/Java region) and Robusta from Africa. The coffee is roasted in Italy before making the liqueur here at the distillery. It is not just a coffee liqueur – the base Molinari Sambuca is there as well so it's a coffee-anise liqueur.

The color comes in part from burnt caramel. My hosts tell me that if you use burnt caramel for coloring you don't need to declare it on the label per EU rules, but other caramel coloring does need to be declared.

Photo: Stephanie Fray of Conundrum Marketing

Legal Regulations for Sambuca

Below are the EU regulations [file here as a PDF] for Sambuca.

38. Sambuca

(a) Sambuca is a colourless aniseed-flavoured liqueur:
- (i) containing distillates of anise (Pimpinella anisum L.), star anise (Illicium verum L.) or other aromatic herbs,
- (ii) with a minimum sugar content of 350 grams per litre expressed as invert sugar,
- (iii) with a natural anethole content of not less than 1 gram and not more than 2 grams per litre.
(b) The minimum alcoholic strength by volume of sambuca shall be 38 %.
L 39/42 EN Official Journal of the European Union 13.2.2008

(c) The rules on flavouring substances and preparations for liqueurs laid down under category 32 apply to sambuca.

(d) The sales denomination may be supplemented by the term ‘liqueur’.

Note that the regulations define sambuca as 'colourless' but there are red and green and black ones on the market at least in the UK. Not sure how that's allowed.

One Quick Recipe

Molinari has hired the talented Gegam Kazarian to develop cocktails with the brand. We tried several of them at a tasting at the cocktail bar Barnum Cafe in Rome. The Cucumis Collins was my favorite of the bunch.

Cucumis Collins
By Gegam Kazarian

60 ml Molinari Extra
30 ml Lemon Juice
60 ml Sparkling Water
60 g Fresh Cucumber
Cherry tomato
Lemon Peel

Muddle the cucumber in a cocktail shaker then add liquid ingredients except sparkling water. Shake with ice and strain into collins glass. Add sparkling water and garnish with lemon peel, and cherry tomato, and a thin slice of cucumber.
March 4, 2015
A Daylong Visit to Cognac Hine

I visited a bunch of cognac houses in the fall of 2014, and spent nearly a whole day with Cognac Hine at their vineyards, winery, distillery, and blending house.

I didn't realize that there are 250 or so cognac houses, so my visit to less than 20 of them is small potatoes. The big potatoes belong to Hennessy, which makes 42% of all cognac. They, plus the other 3 of the Big Four houses, create 80% of cognac sold. Hine does about 1 percent of Hennessy's volume.

The Vineyards

Hine owns 70 hectares under vine in Grande Champagne but don't grow all of their own grapes – they produce about 25% of their own needs.

Cellarmaster Eric Forget says that in 2014 (I was there just before harvest) they expected to harvest grapes that would make 9.5% alcohol at about 3.4 pH. Just about all harvesting is mechanical in Cognac. Hine rents the picking machines and grape presses to make their portion of wine.

Forget says that vines in the region are typically sprayed to prevent mildew, and it is difficult to make organic wine in the region because of the humid weather. Near to harvest time, they can't spray anymore as that could get into the wine.

When the grape juice arrives at the winery, they start fermentation with dry yeast in stainless steel tanks at 17 degrees Celsius. They temperature control fermentation and storage because for cognac you can't add sulfur or anything else as a preservative while the wine waits to be distilled.

Distilling For Hine

The distillery we visited isn't owned by the brand, but they're independent distillers who make almost all of Hine's brandy. (Hine is only 10% of the distillery's business on the other hand.)

The wine that comes into the distillery is distilled up to 30% ABV after the first distillation. They do make a heads and tails cut after the first as well as the second distillation. The second distillation brings the spirit up to 70-72% ABV. Each distillation takes about 12 hours.

It takes approximately 10 liters of wine to produce 1 liter of spirit.

When a brand like Hine has wine distilled for them, they are able to specify certain distillation parameters. These may include whether or not to distill on the lees, that the heads cuts are 30 liters or whatever, how long the distillation time should be, the temperature of distillation, etc.

For Hine, they distill the wine on the lees, which are the bits of yeast and other bits left floating in the liquid after fermentation. Hine also specifies a smaller cut (meaning more heads in the spirit) but generally tells the distiller to do what they think is best.

I asked the distiller why a premium brand would direct the distillation of a smaller cut, which includes what we think of as more undesirable elements of the heads/tails into the spirit. He said that larger brands do larger cuts because its a 'safer' cut, but also probably results in less interesting brandy.

Aging Cognac at Hine

Forget says, "The philosophy of Hine is to use as little wood as possible," which means they're avoid woody flavors and wood influence. The use fine grain oak, and have their barrels toasted to a low level char.

They say that cognac won't improve in barrel after 50-60 years or so, and they'd transfer it to glass demijohns at that point.

