#87 - Jane Anson : Inside Bordeaux

Hello everyone, hi Jane. Hi, hi, how are you? Good, how are you? Excellent, thank you. Nice, so for my audience, I'm just gonna switch to French for two minutes. Just to tell you, bonjour à toutes et tous. Je suis ravie d'enregistrer avec vous aujourd'hui, je suis avec Jane and Sun, qui est l'auteur de "Dinside Bordeaux" et qui est une des plus grandes experts mondial du vent de Bordeaux. On va enregistrer ensemble en anglais, donc j'espère que pour vous c'est ok, c'est l'occasion de découvrir le parcours de Jane de la manière la plus authentique et la plus naturelle. C'est ce qui est le plus simple dans la conversation. Je vous mets aussi une version traduite en français. Si vous avez du mal avec la version anglais, vous pouvez mettre sur pause et aller sur la version française. Si non, avec Jane, on va continuer des changeurs d'anglais. Voilà, je vous souhaite une très bonne écoute. Et maintenant, Jane, on va aller vers cette vidéo. Je vous souhaite toujours la même question. Can vous introducez vous? Certains, surtout, je dois toujours me pardonner, parce que ça fait 20 ans que je suis à Bordeaux. Et j'imagine que je peux facilement le faire en français, mais pour que j'ai reste plus naturel, donc je vais aussi switcher en anglais. Donc je te remercie beaucoup d'avoir la gentillesse pour que je peux le faire en anglais. Donc, oui, 20 ans avant, je suis venu à Bordeaux. Je suis un critique au moins, mais vraiment, je suis un rey en anglais. Je pense que je suis aussi un rey en anglais et un rey en anglais. Avant que je suis venu à Bordeaux, je suis venu en Hong Kong, je suis venu en Japan. Je suis venu en Australie, je suis venu en Anglais, je suis venu à Oxford. Et je suis un journaliste avant que je suis venu à un rey en anglais. Donc quand je suis venu à Bordeaux, je suis venu à spécialiser en anglais, mais c'était vraiment juste pour être ici et fallant en anglais avec la région et en anglais, en anglais, en anglais, en anglais, avec un subject qui est tellement intégal pour la région que je suis venu à, que je suis venu à spécialiser en anglais. Donc je suis venu à un class de anglais, en London, le double de la VS, le Wines Barret Education Trust, et puis en Bordeaux, en 2011, je pense, je suis venu à duade, donc le déploiement des gestes du ISVB, je suis très lucky, je suis toujours encore en train de faire le déne de Bordeaux à la fois. Et je suis venu à un magazine de la Canta, je suis venu à un magazine de Bordeaux, pendant les 10 ans, je suis venu avec eux pour les 18 ans. Et puis 3 ans, je suis venu à un magazine de Canta et je suis venu à mon site, donc je suis venu à un site qui est called Jane Anson-Pancôme, très facile, et elle spécialise également les wines de Bordeaux, et aussi les wines qui sont dans le class de Bordeaux, et il y a beaucoup de wines de l'économie de l'économie de l'économie, de l'appareur, de l'opinion, de l'opinion, de l'Italie, etc. Donc oui, c'est ça, je suis venu dans le middle de Bordeaux, et je suis venu à deux de l'analythie et mon âme aussi en anglais. - Merci. Donc avant de venir au Bordeaux, vous êtes pas spécialisé dans le wine, comme en Hongkong, vous êtes un writer, là? - Oui, je suis un writer, donc quand je suis venu à Japan, je suis 21, je suis venu à Japan, le jour après mon résonement de la Cérémonie de la communauté où je suis étudié à l'anglais literature, et je suis venu à l'anglais pour la fin des années. Je suis un égo sensei, comme je dis, en japonais, dans un middle school, comme un 11 ou 14 ans, c'était beau, c'était en Tokyo, c'était dans un petit suburb qui était à l'heureuse de la ville de Tokyo, mais parce que Tokyo a une énorme ville, qui était toujours là, Tokyo. Et donc pendant les années, je suis venu dans un japonais traditionnel, où je suis étudié dans un school, je suis en l'équibane, qui est un japonais traditionnel, en anglais, en anglais, en anglais, en anglais, en anglais, mais à chaque week-end, je peux aller dans le middle de Tokyo, connecté à de 2 XXXX, mais avec mes implyurs qui nous explorèrent cette勤lerie délève nature planetary! Oui merci Aبي Turnroll et des gens sur l'ent tried en fait, j'étais en train de vivre un peu! Oui, pour moi, c'était le même moment de mon opinion. Je ne l'ai pas fait quand même quand je suis super jeune avec mes parents et c'est ce que j'ai studies. Je me suis venu au Canada depuis une année et quand j'ai été là, je suis là, mais j'ai. Je peux vivre anywhere, c'est le même chose, et vous faites le même chose, vous vous faites le même chose, vous vous laissez en bas et vous serez en bas, et vous avez l'air à l'air, vous vous commencez encore et tout. Et donc c'était vraiment pour moi aussi un moment de mon opinion, comme je suis possible de être là pour la vie, ce n'est pas différent, et vous pouvez faire une clinche. Oui, c'est très cool que quand vous êtes tellement jeune que vous avez le temps de votre vie, avant que vous enveu le faire, je n'en ai pas encore. Je me suis toujours rappelé que j'ai toujours eu une station radio dans Tokyo qui dirait que vous êtes l'un de la plus grande dans le monde ou le plus grand dans le monde, et je me suis vraiment bien dit. C'est vrai. Je me suis aussi là pour moi, nous aussi avons un secondaire de travelling et nous aions dit que le secondaire sera encore une Hong Kong, en fait. C'est très cool. C'est bon parce que j'ai juste un Japon, vous vous êtes à Hong Kong. Je me suis tracé de la journaliste, et à la fois que vous êtes là, c'était 1994, vous êtes là pour que je suis là pour que je suis là pour un Japon, et pour qu'il soit à l'heure de la journaliste, donc je suis là pour que je suis là pour la journaliste. Parce que vous savez que vous êtes à un moment de la historie que vous ne vous êtes pas rappelé, et je me suis travaillé pour les Hongkong newspapers, il y a des ingéances anglais à l'heure de la temps, il y a des gens qui sont là, mais 3 sont là. Donc le l'Eastern Express, le Hong Kong standard et le South China Morning Post. Et je me suis juste sub-editing, comme un peu de la journaliste, et puis je me suis travaillé encore plus long terme pour un magazine de travel. Quand je suis vivant là-dessus, donc j'ai fait beaucoup de travel à l'Asia, et c'était vraiment fun, c'était vraiment très hard, mais il y a beaucoup de jeunes, comme dans vos 20s, dans le Hong Kong. Je sais que je sais que c'est un peu différent dans le Hong Kong, mais c'est toujours un grand pays. Et en fait, c'est quelque chose que j'ai eu de la façon dont j'ai été vivant dans le Bordeaux, pour les 20 ans, il y a été un change d'exchange entre mainland China, Hong Kong et Bordeaux. Et la dernière fois, pour la première fois, je l'ai pris part dans. C'est le Chine qui est le Chine de Wine, et c'est un grand grand compétition qui est déjà élevé dans le Macau, et je vais encore le temps en l'année. Et nous avons peut-être 200 différents entrants de Chine de Wine qui ont été mis dans ce grand compétition, et nous avons des 30 juges internationaux