Heard it on the grapevine: Georgian wine on its way to London
...I travelled to Georgia for Jellied Eel to explore their tradition
for producing ‘natural’ wines, an approach to winemaking that’s
generating great interest here in Britain...
Made with organic or biodynamic grapes, natural winemaking demands
the absolute minimum of interventions and additives (except sulfites in
some cases), in stark contrast to many larger-volume mass market wines
that are more heavily manipulated to ensure a consistent product.
In Georgia, the ‘kvevri’ is at the heart of this process – and,
indeed, of the national psyche itself. This large clay pot, egg-like in
shape but more pointed towards the bottom, is buried in the ground,
filled and sealed.
"Lets drink! For we are all Georgian!"
"Let us toast the people of Georgia, it brings tears to my eyes
to see visitors from another country, to see your pleasure, the sparkle
when you talk."
"I would like to toast by singing a song. Let us drink to friendship"...
These were some of the shorter toasts that started at around 1pm and went on until almost midnight. This tradition of Tamada is
typically Georgian, passing around a horn from which to drink, growing
more abstract and effusive in praise as the evening wears on.
I've had a fantastic but long second day in Tbilisi. I've been struck
by the almost innocent generosity and hospitality of the Georgians.
It's the first country I've been to in a long time where if you take a
picture of someone, they smile rather than ask you for money... (read the full article here)
"I take off my sheet. I'm completely nude"...
...He tells me to lay on the marble slab then he scrubs me with a
rough glove over my entire body, back and front. At one point he points
to my arms where tiny scrolls of grey skin has formed. He nods
cheerfully to me with a wolf-like smile; the implication is clear: 'look
how dirty you are and how clean I am making you'.
I react with shock as he throws a bucket of boiling hot sulphuric water over my head...
...We have spent two days on the road to Kakheti, in Eastern Georgia,
visiting wine growers. They all have fascinating back stories: many
started making wine as a hobby, buying country houses while retaining a
base at the capital of Georgia, Tbsili. Some of them are now
professional full-time wine makers.
There is laughing Nika Bakhia,
the artist/sculptor who lived in Germany, who dresses in a curious
peasant costume, ethno-chic. He surveys his vineyards, pointing to the
black burnt patches where other local farmers, dubious of his
new-fangled bio-dynamic methods, have set fire to his property. With
tears in his eyes, he recounts how "five times" he has had to rebuild
his vineyard...
...Another sun drenched 'supra' lunch is held at Our Wine,
the surrounding grass dotted with wild parma violets and the odours
from a brush wood barbeque, is the home and vineyard of a doctor of
medicine and a linguist, Soliko Tsaishvili and Irakli Pruidze. They talk
about homeopathic methods and astrology in wine-making...
...In the morning sun, next to a babbling brook, a well, and stony houses, we taste some more wines. This guy, Khakha Berishvili, is a Georgian vegetarian, wears hippy clothing and is a big jazz fan. This inspires myself and wine blogger Donald Edwards to characterise the wines by ascribing them musician's personalities. "This one tastes like Iggy Pop, all sinews and wild eyed rocknroll", Donald gargled...(read the full article here)
"Have you ever considered visiting Georgia?"...
...I’m talking the country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia here, not the American state.
Nope, I hadn’t either. I barely had any idea where to stab my finger
on a map, let alone any knowledge of the food, the people, the wine; all
of which, I found out last week, are very loveable indeed.
The Georgians are remarkable characters, famous for their
hospitality; warm, open and generous, their eyes sparkle and their
laughter flows. My first real encounter with the locals was in the food
market we visited in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital. The Georgians are not
yet so used to tourists that they have become jaded; they welcome you to
their stalls to taste food, without any expectations that you will
buy...(read the full article here)
"Apparently, Georgia was the first country to start making wine"...
...they’ve been doing it for 8000 years. The way they do it is really
interesting, though. No barrels for them. They get these massive clay
pots called qvevri, and they bury them in the ground. Then they whack
everything (juice, skins, stems) in there, seal it up with clay and let
it all separate out. The wine is then drawn off the top very carefully
using a special jug on a stick. They use a really old grape variety
called Rkatsiteli which comes out freakin’ orange! Then there’s another
one, which is red and called Saperavi. They’re both native to Georgia.
