WBW #31 Non-traditional Packaging
For the WBW the theme was non-traditional packaging, defined as anything besides a bottle. I decided to search out some wine “en vrac” (in bulk). Ironically this might be considered traditional packaging in France.
It’s that time again. Today is Wine Blogging Wednesday #31. The theme for this month’s tasting is boxed wine and beyond - wine in non-traditional (i.e. not glass) packaging. Thanks to Roger at Box Wines for proposing the theme and rounding up all the tasting notes. For my tasting I decided to explore the world of wine “en vrac” (in bulk) here in France. You can easily find bag-in-box wines, wines in plastic bottles, wine in tetrapak’s, etc here and in the U.S. However, albeit common in Europe, I don’t think that you can buy wine in bulk anywhere in North America. (correct me if I’m wrong)
Cave Cooperative de Saint-Emilion
My first stop was at the Cave Cooperative de Saint-Emilion. They actually sell an AOC Saint-Emilion wine in bulk, which means that it did satisfy the Syndicat’s quality requirements - a good sign. Interestingly, due to sanitation problems they will soon discontinue selling wine in bulk. According to them it is most common for customers to bring in their own containers and then take the wine home and bottle it. Apparently sometimes they will come back later complaining about the quality of the wine. For example that it is fizzy. I guess it doesn’t occur to them that the source of contamination may be their container rather than the winery. For this reason, and others, the Cooperative is moving towards bag-in-box (and bottles of course) only.
Libourne Wine Shop
Our second stop was a small traditional wine store in Libourne where the garde-vin tanks are directly in the store and the wine is gravity fed into whatever container. Fortunately they had some 1.5L water bottles here so I was not obliged to buy 5L, as at the Cooperative. They had a selection of wines in bulk - red, rosé, vin de table, and AOC Bordeaux. We decided to go with the red vin de table and Bordeaux.
The following are my notes on the three wines purchased. In general two of the three wines were better than I was expecting, in fact they were very drinkable.
- Saint-Emilion Cave Cooperative - 6.25 euros/L - black jelly bean, touch bell pepper, cherry, good structure, simple but decent
- Bordeaux Superieure - 2.55 euros/L - touch oxidized, bell pepper, honest, light
- Vin de Table (Montagne Saint-Emilion) - 1.95 euros/L - pretty bad, very purple, charactural fruit, cherry cough syrup, dry tannins
I would happily purchase the Saint-Emilion again for Tuesday night dinner or for a large birthday party, but I would probably buy the bag-in-box rather than the bulk version. (I guess I won’t even have the choice in the future.
Although my choice of wine purchased in bulk does fit the theme proposed by Roger, in that it isn’t sold in a glass bottle, bulk wine could actually be considered traditional and historically common in France. As few as 20 years ago a large percentage of all wine sold in France (by volume not sales) was sold in bulk to the end consumer. Even today in a country where wine is still considered by many to be an everyday alimentary product rather than a luxury good, wine is still commonly sold in these arbitrary quantities. All co-operatives and many traditional wine caves (stores) dispense wine directly from their tank into a container supplied by the customer. When buying in large quantities (a traditional cubie is 30L) the customer will typically bottle the wine themselves at home in order to be able to store and possibly even age it.
The practice of buying wine in bulk in France is steadily decreasing for numerous reasons. Bag-in-box packaging is more and more common - technology is constantly improving, it is more convenient for medium-term storage, and it’s much cleaner (as mentioned at the Saint-Emilion Cooperative). Also, general models of wine consumption in France are shifting. Moderation is being encouraged through ubiquitous negative health advertising messages (less balanced than in the U.S.). Younger people are drinking more beer and soda than wine, in contrast to their parents and grandparents. For all these reasons fewer and fewer individuals and families are purchasing cubies of 30L of wine.