Stirring the possum in the Languedoc
Karen Turner was born in Melbourne. She escaped. With her French husband Emmanuel Pageot, she is now doing something very interesting in the Languedoc.
Although I can’t quite work out what it is.
A Fair Dinkum Languedoc winemaker
After starting out at Brown Brothers in Victoria and doing a post-graduate degree in Adelaide, she trained (and met hubby) at Hugel in Alsace, where “they do the opposite of everything I’d learned back home”. She also worked in South Africa and Portugal before becoming Technical Director of the famous Prieuré St Jean de Bébian in Pezenas.
In 2007 they bought five hectares of mainly north-facing vines in nearby Gabian which they turned immediately to biodynamics. I was not surprised when she said that they’d had a few issues in 2008, a wet, illness-prone year. Most organic and biodynamic vignerons say that you need to make the change gently.
“Nup,” Karen says with antipodean confidence. “We’re going right for it.”
They poured me five wines: Le Blanc, Le Rupture, Le Rosé, Le Rouge and Carmina Major.
One fifth of Le Blanc is made with wine made in the red way - with maceration of skins and stems. It was rich and round, in a slightly oxidized style. The Rupture, 100% barrel-aged Sauvignon blanc, was tight, clean and unusual. I was pleased but flummoxed.
You said you'd take one picture!
Le Rosé is made by “bleeding”: she pours off the juice after 48 hours. The nose is extraordinarily powerful of lollies, soft and rich. It’s quite like a red in structure. I found it bizarre but beguiling. Le Rouge (80% grenache, 20% syrah) also had that ample thing going, with interesting flavours. Like all her offerings it is designed to accompany food: perhaps the bull on the label is a hint. Finally the Carmina Major is 70% syrah, 30% mourvedre. These are enthralling varieties. She ages the wine for 12 months in barrels, 40% of which are new.
These wines have heaps of originality and personality and I loved the flavours. I was floundering, though. I guess I found them a bit structurally easy. This is the hazard when you are surrounded with French wines. You get used to a rigidity in the structure which many New World wine lovers would call mean. I am sure that Turner Pageot’s wines would show up very well over a good meal at a big table with friends under a leafy pergola somewhere in the South of France or the Adelaide hills.
Sigh. It’s hard to taste at wine salons, a lot like studying the desert in Helsinki.
Love that analogy of studying the dessert in Helsinki. Perhaps there’ll be a follow up when you actually enjoy the wines with a table of food and good friends? Le Blanc sounds very interesting. Wonder if they’ll sell it down under.
Hi Sylvia, I will take you up on that idea of enjoying the wines with food. As for Melbourne distribution, why don’t you write to Karen ( contact at turnerpageot.com) mention my blog and ask her if that have a distributor in her home town! Best, Linc
That address came out funny. The “at” should be an at sign, of course!
I have had a few comments asking me to say what I think about these wines. Did I like them or not?
I loved the flavours and was fascinated overall. I think the point I was trying to make is that I don’t always find it easy to taste wines at salons like that, essentially out of context. Also, that taste is relative, even for the individual. The first days down in Australia I feel I am drinking alcoholic melted plum ice-cream, then the first few days back in France I am yearning for more fruit. The adherence of wine lovers in wine producing countries to the local offer is not just chauvinism. So, there you have it, a clear nuanced answer. Been in France too long.