Hine is a cognac that produces a lot of "Early Landed" cognacs, which are not aged in France but in England. By the way, I learned that the amazing grocery/liquor store in Sacramento, Corti Brothers, has a small specialty selection of early landed cognacs.

They also released a unique single-vintage, single-vineyard cognac called Domaines HINE Bonneuil 2005.

Anyway, this visit was my last cognac house for my 2014 trip, and a beautiful way to end it.

February 25, 2015
The Complicated Aging Process for Cognac, as Seen at Cognac Hardy
In 2014 I visited several cognac houses, and had the pleasure to spend several hours with Benedicte Hardy of Cognac Hardy in their aging and blending facilities.

We got really nerdy with specifics on aging cognac. But first, some background.

Hardy specializes in luxury cognacs, and in general is blended in an "approachable" and "feminine" style. It's a very large operation, with 20,000 barrels aging at their warehouses valued at more than 50 million dollars worth of booze.

It was Benedicte's father who made the company famous in recent years putting the emphasis on luxury. She herself has a law degree and is in charge of the US market, so there may be opportunities to meet with her at events in the States (and I'd highly recommend doing so if the occasion arises- she's a character).

A Cognac Maker, Not A Distiller

Hardy is not a cognac house that grows, ferments, and distills grapes, but they do work with a co-op of 200 growers.

The blender, Michael, buys spirit from Grande Champagne, Petite Champagne, Fin Bois, and Bon Bois. But he doesn't just purchase already-distilled wine, he goes to the distillery/wineries to taste before/after and helps direct the distillation if need be. He said that for example, if a wine is super aromatic he might instruct the distillery to distill on the lees, which will mark the spirit for longer aging.

Regardless, he tastes the new-make spirit after purchase and makes a determination on which product they're destined for – VSOP, XO, etc. He says that 90% of the time the initial determination is correct and they won't have to redirect it off its appointed path later on.

Aging Cognac Versus Other Spirits

Many of the world's spirits, including nearly all scotch whisky, rum, and tequila, age in ex-bourbon casks. The wood has had its influence on the bourbon and vice-versa. So the next time that barrel is used to age rum or whatever, it will not have the same amount of influence on the color and flavor of the next spirit.

In cognac and armagnac, on the other hand, they do not use ex-bourbon casks but new and used French oak barrels. The wood gives a lot of influence when it is first used, and in the case of French oak it brings in lots of tannins along with flavor.

So while bourbon ages only in new barrels for its entire life, cognac is usually aged only for a small amount of time in new barrels then it is transferred into older barrels for the rest of its life so that the wood doesn't take over. (One thing to note that in Cognac, a 'new' barrel means that it has been used for three years or less; it's doesn't necessarily mean brand new.)

In scotch whisky and rum and tequila, since they're using used barrels from the get-go, they don't have to worry so much about the over-oaking so they don't need to move the liquids around unless they feel like it.

Aging at Hardy

So that was a lot of lead-up. Here is how the VSOP is aged at Cognac Hardy.
1. The brandy is purchased at 70% ABV
2. It is reduced with water down to 55% and put in Small (220 liter), New barrels. (Note that a typical cognac barrels is 350 liters)
3. The barrels are divided up – some are put into dry cellars and others are put into humid cellars. The ratio is a house secret.
4. At 18 months the barrels are moved into Dry cellars
5. At 24 months, the cognac is reduced to 47% ABV and placed in Humid Cellars
6. After 5 years, the cognac is reduced to 43% ABV and placed back into Small barrels
7. After 8 years, the cognac is blended and reduced to 40%
8. After another 6 months marrying, it is bottled.
Notes About That:
- At each barrel transfer stage, the cognac is taken out from individual barrels and put into a big vat before dilution, then redistributed to the next barrels. No wonder cognac is so pricey.
- Humid cellars at Hardy have about a 3% annual angels' share, while dry ones have 6%.
- For longer-aged XO cognac, they put it into barrels that have been toasted for longer so that these will continue to contribute their toasted effects to it
- XO has the same reduction with water scheme as the VSOP, but the toasting is different. (Additionally it is made from brandy that was more distilled on the lees than the younger brandies.)
- Chill filtration before bottling is at -7 degrees Celsius for 7 days before running it through the filter
The $64,000 Tasting

We were allowed to taste the highest of the high end Hardy cognacs bottled in Lalique decanters, which retail for $16,000 per bottle. They all come from the same stock of cognacs distilled in the 1920s-1940s, but are blended to bring out different aspects of each.

They are named for each of the four seasons, though currently only the spring (Le Printemps) is on the market. Summer launches in November 2015, and Fall and Winter will follow every 2 years from that.

It's weird and rather awesome to be able to taste a cognac that won't hit the market until 2019.
February 24, 2015