de l'Ur-Germain, des gens qui sont vivant dans les Chines, des gens de l'Australie, et tout ce qui est tout en plus. Et c'est un grand compétition très parfait, en fait, en fait, en fait, en Chine de Wine qui est bien élevé dans les années. Et je l'ai l'impression que je peux aller à Hong Kong et à Macau et à voir comment les cities ont changé. Donc j'espère que vous allez vous faire le temps à partir de cette année, ou à l'heure. Non, mais nous l'avons dit, donc ça va bien. Mais, wow, vous êtes discovergent le Wine de Chine. C'est super intéressant, je n'ai jamais testé le Wine de Chine, je pense. Je l'ai vu un peu dans le Wine de Paris, mais n'ai pas eu l'opportunité de faire des gens. C'est moins d'être en train de faire des gens. Il y a un grand rang et ce qui est intéressant. Donc j'ai travaillé à Chine un peu avec de Canterme magazine, parce que nous avons fait un grand Shanghai une fois un grand Shanghai event. Et donc, de là, je suis venu au Wine de Chine, pour l'autre, le grand grand de Chine est le grand grand, c'est called "Ninxia". Et j'ai venu à quelques fois, et en fait, un grand grand, c'est le premier Wine de Chine qui est venu au Wine de Chine. Et c'est très intéressant. Vous vous trouvez plus de faute que vous trouvez dans le Wine de Chine, parce que, quite souvent, il y a des simples choses comme ne pas agir le Wine, carrément assez bien, pour faire assurer qu'il y a des noxidations qui sont édite, parfois les closures, comme les cours, ne sont pas assez de bonnes qualités. Donc vous pouvez vous trouvez plus de faute, mais c'est de changer rapidement. Et quand le Wine est bien, ils sont très bien. En fait, mon favorite Wine de Chine que j'ai fait, c'est un peu plus de faute que les cours de Chine. Et je vais vous dire que les cours de Chine, c'est un peu plus de faute que les cours de Chine. Et c'est un peu plus de faute que les cours de Chine. for these magazines, when did you start thinking about wine or loving wine? When I was living in Hong Kong, so '94 to '97, we drank the cheapest, most terrible wine, you could possibly imagine, mainly jug wine that was pooled, mass-on, I think it was called, and it came in a big jug with a like a peel back plastic lid. So I cannot pretend that I was drinking great wine at that point, but there was a feeling that Hong Kong was growing in interest in wine, but really my life-changing moment came from Hong Kong where I traveled to Africa. So I spent three months traveling around Africa on my own in 1996, and then I went back to Hong Kong afterwards. And when I was there, I visited South Africa, and it was just two years after the first three elections, so post-apartheid South Africa. And I interviewed a guy called Jabulani who was the first black manager of a winery in South Africa. He was manager of the shop and the wine tourism, not of the winery, but he, this was a spear winery in the Cape, Cape Wainlands. And I interviewed him as a journalist, not about wine, but about his experience. He'd been living in New York and he'd come back to South Africa and he got this job. And so I interviewed him about the experience of being a South African coming back post-apartheid. But doing that, we did it in the winery, we were tasting the wines, and I spent maybe just five days, but in the wine lands of the Cape. And it was just such a fascinating time to be there. And you met some white South Africans who had stayed the whole time during a partite, and it was quite difficult actually to interview them and think how they'd been able to do that. And then that feeling at the time that South Africa was the future that so much was going to change, it felt so positive. But also thought provoking and upsetting. It was just such an interesting place to be as a journalist and as a human being at that time. And I think I left South Africa thinking, do you know there's something in wine? There's something that brings so much of human life together in how we talk about wine, how we kind of share it with people. I can remember I'm taking a bottle of a difference South African wine to a friend of mine who was living in Zanzibar. And I carried it across South Africa to up to Tanzania over to Zanzibar. You must have been able to take it as hand luggage at the time because I was flew up to Zanzibar. And I took it with her and I went to see her. And we sat in this, she was teaching English in this very, very small village in Zanzibar. And I remember we had these kind of little plastic cups. And I'd brought this really expensive, it was a syrup from, I forget the name of the wine, or any, and anyway, I can picture it, I can picture the label. But anyway, we sat in her, in her little very modest house and drank out of these plastic cups. And we had this incredible experience just being back together drinking this pretty expensive South African wine in a completely weird setting, like an unusual setting. And it was wonderful, one of the nicest wines I've ever drunk because of that connection that me and my friend Eloise had at that time. And this was actually, Eloise was important to my wine journey as well because at university, remember I'm English, not you guys French, of course, would not have had this experience. But in England, I drunk grew up drinking cider, much more than wine. Whereas Eloise, my friend, was much more sophisticated. And even at university, she drank red wine and she ate olives. And we were like, "Wow!" She's so cool. So that must be why I took this quite expensive bottle of syrup to her. Anyway, so I think those things coming together in South Africa. And then in Zanzibar made me just realize that there was, that I wanted to pursue wine. Since then I began studying more than now here I am. Yeah, no worries on the cider because we come from the north of France. And so we don't drink that in the wine. No shame for the cider. It's mostly beer. So the same for us. Wine is an adoption, not something that is here every time. So you were in Zanzibar drinking this super expensive wine, but then you flew back to Hong Kong. Yeah, so I went back to Hong Kong. And from Hong Kong went to Australia where again there's more wine, so not for long. Then I came back home. So then I came back to England and spent about five years in England where I met my husband. Well, I knew him already, but where I got together with my husband and got married to him. And it was from there he was a real Bordeaux wine lover. He's English, but he was always a lover of Bordeaux wine. And so when our first child was born we decided that we wanted to move to Bordeaux just for a year or two. No plans to stay for 20 years. But yeah, when we got here I saw I'd already begun to then more specialise in wine, but it was only when I moved here that I became full-time, writing about wine and nothing else. I never thought that would happen, but I think like so many of us, and you maybe have had this same experience when you dive into wine, you realise there's a whole career waiting for