What to do to protect viticulture from climate change?
I have read a lot about the drought in Spain and I have especially regretted it when visiting some Spanish vineyards...
Will we have to change crops?
They have it worse in France, I'm afraid, because you have mountains and you can raise the cultivation areas and thus improve the conditions in the face of heat and drought. In France it is more difficult for them to achieve it.
Is there any other alternative?
Recover varieties and diversify viticulture. I remember that I was once in an old vineyard in Cárdenas, in La Rioja, which had been planted in 1910 and in just 100 square meters there were ten different varieties of grapes...
Will there always be one that progresses?
It is the best strategy and the only one that guarantees good grapes in the long term. Of course it is easier to plant only one variety in the short term following the whims of the market, but it is also the most risky. In the past, no one planted just one variety, neither in vineyards, nor in fruit trees, nor in anything else.
Why is it the best strategy?
If a year came with a tremendous frost in April and in your vineyards you only had tempranillo, which is an early ripening grape variety... Well, goodbye harvest.
Do we have to learn from the ancestors?
At all, and thanks to them and their wise varietal diversity, today there are wine-growing regions that are better adapted to climate change, such as Galicia, or high-altitude vineyards in other regions.
As?
Graciano, Mazuelo, Cariñena, Garnacha... And what a pity the loss of so many Garnacha vines in Spanish vineyards!
Why does it hurt so much?
Garnacha withstands heat much better than Tempranillo...
Does the same happen in other regions?
I am specialized in the viticulture of South America and South Africa, and I was in Uruguay last week...
Do they suffer the same from the heating?
They have done well in their Atlantic frontage vineyards and now get some excellent wines there.
Better than the Spanish?
Look. If I were Spanish, Italian or French I would eat and drink nearby, but I am British and I have no choice, and that is why we had a commercial empire, than to travel, compare and buy...
Don't they have some good British wine thanks to climate change?
There are some sparkling... Let's leave it there. But we were the inventors of sherry, port and bordeaux... That's why today I don't taste a wine without going to see the vineyard and the vignerons and I talk to them: I listen to them.
Does the palate for tasting improve or worsen over the years?
The palate loses; but the palette of remembered flavors wins, and I think it makes up for it, or at least I want to believe it.
What is the worst wine you have tasted?
Many! There are so many! But since I've told you well about Uruguay, I'll also tell you that they have something they pompously call bourgogne and to which they actually add sugar...
Sacrilege!
A sacrilege that they love...
Like bleeding, I'm afraid.
And they offered it to me in a tasting that seemed serious! But I must add that I am not one to tell anyone what to like, and that includes the sangria. And the worst drink I've ever tasted is the lizard liqueur in Thailand, with the lizard included and visible in the bottle, with its huge open eyes...
Will you be original when you tell me what has been the best wine you have tasted?
Better yet: I'm going to be honest and tell you that sometimes it depends on who pays for it.
Don't they pay you to taste them?
Years ago I bought a box of Chateâuneuf-du-Pape...
Here I interviewed his vigneron, Jean-Pierre Perrin, by the hand of the master Abó.
...That box cost me 600 pounds, but they went up in price as I opened them, and the last bottle –it tasted glorious to me– cost and was already worth 2,300.
Doesn't it seem short-sighted to reduce the wine experience to its price?
You have said it: it is "the experience" that counts and includes the price and the feeling of having made the right choice, that the market agrees with you, when buying it.
Is it part of the experience?
And the memory. I lived in Avignon for a year and perhaps that is why my favorite is Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2005. And it is not money, but the memory that adds to the memory of the entire tasting experience. And it is very personal.
And doesn't it depend on the price now?
There are memories, the best, that cannot be bought or sold. And the wine – that does not depend on the price – enhances them.