The first time I tasted the orange wine, I was quite taken aback; that
stuff is just totally unlike any wine I’ve ever tasted; kinda funky but,
you know what? I got into it. By the end of that trip I think we were
all a bit Georgian...
...I found it fascinating, even despite my insecurity telling me I
couldn’t possibly be as interested in the wine as I was in the food. I
urge you to seek out some Georgian wine, because that stuff will make
you have a good old think about natural wine and wine making, if you’re
at all interested. The RAW natural wine fair is happening on May 20th
and 21st in London... (Read the full article here)
"Where 'natural' is a way of life"
by Erica Landin, for her blogpost: "Georgia - where 'natural' is a way of life"
A country bursting with tradition. One foot in another time and the
other firmly in the present – it was hardly worth raising an eyebrow
when a spanking new Mercedes passed a donkey-drawn cart on the way to
the same farmers market. Bordering on Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and
Turkey, this small country is rebuilding itself after years under Soviet
rule...
...What is special about the traditional wine making here is the use
of clay vessels called Qvevri, buried into the earth. Big enough for a
person to fit in (we tried), every Georgian family still seems to have
at least one...
...The pride in their wine and food culture is obvious; It is also
more than justified. Going to the market in the capital of Tbilisi is an
experience of pure love for every foodie. No-one speaks
English, communication works with a genuine smile and sign language. The
stall holders are proud of their wares – from fresh vegetables and
herbs to honey, dried fruits, salty cheeses, fresh walnuts and beautiful
piles of spices, and are happy to let you smell and taste... (Read the full article here)
"Let’s begin with the Orange Fanta colored wine"...
At the head of the table sits a small stocky man with a stoic
expression...he brought his hands together, leaned back in his chair and
began, “For 5,000 years we have been crafting wine. So this ‘funky’
color, as you call it, is far from odd. We have dozens of words to help
us describe this color, from amber to orange peel, each color is unique
onto itself.”
“But how do we get this stunning color?” he continued in a husky
voice. “We get it by having our Kvevri makers sculpt the perfect clay
vessel for our wines, a long and arduous process that takes a lifetime
to perfect. Similar to a giant amphora in shape, the interior of the
kvevri is lined with a natural beeswax, while the exterior is painted
with a lime wash to protect it from contamination. Once the Kvevri is
ready, it’s buried deep into the ground with only a hole, slightly
larger than a man’s shoulder width, exposed to receive the wine.”
Georgia’s New Old
The funny thing about tradition and traditional wisdom is that too often people forget where it came from.
Georgia, east of the black sea, looking north over the Caucasus
Mountains towards Russia and further east to Azerbaijan and Iran. Long
part of the Silk route east it’s a country whose dusty trails have been
trodden for millennia. It’s also as good a guess as to the birthplace of
wine as we can yet make.
When we think of wine in antiquity, we see images of painted
amphorae, long necked serving jugs and shallow communal cups. Though we
probably also see museum display cases and yellowing textbooks.
Georgia is unique in that they held onto their tradition, their
traditional grape varieties, grown little different to how they always
have been and the wine made in their kvevris (the Georgian term for
amphora) as it always was.
However Georgia, like so much of Eastern Europe, spent much of the
20th Century under the yoke of Communism, their wines relegated to
providing sweet sustenance to the Communist elite, and subject to the
policy whims of the politburo. The collapse of the USSR freed the
country to reinvent itself. To reappraise it’s traditions and re-mould
itself in whatever image it wished.
You can see this when you drive around the capital of Tblisi, there
are dazzling new bridges, gleaming hotels and cable cars preparing to
scale the hills beneath which it sits.
Yet there is another side to Georgia’s rebirth, one that I’d call a rediscovery. People like Irakli Pruidze and Soliko Tsaishvili,
friends who, nearly thirty years ago, decided to start making their own
wine together. Buying grapes from the region of Khakheti they would
drive them back to Tbilisi to vinify. Ever inquisitive their questioning
of traditional and modern practices led them to buy vineyards and to
build wineries. It got them to see the similarities between biodynamic
practices and their own patrimony of grape husbandry. They started to
query the Soviet era practice of lining the outside of their kvevris
with concrete. They started to understand the subtleties of working with
the different varieties depending of their region. In short it was a
renaissance. This is what we’d come to see.