you and it's such an interesting career. And so you, at this time you were kind of super beginner in wine, so you started training in it. I always say I was lucky to not know what I didn't know. It's always the same. First you don't know anything, but you feel like you're about everyone else because you're like, "Yeah, I know everything." And then you realise that actually you know nothing, but you know more than the rest of the population. So it's pretty fun because the more you know, the less you feel like knowing. Definitely. So as long as we stay curious, that's all that matters. Exactly. So when you arrived in Bordeaux 20 years ago you were kind of a beginner in wine. So how did you do to start? Did you knock on different estate and chataux and say, "Hey, I want to do this?" Did you add a contract already with the counter? So I actually moved to Bordeaux without a contract with the counter, but within three months I went back to London and basically knocked on their door and said, "I'm here." I think the great thing about having journalist training is you're not afraid to ask questions to people and I very much approached learning about Bordeaux wine as I would have approached learning about any subject, not being ashamed or afraid to admit what I didn't know. And so just ask questions. And I will always say that to anybody who wants to know about wine now. We all start knowing nothing. So you just have to ask questions and be open and taste. And I was very lucky as well that when I moved to Bordeaux, as soon as I had the decanter behind me, I was easier of course to open doors to get into chataux. But also people were very generous. So a couple of people particularly to me, Jean-Michel Caz, who very sadly died a few years ago, but Jean-Michel who was owner of Lynch Barge, as soon as I met him, he gave me the books that he thought I should read. He just was very, very welcome and opening. Sorry, welcoming and open. Also Jean-Claude Berrawe, over on the right bank at the time at Moex, again very, very generous and open. And I think I found through my career often it's the people that know the most and have nothing to prove who are often the most generous and the most kind and the most humble as well because they're just a very happy to share what they know. So that was one for Danny de Bordeaux as well. From the second I first met Danny, way before I studied with him at the ISVV, he was a really important part in my wine journey and understanding more and more about wine because he, I think he liked that I asked a lot of questions because he was a professor and he had that experience of teaching students. So I think he appreciated that I was willing to ask questions. And yeah, just it went from there. And then I did my own research. I think the best way to learn about anything is to teach and to write because you've got to do your research, you've got to do your homework. And so I did that. And yeah, and I just found Bordeaux to be a place that is a fascinating place to try and understand wine because it's at the crossroads of so much global wine history and also of global wine economics. And just by being here, you have a kind of a window, a front row seat on so much that's happening in the world of wine, not just in Bordeaux because so many other producers come here, you know, you get to taste many, many, other wine regions. I love the fact that Bordeaux is a port city and it has that history of being open to the world. Yeah, it's interesting because we have a similar wine journey, but we are at the super beginning. So it's okay, but it's something that I have also witnessed that the people who know the most in wine are actually the most accessible and the most friendly and happy to share with you what they know, invite you to to to taste things and everything. So yeah, we also have amazing memories with Jean Michel Cas, who was on this podcast a few years ago. So I'm super happy we did this interview. And we actually met Jean Claude Berwe last summer, I think, or two years, no, one One year ago, one year ago I think so last summer it was really a fun experience. And it was like, yes, or I did some wines in my life and you know a super simple guy. You're like, man, you think that was petruse for 40 years, but yeah. You did all the petruses, so actually, that was fun. Do you remember the first estate that you visited? Well, the first estate that I visited was Spear in South Africa. In Bordeaux, oh, it's a really good question. In Bordeaux, I remember the first wine that I bought that I was excited about buying and that was Shateau La Puente from Pomerole. And I think because now it's actually done a lot of investment and is much more of a long term wine, but then it was a more accessible version of Pomerole. And so we found it completely delicious and I remember buying a three pack and it being like a really big deal, which was said that must have been in 2003, so we were probably buying the 2000 vintage maybe. Do you still have some bottles? Of those three? No. I probably drank them all within about six months of buying them. Yeah, it's always fun to try to keep a few bottles, but definitely at the time a few hours ago. It's funny because like Pomerole, for me, I have the, I don't have a true vision on it. I think it's a super confidential, it's not super well distributed, I feel. I feel like it's for some restaurants or some hotels, it's like sold in advance, not very consumer friendly. I think it's so interesting. I think the difference for Pomerole compared to most other Bordeaux appellations is how tiny the production is. So I do lots of tastings and I often find Poyacan Pomerole are the two names of appellations that make people most excited. They're super, super excited to taste them. Poyac makes so much that probably a lot of people have tasted a Poyac even though they're expensive, but still they make many, many thousands of bottles per per estate. Whereas you're right. Pomerole, even the big guys are quite small in comparison, so maybe they're harder to find. But I definitely feel there's a magic that comes with the name Pomerole that make people excited. Yeah, I agree. I'm always super excited for Pomerole, so whenever. But yeah, even if you compare to something new, which is super close, it's not at all the same commercialization and distribution. So it's pretty fun. What did you witness in 20 years in Bordeaux? I'm sure that there are a lot of things, but what are the main things that you saw changing? So I guess good and bad things. When I moved here in 2003, it was seen as an extremely unusually hot vintage. Now we know that that was really the beginning of a profound shift. For a long time, I guess we thought that 2003 would not be repeated for maybe 50 years, and then we had 2022, which was even drier and even more sustained heat than 2003. So we've seen that kind of climate evolution. Without doubt, people now are more used to dealing with it, and there's much, much better canopy