Bubbles!

5-18-11

Woohoo! Champagne, France was fun. :] We started the day off touring an agricultural high school just inside the Champagne region. Our tour was conducted by an older level English class and we were their test. The English teacher stayed with us and translated a bit in between while she was grading the students on their pronunciations and fluidity of their English. It was pretty cool. They showed us the horse, sheep, and dairy cow barns. Then we went a-roaming in the fields where we talked to the head viticulturalist and learned about the vines they raise on the farm at the school. We toured their wine making facilities and got to see the cellar. The English teacher was told there was around 70,000 bottles of Champagne currently bottled in the cellar. Holy hijinks, Batman. That's a lot of sparkling wine.

After meeting the head farmer and the head wine maker, we were given a bottle to taste. Very, very good in my opinion.

Next we went to Comite Champagne. Basically, the USDA of the Champagne region, except a lot stricter and a bit smaller. They handle international label lawsuits, research and development, marketing, growing methods, and quality assurance. To make sure that all Champagne is traditional Champagne, there's a very detailed set of rules that every wine grower in the region has to follow. Things like what they can use for pest control to what day exactly they can begin harvesting. It's pretty harsh, but for the prices that some of those bottles fetch it's more than worth it. And then we tasted some more wine.

Then we went to visit a grower in the region. He gave us a tour of his fields and explained some of the practices he implemented. His English was quite good so it was easy to ask him questions about the vine qualities and his preferences. He owns 11 hectares of vines by himself and is one of the larger small growers in the region. He has most of the modern equipment so he services another 30 some hectares around his region and works with the other growers to ensure everybody's vines are good to go.

And then we tasted some more wine...

After we got back, I went to the local super market and grabbed a few ingredients. I elected to make dinner tonight and decided we'd have some chicken, white rice, candied carrots, and cheesy bread. It took a bit to find a stove top that would cooperate with me, but I finally got it all cooked and dinner was a success! The girls enjoyed a meal they didn't have to order in French and definitely liked the candied carrots. I enjoyed being able to cook again the most. Mmm, taste testing food. My favorite! :]