| Francoise Le Calvez and her enologist husband Pascal Frissant (a. k. a. The Poet from the Loire) work Chateau Coupe Roses with passion and acumen high in the Mediterranean hinterlands. Their vineyards are in Le Causse and Le Petit Causse (a causse refers to an enormous outcropping of exposed rock- in this case, limestone-that supports little more than garrigue and can cultivate little more than olives and vines). These two delimited areas make up the highest growing zones in the Minervois appellation. At 750 to 1,350 feet above sea level, these zones have relatively cool nights and the growing season is the longest in the AOC (domains down on the plain often begin harvesting a full two weeks earlier). The wines from Coupe Roses have excellent acidity and freshness, which Francoise adores, without any plodding, overripe character, which she really doesn?t adore. Francoise?s father hails from Brittany (Le Calvez turns out to be a common Breton name), but her mother?s side of the family has been in La Caunette for at least twelve generations. The village essentially is a one-street village strung along a bench at the base of a tall limestone cliff that towers above the Cesse River. Cesse shares the root word of cease and cessation, because in summer this river stops running. La Caunette, for its etymological part, is Occitan, referring to small cave dwellings; in ancient times, the locals lived in caves burrowed into the cliff. Just upstream is the village of Minerve, which gives its name to the appellation of Minervois. It sits high on a pinnacle of limestone at the confluence of the Cesse and the Rieussec, hidden in a mountain valley behind the first range of mountains after the vast Mediterranean plain. It was here that the Cathars (catharsis-to purge!) had a stronghold, which held out for months before surrendering early in a twenty-year crusade launched by Pope Innocent III in 1209 that swept over the Languedoc and burned infidels wherever they could find them. They found a lot in Minerve. Most of Coupe Roses? vineyards are on the plateau above the cliff, an arid, windswept place of scrub and rock-calcified limestone that microorganisms living in the threadbare soil eat into, creating pockets for water, soil and roots. Pascal is fond of taking visitors up to the plateau to show them vineyards that appear to be growing in pure rock. He points out the odd olive tree here and there, the remnants of an ancient Roman road, and the fiendish rabbits that eat his young vines. Then he tells everyone to hush and listen. There is nothing to listen to; the silence is overwhelming. If you want to go crazy, he says, this is the place to do it. |
0