cover, canopy control, understanding of root stocks, understanding of all kinds of things, earlier harvesting. So there's a greater recognition of what we need to do to mitigate climate change. There's also a change in the value of the land of the smaller properties. So when I arrived in 2003, we were at almost the heights. I think 2000 was the actual height, but of the price per hectare of AOC Bordeaux AOC Bordeaux Superior. So in those times, it was perfectly possible to make quite a good living from those smaller estates because the value of the land was better. And now we know that ever since then, the price of land for AOC Bordeaux AOC Bordeaux Superior and those smaller appellations has been going down, and it's extremely tough for a lot of those guys to be successfully earning a living today. So we've seen that's been really tough, I think, especially over the last five years, seeing the smaller Vignoran Bordeaux having a much harder time being a hauntabler, being able to make money from their wines. So that's super tough. We've also seen the price of the classified rising. This has been a very interesting 20 years because we've had the Chinese market coming in. And again, as I say, because I'd lived in Hong Kong, I think as soon as that happened, my eyes and ears were open to it because I was, I already had so many contacts there. So for a long time, I did a column for the South China Morning Post. So that was interesting. I wrote the first article, which was for Decantar in 2008, about the first woman who bought a Chinese woman who bought a property. It was called Chateau Latour Laguenes. It was down in Antredamere. And I remember just being like a really big deal writing that article. It got loads of press. It was picked up everywhere. And then of course, we know that it turned out. There were many hundreds of Chinese purchases. And now we know all of those purchases are not all, but many of them have resold or they're trying to resell. And the government, the climate within China itself has changed. So for a long time, there was a real desire to buy not just the estates but the wines themselves. And then the president, Z, came in, the culture and the politics of China changed. And so now there's less of that demand. That's been fascinating from a journalist point of view. I of course, tough for the wine makers because they put an awful lot of time in the Chinese market, which is now more complicated. Again, that's one of the reasons why I'm enjoying going to this Chinese wine awards because it remains an important market. And I feel like we should all, all of us who are interested in wine, we know we ought to be keeping an eye on the Chinese market and understanding how best to work with it. And so yeah, I find this is a very good opportunity for me to go and help. So I can tell my readers afterwards. Today my site is a subscription site. And I write tasting notes. A lot of my subscribers are subscribing to me for my tasting notes. And also for my market knowledge of what's happening. So I think that's still a very important important thing to do. But yeah, that's been fascinating really to see that. As an English person, I was quite happy that all of a sudden, all of the Chateau's had tea. They were suddenly serving tea because they were so many Chinese visitors. I wish they didn't do for just the English before. But they started serving wonderful teas. I was very happy about that. Yeah, that's super interesting. The presence of Chinese people in Bordeaux. So you witnessed them coming and buying. And now most of them are actually selling or living that. There are still, of course, some exceptional and very successful Chinese and purchases. And in fact, and I should say Asian purchases because probably the most successful is actually from Vietnam. Lives in Hong Kong. So Peter Quoc, who owns the Vignuobal Kay, stuff like Belphon Belcier, probably their own, I think, eight different estates. Now they sold one, but they still have a lot of them. Tour Sanclis Stoff, Chateau Louré, and they're exceptionally good quality and investment very, very high. It's just been interesting to see this contrast between the owners who have come to stay and to invest and others who I feel like were probably taken advantage of a little bit by a lot of the estate agents who would have promised the world. But it was obvious to anyone who was looking that buying a beautiful Chateau in a low value appellation is never going to be an easy combination. Yeah, absolutely. It's also the same with revisiting a Chateau Lagrange, which is absolutely stunning. So the Japanese owners. But it's crazy the investment that they did, the quality of the wines. The Chateau is certainly wonderful. So yeah, there is always a concentration between people wanting to do quality and long-term versus people just wanting to do it for either for fun or for like just to show off or because they think there is an opportunity, it's always a two different path. Yeah, absolutely. And I like that in the history of Bordeaux, that's always been the case of Bordeaux. You've always had overseas investors who come in ever since 2000 years ago with the Romans, but especially for the past 1000 years since Alina Rakuten marrying Henri, Henry II of England. So it's nothing new, but it's interesting to watch. Do you see a difference between your audience being like a so English speaker mostly? I guess mostly people in the UK and in the US. Do you see differences between the two of them and also between kind of how they leave their wine experience versus what you've seen in France these last years? So the majority of my subscribers are from the US and Australia. We have a lot of of the Caribbean from Australia, the UK as well, you're right. France quite a lot. I have visited my site from 86 different countries to the lot, but that's a reflection of how international Bordeaux is. Anywhere around the world, people are drinking and are interested in Bordeaux wine. I think what I find is the idea of scoring wines, which gets a lot of criticism from general wine lovers and I totally understand why, but it is still something which people want. Even if we know that a score is a single moment in time, you know, it's not a written in stone, what a wine tastes like, because like we said right at the beginning, who you're with, what mood you're in, what you're having it with, all of these things make a difference. And yet, I'm always surprised by how there is still a real appetite for wine scores. I think the way I approach it, I hope is the most helpful way to do it, which is to try very, very much to put wines in context and to try to give as much useful information about that winery that you can do so that people can judge it. So the book that you mentioned very kindly at the beginning inside Bordeaux, one of the things that I specialised in or concentrated on in that book was looking at Teraoir of Bordeaux. I felt that that was an area which we hadn't talked