{"id":1327,"date":"2019-07-30T20:59:05","date_gmt":"2019-07-30T20:59:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1327"},"modified":"2019-07-30T20:59:05","modified_gmt":"2019-07-30T20:59:05","slug":"cooperatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1327","title":{"rendered":"Cooperatives"},"content":{"rendered":"

Across Europe\u2019s many wine growing regions there are regional cooperatives.\u00a0 These are societies that produce wines under the name of the locality, in many cases well-known ones such as Chablis or Barbera. In other places, they\u2019re little more than the village wine press.\u00a0 The wines they produce, for the most part, are indicative of the style of that region.\u00a0 And why not?\u00a0 They are made from the same grapes that grow in that AOC, DOPG or whatever the local wine denomination may be.\u00a0 In some instances, they make rather good wine at a very good price.\u00a0 In others, the best wine available is pure plonk by any measure.<\/p>\n

Why should a visitor to any particular corner of European Wine Country take the time to visit one of these cooperatives?\u00a0 The answer depends a lot on how you approach wine tasting and how much time you have.<\/p>\n

If you are the sort who only wants to taste the very best products of the European vines, by all means spend your time in Bordeaux, Tuscany and the Rioja.\u00a0 Spend freely and drink deeply.\u00a0 And to be sure, there is a time in every wine lover\u2019s life when he or she should get to know what truly great wines taste like.<\/p>\n

But if you also want to get to know the geography of a locale, who the people are and how they live, where they shop and what they drink, the cooperatives are a great place to start.\u00a0 Very few people in Burgundy, for example, are drinking grand cru<\/em> wines every night with dinner.\u00a0 We doubt that even the Rothschilds are quaffing Lafitte with a plate of charcuterie.\u00a0 And if you aren\u2019t a baron, you probably don\u2019t either.<\/p>\n

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A customer bringing his jug for a refill at the Coop\u00e9rative d\u2019Enserune in Languedoc, France.<\/em><\/p>\n

What do the regular people in the small villages that dot the countryside do?\u00a0 They bring empty bottles and jugs to the cooperative and fill them up at a spigot, much like putting gas in their cars.\u00a0 The wine lists are not extensive: white, red and ros\u00e9 are on offer, and often not all three if they\u2019re not made locally.\u00a0 These folks go to their homes, eat nice meals and drink nice wines and are quite happy doing so.\u00a0 They\u2019ll buy a good bottle every now and again for special occasions, but they don\u2019t make a big deal about a pleasant beverage that accompanies their meals and their lives.\u00a0 Even as a visitor, if you want a picnic or light meal on your hotel balcony, why not do like the locals do?<\/p>\n

Another good reason to visit some \u2013 not all \u2013 cooperatives is to get an introduction into the grapes, winemaking methods and terroirs<\/em> of the region.\u00a0 In quite a few cases, one town may have a cooperative that\u2019s almost a museum of their wines and the next one over is little more than an outlet store.\u00a0 It\u2019s a bit of a crap shoot and there isn\u2019t much available even on the Internet to guide you before you get there.\u00a0 Give a try, especially if you\u2019re going to be in a town for a while.\u00a0 The worst that will happen is that you\u2019ll walk in, have a taste and leave.<\/p>\n

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La Chablisienne may be as famous for this poster as they are for their wines.<\/em><\/p>\n

Finally, there are some cooperatives that make really good wine.\u00a0 Often they make up a name for their labels so you won\u2019t know they\u2019re coop wines.\u00a0 Rasteau makes Ortas; Chablis has La Chablisienne.\u00a0 These are worth buying either while you\u2019re there or if they show up in a local wine shop back home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Across Europe\u2019s many wine growing regions there are regional cooperatives.\u00a0 These are societies that produce wines under the name of the locality, in many cases well-known ones such as Chablis or Barbera. In other places, they\u2019re little more than the village wine press.\u00a0 The wines they produce, for the most part, are indicative of the … Continue reading Cooperatives<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1327"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1330,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327\/revisions\/1330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}