It seems as far back as I can remember, wine has always been a part of my life. As a child growing up in NYC, I was always eagerly awaiting my father coming home from working in the Garment Center and on Friday nights he always brought home a bottle of wine. He thought wine made dinner a little special. The wines that were brought home were very simple, I remember the Chianti wrapped in straw, Valpo and Soave. Bolla was a big name back then. But so were Zenith black and white TVs. My father instilled in me the fact that wine is meant to share with friends and family in good times and in bad. I never drank wine out of a stemmed wine glass until after I graduated from college. It was always in little tumblers. I do remember my mother having a set of some stemmed glasses but we never used them. It was for special occasions or special guests, we were told, but everyone who came over was either friends or family, neither warranted the pretentiousness of fancy glasses.

My MO during my younger years- I figured I would be drinking wine pretty regularly and that it might be smart for me to find the great ones at reasonable prices.

The biggest catharsis in my wine style occurred on an over the top trip I took 16yrs ago. I had won an award for a wine program I had designed in San Francisco and part of the award was a two week trip to the wine regions of France. Which I thought was pretty cool. I had never been to the wine regions and had dreams of seeing the vineyards of Bordeaux and tasting Pinot Noir from barrels in Pommard.  The trip was with nine other winners from across the country, all of which were Master Sommeliers.

It was a remarkable experience spending time at some First Growths in Bordeaux but the rest of my time was spent with obnoxious travel companions and every Frenchman trying engage me in arguments about the USA political standings in the world. Now don’t get me wrong, it isn’t that I dislike the French, but I do think Hannibal Lecter said it best by stating, “I love the French, they taste just like chicken”. My fellow Sommeliers spent their time trying to out do one another and complaning about wines that were “too cheap”.

I was banished from the group one night, thank God, because I found a store that sold Cuban cigars and had the audacity to want to enjoy one walking in the vineyards of Domaine Leroy after dinner. They changed their tune when the Grand Dame herself, Madame Leroy asked if I had a spare cigar and we smoked together as she personally showed me her favorite spots in the vineyard. She was really one of the first women to own and operate a powerful winery in Burgundy. She broke the barrier but good.  She is a legend and a take no prisoners  type of gal.

Luckily for me my brother was staying in Collioure on the Mediterranean coast in southwest France. So I arrived a day later and discovered this spot of heaven on earth. Warm and sunny with the Pyrénées at your back with vineyards as far as the eye can see and the big blue Mediterranean sea laid out in front of you. It is influenced greatly by the Catalan culture, so you have a little French with a heavy dose of Spanish flavors. The food is amazing and the dish most popular is Soup de Poisson.  I was fairly uninspired about eating fish soup until I tried it in a little café on the beach with crisp croutons smeared with a spicy aioli and of course a lovely rosé.  I was immediately hooked and spent the rest of my time there going from restaurant to restaurant comparing the soup de poisson.

So let me get this straight, a beautiful place by the sea, warm southern California temps, mountains surrounded by vineyards, fantastic food, gorgeous wines,  no Americans and  stunning beaches (clothing optional) beautiful women everywhere you turn, I was single back then.  The beaches were eye opening experience, to say the least. It was the first time I had a conversation with a naked woman I didn’t know. Talk about keeping your mind focus. I never worked so hard in my life. I almost burned my passport.

But what really got me was how they felt about wine. Most of the vineyards around there do not even use trellises. The grapes grow like shrubs. A lot of the vineyards are part of co-ops that farm and sell the grapes. I went into the field with a grower and he stopped and picked 4 different grapes and told me to open my mouth and he put them in and said that is my wine. You rarely see a bottle of wine as it is mostly served in pitchers placed in the middle of the table before you even see a menu. A pitcher of rosé and red. Sometimes a white if you ask for it. The reds are all blends of Rhone varietals, Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre, Cinsalt and Carrignan.  They are easy, approachable and fun to drink.

There is a wine store in town that does carry some bottles of the local wineries, mostly for the European tourist, but you see locals walking in with what looked like empty plastic jugs and places them on the counter and the clerk goes in the back and drags this enormous hose, which looks like your filling up your car with fuel and proceeds to fill the jugs with wine. What do you want, red, white or Rosé? Of course they say it in French or in Catalan, which I didn’t understand at all. It is like speaking Roman in Rome, nobody does it that much anymore. But the wine service was the most unpretentious thing I have ever seen and in France no less.

The wine growing region of Languedoc/Roussillion, which Colliour is a part of, produces almost 78% of all of Frances table wine that people drink daily. It is the essence of how I approach my wine style, sometimes you just have to stop thinking about the wine and just sit your butt down and enjoy a glass with friends.