about enough. And I think it's a way to empower the consumer because having some understanding of what difference in taste do you get from a wine which is mainly made grown on clay, which is quite powerful compared to a wine which is mainly grown on limestone, which can be kind of, lots of minerality and exactly a higher acidity and more salinity, maybe more fragrance. Knowing those kind of things is super, super helpful. And if you then can add that together with, well, in a rainy year, maybe you're going to do better on a specific type, unlike a gravel maybe, which is a little bit warmer and has good drainage. Being able to put these pieces of the jigsaw together is very, very helpful for consumers and for us who are tasting the wines. And so I always try as much as possible to give these clues, these keys, this of information so that yes, you can listen to what I'm saying, but you don't have to agree with me to be able to make a judgment yourself on if you will like that wine or not. So I find that that's a way that I hope I am changing a bit the way wine critics talk because there certainly was a time 20 years ago when a critic would say, this is my opinion, I know everything and you just listen to what I'm saying. So I try not to do it like that. This is bad. Yeah. Yeah, it's super interesting. The vineyards in a, especially in Bordeaux, I think, and the Théauard notion was a bit more on the side for a lot of time because we were focusing on names and, you know, biggest states, big, classified thing. And Bergenji always did it super well, identifying the Théauard and being super specific about the soil and everything. And now I see that it's coming to Bordeaux since a few years. So that's great. It is great. And I think it puts the power back as well in the hands of the, well, the consumer for me to understand things, but also it's exciting for the wine makers, I think, that they can get this feeling that they can translate what's in front of them. And my expectation over the next decade is the viticulturalists will be the guys who become the real stars, the people who are really brilliant in the vineyards because we have this issues with climate. It matters so much how you deal with your vines during the growing season. And for that, you need to understand the Théauard. So I think all of that comes together. And, you know, we're all interested in more authenticity in the real stories of the people who are making the wine. That's such an important thing compared to just the history of the estate and how much money the owners have and all of those things, but to actually being able to in the way that I think natural wines have done maybe very well, organic biogenomic, the kind of the new wave of wine makers have done such a good job. And all of that, in my opinion, is putting the focus back onto the vineyards and the viticulturalists. And that's great. It's funny because a few weeks ago, I published an interview with a coin Montereau Poulos from Chateau Margo. And she was telling me the story of the 1980s, 1990s when, you know, it was like flying wine makers being the superstar of wine and coming from all over the world, doing wine from all over the world. And she was saying to me, it was funny because they were coming to the She, so to see how did we process the grapes, but they never went to the vines, so they never went just outside to see how the grape actually grows. And she was like, but this is where the magic happens. And if you don't have a wonderful grapes, if you don't have an attention that you put outside, the wine just not going to be that great or that good. I can remember going maybe eight years ago to a big chateau in San Julien, really great chateau. And doing a tasting and saying, can we go out into the vineyard? And them saying to me, like literally with a jaw open saying you're the first journalist who's ever asked us to go out into the vineyard. And that was just blew my mind. Yeah, so I agree with Carina, 100%. And it's so important. And it's one of the things I'm super lucky with this podcast is that we get to travel to places that we wouldn't have go that early in our life or even maybe never. And that's so great to be just in one place and you know, understand, okay, so North is that direction. Then you have this this type of information, the soil is limestone or whatever. And then you understand way better the wine that that's your taste. Yeah, I agree. And in fact, there's someone else that I should mention who maybe I met a little later than Jean-Michel, etc. But Kays van Lohen, Kays van Lohen who's a professor at the Institute again, the ISVV, who if you haven't interviewed yet, I definitely recommend you do so. And his approach was again, the very, very mind opening for me, the clarity with which he described the different terror types and the impact that they had. And going out into the vines with him and doing the digging the holes and stuff, it was just really cool. So when I wrote inside Bordeaux, I asked him to be my scientific advisor so that when I'm writing about Terroir, I could have somebody who actually, because of I'm not a scientist, but I think it's helpful that I wasn't a scientist because I've caused red all of the things that had been written and some brilliant, brilliant books, Malium French, really excellent books about the history of the Terroir of Bordeaux. But I really wanted to make that mean something for people who are drinking the wine. And because I wasn't a scientist, I think I was able to take that leap. And I just kept rewriting that chapter. I must have rewritten it 50 times to make it more understandable and to be able to connect with people. And it's complicated because you want to keep a high level of information, but make it super accessible so that people really understand it. Yeah, exactly. It's not an easy thing to do. So this is why you need to have so K's read over what I've written at the end and was like, yes, okay, you got the sweet spot. How do you do you have a ritual for tasting wines because you taste a lot of them. You've talked a few minutes ago about the condition that you can be in that can influence your perception of wines, but since you taste a lot of them, you're read by hundreds or even tens of thousands of people. How do you try to make sure you are not the most objective, but in the most similar condition? Yeah, it's a great question. And I think you have to take it seriously is one thing that's really important. You have to be in good health to be able to be a good wine taster. So don't be excessive in the rest of your life. So if I've been tasting a lot of wines during the day, I'll only have water in the evening. I will actually have water only at lunch time as well if I've stopped because I want to keep as clear headed as possible. I try to always have people vary, but I like to have bread or crackers with me while I'm tasting to avoid too much panic build up. So I will taste probably I would go as many