We’d set off from Tbilisi for the Khakheti, a two-hour drive through
winding dusty roads, dodging cows and donkey driven carts. Roadside
snacks of buffalo milk yoghurts in roughly thrown clay pots. Hillside
markets where trestle tables butted up next to each other piled with
offal and spices, bathtubs of fish and somnolent rabbits. Smiling old
ladies pressed wedges of their cheese into our hands, their generosity
at times a little baffling but their friendliness in no doubt.
Our first stop was to the workshop of Lagvinari
where they were taking concrete covered kvevris and laboriously
chipping off their coatings. The rationale being that despite it giving
greater strength to the kvevri in the ground (Georgia is in a very
seismically active part of the world) it nonetheless prevents the wine
from properly interacting with its earthen berth.
At lunch we met Soliko and his friends, over khachapuri (salty cheesy
delicious flat bread), spiced pork skewers and lobio the traditional
bean stew we tasted the young vintages. Our Wine Rkatsiteli 2010, 6
months of ageing on skins in the kvevri. Floral with lifted tangerine
oil like notes, a vibrant swagger of youthful enthusiasm and fresh
acidic bite. From the western part of the country we had Ramaz Nikoladze’s
Tsitskas and Tsolikauris, both individually and in the more traditional
blend. The non skin maceration Tsitska 2011 was all fresh apples and
white flowers, while the long maceration Tsolikauri 2010 was much more
mineral with sour apples, and the bees waxy notes of its lengthy
evolution.
We then met the reds, Saperavi, muscular, tannic, deeply coloured and
prodigiously aromatic, all deep herbal black cherries and brooding
medicinal bitters, yet offset with a swarthy acidity that really woke
the palette. Inky purple from clay jugs it made short order of staining
our teeth and lips.
Nika.
Dressed in horse riding garb, straw hat and traditional scarf. Impishly
giggling at his own jokes. A sculptor based out of Berlin, switching
between Georgian, English, German and French as and when. The son of two
Physicists he found himself drawn to the Khakheti, his north facing
vineyards affording the most stunning views of the lower Caucasus’ and
giving his wines a unique freshness. In particular his magnificent
Saperavis, a bottle of his first vintage the 08 was pretty dazzling, and
seemed to show even better after a day and a half of being bumped
around in my bag.
That night we found ourselves feasting Georgian style, plate upon
plate of food arriving at the table. Toast upon toast, singing, poetry,
dancing, open wood fires, more toasting, a very late night with somewhat
hazy memories.
The Alazani river snakes through the Alazani valley, the seasonal
melt waters from the mountains giving it a battered flood cycle look of
piled boulders and diverse rivulets darting down funnels in the finely
crushed grey gravel.
Kakha Berishvili,
or Kakha’s commune, is nestled in one such bend of the river: his vines
on the plains nearby, ramshackle with nothing going to waste, it is a
little oasis of vegetarian calm. His Mtsvane/Rkatsiteli 2011 showed none
of the laid back charm of its home, all tight muscular minerally power.
Think a young Iggy Pop, all contained wildness and surprise. His
Saperavi of the same vintage was fine with a chalkiness to the tannic
structure underpinning the grapes characteristic bitter herbal glare.
We kept up the hippy feel when we visited Jean-Jaques, Alsatian
biodynamic wheat archeologist. At his homestead, with his woofer helpers
we discussed ancient wheat varieties, the spiritualism that underlies
biodynamics and our connections to the earth and the sky. Cats slunk
about the tables looking for scraps while his neighbor grilled meat
skewers over cinders of burnt vine cuttings. We ate the salty sharp
local sheep’s cheese, the sour red and green plum sauces. His heavy home
baked bread, deep and flavorsome with an almost savoury cake like
character. Certainly more intense than any bread I’ve had before.
Post lunch we got a chance to get our hands dirty with proper Alazani
valley clay while visiting one of the remaining master kvevri makers
(of which, more later). Amusingly, one of the group (who shall remain
nameless) decided to purchase a rather lovely clay serving jug, only to
demand that it be filled with wine for the return journey. Queue, much
quaffing and a general sense of communing with many millennia of
drinkers that had gone before.
A final day of much needed relaxation in Tbilisi was topped off by a
most impressive meal at Tbilisi’s newest and hottest restaurant,
Mandari. All the winemakers joined us, there were older vintages,
messily scrawled notes, and no small sadness that we were going to be
getting on a plane home come 4am that morning.
