Wine Tour

The new guests arrived on Tuesday evening - two couples from the UK travelling together. We settled them in with some canapes and a glass or two of wine and then sent them off for some dinner at Cote Ferme, the restaurant of the delicatessen, La Ferme. The feedback was good which is always a relief.

The next morning I had to get myself back into breakfast mode again, not having put a client breakfast tray together for nearly two months.

The guests are a booking through Wendy Gedney, who organises wine tours in the Languedoc. Several clients went on her tours during the year and they all had a great time, so we decided to go out with her and the clients yesterday to experience one of her tours for ourselves.

We started off at Domaine de Cabezan, just outside Villegailhenc in the Cabardes region. This is a very new operation. Clement Mongus and his family moved here from the Alsace and have set out to create a lifestyle business for themselves with the vineyard and four gites and his wife's teaching job - any one element on it's own would not be enough to support them.

We tasted a rosé and four reds - two vin de pays and two AOC wines. They were good to varying degrees but not good enough for us to be tempted to buy any.

From there we headed to Lastours for lunch at Puits des Tresors, which frankly was a bit disappointing. The restaurant has a Michelin star although I was told that service can be very slow (even by French standards). We ate in the newish cafe and partook of the €18 fixed menu - the food quality and the service was rubbish.

Our next stop was at a truffle farm and olive oil producer, Le Mazet de la Clamoux. On the slopes opposite the entrance to the Gouffre de Cabrespine sits a small unpretentious little house surrounded by olive and oak trees. It is here that Sandra and Olivier Galibert run their little operation. I say little - apart from the 11 hectares on this site he also has 30 hectares of vines in the Minervois which keep him busy and she has a special needs teaching job. It seems that everyone does more than one thing round here to make a living.

The real star of the truffling though was the dog - who gave us a demonstration of her unique skills by locating four truffles in next to no time as we wandered up the slopes amongst the oaks.

Afterwards we tasted truffle butter and olives and wine and then Olivier produced his homemade Carthagene, the local aperitif, and his Walnut wine , also fortified - both excellent, both dangerous. We bought some of his wonderful cold pressed olive oil.

The last stop, by now after dark and under the light of a near full moon, was at Chateau de Rieux in Rieux-Minervois where Emmanuel de Soos was waiting to show us around his cellar and his wines. We tasted a delicious Viognier (and bought a case) as well as his two top of the range reds (both excellent). I will be visiting him again during the year to take some of his wine boxes which will be just perfect for use at 42rvh.

It was well past seven when we got back - a very full and interesting day out and justified my faith in Wendy and her tours.