as 60 or 70 wines in a day, which is quite a lot, but I wouldn't go some people would definitely go higher. I would try I would be more like 60s about what I feel comfortable with. Always in the same glass, I think that's really important. I don't really care what kind of glass it is. I'm not a huge, there are few journalists who take who bring their own glasses with them. So they'll you'll always see them with their little bags with their glasses in. That's great. That works for them. I don't mind what glass I'm tasting, but I do mind if they change within the same tasting because you want to be judging those wines on exactly the same conditions. Thank you so much. Need to make sure that there is enough wine in the glass that you get the aromatics. So the only thing that's important about the glass is that the the rim of the glass is slightly smaller than the base. Just to capture these aromatics while you're tasting. Make sure that you have enough wine in your glass that it can speak to you. So really take the time to get those aromatics, but then when you get the wine in your mouth, you have to really give it the time to open and to do that, get in the oxygen over and then spitting it out. I again, this mate might seem obvious, but I don't know that it is for people who are listening who aren't wine tasters, is spit the wine out after you've, so you give it, get in your mouth, get all that oxygen going, really take the time to have had the aromatics first and then spit it out because you cannot taste 60 wines in a day if you're not cashing afterwards. And then I think it's really important to do nothing for a minute or two and you just listen and pay attention to what's physically happening in your mouth after that wine has left. I think that's also something that's really important even when you're at home tasting is to realise that so much of what the wine is telling you happens once you've got nothing left in your mouth because that's when you can really see is that flavour kind of growing in intensity. That's when maybe is there a bitterness or do you get that feeling of heat from alcohol, all of those things you can get, but you only really can tell once your mouth is empty again from the wine. So yeah, so I think I have now it's so second nature, but when I'm like here trying to break it down for you, I think that's something I would do for every wine, really approach it. Often I will go back to retaste the first one because if you're starting the day at 9 a.m., then sometimes it's tough on that first wine, so I will go back and taste it again at the end. I would taste red before white because I think red has got so much tan in that you want to do it while your mouth is as fresh as possible. And then I quite like having a fresh pick you up basically at the end with the whites. I think that again is fairer for them. It's funny because usually we do the other way around. Yeah, well I think if you're with friends, then you'll do white before red of course at dinner, but when you're doing a professional tasting, I'd like to do the most tannic, or yeah, white rather than red. Not necessarily the most tannic reds, but the more tannins say the reds before the whites. Always end with sweet because that will coat your mouth so you can't really taste other wines after you've had sweet wines. I think that's it. Yeah, lots of water. Always, always, always take breaks. Even if you've had like 30 wines, stop, get up, have a walk around and then come back down. So I think it's all about remaining clear having clarity when you're tasting. And do you remember the first tastings that you had or the first one that was with so much wines? On my side, I remember one of the first time I actually tasted that many wines. It was not for the best occasion when you were a beginner, but I think it was for the Primaire campaign. Primaire is the moment when wines are discovered by the public for buying them and having them two years later. There are always big tastings organized by a lot of people. And I remember arriving in a big place in Paris with like, I think hundreds of maybe one hundred or 150 wines around a table. And people being like, yeah, you can taste everything. So I tried to tasting as many as possible because you know, when you're beginning, you're like, okay, it's a good opportunity for me. But it was terrible because first it was Primaire wine. So it's not super good or for beginner, it's super difficult to taste it. And yeah, it was just super long. And I think at the end, I didn't taste anything. And I was super impressed by that and by people taking notes of every wine and everything. So do you remember the first time that you saw that many wines? I can remember in Hong Kong going to a few of those big big tastings of maybe I don't know, a hundred Italian wines and same thing, trying to taste as many as I could do and realizing that was not a good idea because you can't take everything in. And the first on Primaire campaign that I did was probably the 2004. So I moved in 2003 and I maybe went to one or two things for the 2003 primers, which would have been 2004. But I think the one I, the first one I properly did with 2004. And I agree with you, I, it's such a skill learning to taste on Primaire because they're so different, the wines are so tight and often closed. I think the first on Primaire that I felt like I knew what I was doing was five years later than that was 2009 and 2010. By that point, I think I really started to understand how different it is and what you're looking for. And I can remember 2010, particularly I can remember sitting down after a day's tasting and just writing a blog, I think it was at the time about the architecture of the wines and really visualising what they look like, the walls of the wine and the floors and it was all about angles in 2010 because everything was so muscular and it was, it was so big. And I can definitely remember that feeling of, oh, okay, now I think I have an understanding of what it is I'm trying to, to do and what it is I'm trying to transmit to people. But it takes time. Yeah, it definitely takes time. And you have to have those first day years when you're like, what the hell am I doing? I've just got to, I just keep my head down and take notes and then you start to think, okay, I like very much, I'm a big, big tennis fan. I love playing tennis, I love watching tennis. It's just ready and open right now. I was just putting listening to A.O. Radio podcast while we were waiting for you guys. And I love the thought that on Primaire is like the ATP rankings of that year. So you're looking to see how his each shadow performed and even the best shadows sometimes can, you know, kind of have a misstep because there's always different conditions and years like 2021 and 2022, which were really such opposite ventages. So 21 slightly cool 2022, extremely hot. I love that thought that by the end of on Primaire, you've spent, say in my case, I normally spend three or four weeks tasting because I take so many wines. And by the end of it, you have a really good idea of who has really knocked out the park and done a great job and who maybe had more difficulties. And then like the idea of the coaching staff and like so each tennis player has this whole team around him. I like seeing what's happened in the shadows because sometimes they might have lost their technical director or they might have a new consultant and all of these things make a difference. So that's what I mean in terms of trying to put context in my wine notes. Of course, you can't write a book for each wine note, but just little bits of information which I think will help people understand why a shadow has done a certain thing, why it's been good or bad this year. And then you sometimes have like, I remember Danny Durantu who was Legli's Cleanay and Pomerole, a wonderful, wonderful wine maker who died a few years ago. I can remember writing that tasting note. And when it was the in bottle, so a few years after the on-premise, I gave it a hundred points. It was really a brilliant wine. I don't give very many hundred points, but I gave it for this one. And I can remember writing in the tasting note. Am I doing this because I'm saying thank you to Danny Durantu and he's not here anymore. And I thought, do you know what? If I am, I don't mind because it's a, when you get to a hundred points, that's an emotion. You know, that is a wine which your shed, which feels like they couldn't have done any better and you want to share that so much with people. And so that was an interesting example of when I remember feeling my emotion told me this deserved a hundred points. Yeah, that must be super hard for you to put ratings online, especially after 20 years because you get to know everyone and build a personal relationship with everyone and then comes a point when you're just tasting an enormous rate of, I think it's helpful that I live in Borde City center, not in the vineyards. I think it's helpful that my husband is English, not a wine maker. Certainly I couldn't be a critterly with a wine maker, but not Bordele. And I think after so long, I hope most of the wine makers know that even if in a certain year, I don't give them the score that they wished. They know that I do take it seriously. I do my back in my work, I do my homework to see how they're doing. And it's just that's the way it is. I think what I have to always tell myself and again, it helps being a journalist. If you don't have independence and you don't have, if you can't step back, then you shouldn't be doing this job. Yeah, absolutely. And it's not a, it's not personal. Like what your writing is about the wine in a context and everything, but it's very interesting what you said about the context when tasting. I interviewed a log as part of a few years ago as well. And she told me something. I think she wrote a book about that. But she told me when you are taste of wine, you also taste the life of a of a vignan or a wine maker. And actually, sometimes you try to rationalize things like this year, we've used that type of techniques and that, but the truth is sometimes people like things. in life happens. And so sometimes it was just like, yeah, actually, I took some vacation. So we just, if I that or I had this incident in my family and I had to take a few days off and so I wasn't there for this and that. And so actually you really taste the life of someone. It's a really brilliant point. I can think of one and I won't say the name of the estate, but I can think of one estate in a vintage that had a lot of milgew. And they had been away for a weekend on a big family's sporting event. And so they missed a treatment of a milgew and it turned out to be really devastating that they'd missed that. And you could tell in the wine. And that's where you're right. That's where it can't be personal because they knew as well that that was the shame that they hadn't made that treatment and it did have an impact. But you can't pretend that that hasn't happened. But you're right. It's such a, I think it's helpful for all of us to think, well, these things happen to all of us in life. But that's why again, it goes back to this idea of ATP rankings. Sometimes people get it all right and other times life gets in the way and it doesn't all go right. And you can have surprises. And there are some in Australia open. I saw that Monfie's the French player bit it. He did brilliantly. Sadly this morning he's just had to retire after against Shelton. But he did a heel brilliant figure. There was all these young guys at 17, 18, 19 this year who did great. So yeah, it can always happen. What was my next question? Forgot about it. Marin, do you have one? So you're high. I think nobody never hears me on the microphone. So yeah, hello Jane. So you're an expert about border wines. And you're known for it. But my question is what about the other wines? Do you think border wines are the best wines in the world? What do you think about all the regions in France and also all the wines in the world? I think easy, easy answer to that question. No, I don't think the border wines are the best wines in the world necessarily. I think some border wines are among the very, very best wines in the world. If I was just drinking at home myself, I adore wines of the Rome, especially the northern Rome. So we often will be drinking here. San Josef, if we want to spend more maybe we'd go co-roti. But San Josef we often drink here. I love Nebiollo so a lot of wines from Northern Italy. So Barberesco Barolo, but also just a Languiette. I think Languiette, Nebiollo is some of the greatest value delicious wine in the world. I absolutely love white wines and I don't always go to border for my white wines. Sometimes I do. I think Pesca Leonian is fantastic and I love like the name Chivalier, brilliant, brilliant wines. But I really love. So if I'm going to Burgundy, I would much more often buy a white Burgundy, like Pernon, Virgales, something like that. So I really adore. I drink quite a bit of reasling from Australia rather than reasling from Germany, which is probably sacrilege, but I really like reasling from Australia. I still enjoy South Africa because that was the first place that kind of awakened me to wine. And in fact today I think South Africa is making super exciting wines. Ryoka, I like in Bordeaux we can go to Ryoka quite easily. Another guy who you guys, if you haven't interviewed him yet, tell me Rodríguez who makes amazing wine in Ryoka. He's a brilliant wine maker. So yeah, I love wines from other places. I think I've, because my career and my website is so focused on Bordeaux, I'm being sensible as well because it's a business and that's what people come to me for. So I definitely focus on Bordeaux and Bordeaux is such a big area. It deserves it. It's mechete, somebody to take the time to really get to know it because most critics will come into Bordeaux, taste the same wines, which are brilliant wines, but they'll taste the same wines and then they go somewhere else. But Bordeaux is such a wide and varied region that I feel it deserves having the specialty that I give it. But yes, I adore wines from other parts of the world as well. So there's something I haven't actually talked about yet and I really should do in that's the Bordeaux Mental Week. So the Bordeaux Mental Week is a charity initiative that I started when I launched my website in 2021. I wouldn't about to do the fourth version this year in September and it brings young, some aliase or young people working in wine shops or maybe they're starting out as wine writers from around the world and I do it in a partnership with a friend of mine called Chinnado Rita Rosa who is a Nigerian wine consultant importer. She helps people mainly with importing wines across the continent of Africa. Anyway, and so we set up this this week to try and open the Bordeaux, the world of Bordeaux for diversity, for access, all of those things. And that's been a great way for me also to connect with other wine regions because we have people who come here from, they tend to be, I think the youngest we've had is 19, the oldest 34 and they've come from India, from Nigeria, from South Africa, from Ecuador, from Mexico, from the States, from Thailand. Anyway, it's really a wonderful thing and they bring wines often with them. So last year I had one of the best pairings I had all year was a sparkling wine from Ecuador which was matched with this incredible chocolate that was also from Ecuador and that wasn't too sweet. It was this brilliant, brilliant chocolate with an Ecuadorian sparkling wine. It was mind blowing. It was so good. So yeah, I love the variety and the passion and the stories of wine from all over the world. So as you said, the wine world is something once you dive in, you can have the door open. Yeah, you can go anywhere. Who knows where you're going to end up. Yeah, the next step for inside Bordeaux or Jan Anton is to travel at Gen.C. after that. We thought maybe we could start a coffee company because all of these countries where our scholars come from for the Bordeaux mental week tend to be great coffee places. Maybe that could be the next step. Yeah, and there are a lot of things to do in coffee as well. We have a special interview coming in a few weeks specifically about coffee and how you do it, how you taste it. Oh, I can't wait to listen to it. There are fermentation in coffee as well. So it's a super interesting bring as well. Well, thank you very much. Jane, I think we covered a lot of topics today. We had the opportunity to talk about a lot of things. Did we forget something before the conclusion? No, I don't think so. That was great. It was lovely chatting tea. Nice. So I have three last questions that are always the same. The first one is do you have a book you would recommend about wine? It's a very long book, but it is absolutely worth everybody's time. It's called the Australian Ark and it's by a friend of mine called Andrew Coyard. He's a master of wine and he also is written, sorry, he's done a few movies. I don't know if anybody saw the movie about China and Bordeaux. We're called Red Obsession. Did you ever see that? It's a very great documentary about this kind of obsession that the Chinese had over Bordeaux wines for a while. Anyway, he's written a book that took him about 20 years of research and it's three big volumes and it looks at the history of Australian wine right from the first landings of the colonialists back in the late 18th century through two, 17th century, oh my goodness me, anyway, from the beginning, right through until today and it looks at, yeah, the history and then it looks at who are the people today. It is an astonishing book. It really is. It just won the OIV Presidents Award. The first time that a book has ever won that award since the OIV launched their awards maybe 30 years ago and it's brilliant. So that thoroughly recommend it. It's the Australian arc. It seems to be a bit long but I'm getting used to to the super long books so no problem. Do you have a recent tasting that was a good memory for you or? I do and it's not a Bordeaux tasting but it was held at Chateu Lascôme. So Chateu Lascôme in December, you may know Axel Heinz who is now the wine maker and the director of Lascôme and he came from Italy. He was working for a long time in Italy before at Miserdeau, Annalaya and so he's kept this relationship with Italy and Italian wines and a state called Cantina Tullano came to Chateu Lascôme in December and they are actually a cooperative but they're probably the best quality cooperatives in the world and they're located in the Dolomites in Alto Aldige so right up in the mountains and they make white wine which is very unusual. It's brilliant white wine but it's unusual from being able to age for a long time. So we went right back to 1955 of these incredible white wines and the Pinobienco so Pinoblanc so you'd never think that that would be a particularly long aging fantastic wine and yet there's some of the greatest white wines I've ever tasted. really brilliant. And the whole tasting, there were maybe 20 of us around the table. And you could just tell everybody was getting more and more excited at how good these wines were. So I already recommended I've actually been to three or four wine shops in Bordeaux since trying to track them down and I haven't found them in Bordeaux yet. But I'm going to find them. So Cantina Telenor, Telenor. So if we don't find them, it's a good opportunity for us to travel and to go see them. Yeah, that's me too. And finally, who is the next person I should interview? So I gave you so many names along the way. Already. So Kaze Van Loon, if you haven't. And Chinay Duh, who's my partner in the Bordeaux mental week, she's very, very interesting. Woman was great and talking about the whole African continent and just how much potential there is there, which is great. And then there's a very, very lovely Indian wine maker, friend of mine, called Nam Ratha, Prasant Prasant Praschantha, who also lives in Bordeaux. And she makes a wine called Solicatus, but has a very interesting story where she came from India to do her master's in wine here and then stayed and started her own her own wine label. So great stories in women in wine who've really made a difference. Definitely. We'll contact them just after. Thank you very much for all of that Jane. It was super cool to talk to you and to have this conversation. Thank you very much for taking the time to do it. Well, thank you for coming. Have a have a good time for the primers that are coming. Because the goodness made, they'll be here before we know it. We are a hand of generous. So it comes pretty fast. Thanks again. People who are listening. Thanks for being here. I hope you like this interview. If it's the case, don't forget to share it. And taste the great things. See you soon. Bye bye. Bye. Merci.