Châteauneuf-du-Pape and Beaucastel. Thirteen grapes and one family.

Two Rhônes, north and south

The Rhône Valley is really two different worlds. The north is narrow and steep, with a cooler continental climate, and its reds are made from Syrah alone. The south is flatter and Mediterranean, with many permitted grape varieties for red and white. As one of the Perrins puts it, the north cooks with butter and the south with olive oil.

The Southern Rhône has a ladder of appellations: Côtes du Rhône, Côtes du Rhône Villages, villages allowed to add their own name, and finally the crus. The film also visits two of them. Gigondas sits on the slopes of the Dentelles de Montmirail, mostly Grenache, freshened by cool winds from Mont Ventoux. Vacqueyras, lower on the plain, gives fruitier, slightly more powerful wines.

The pope's new castle

In the 14th century the popes settled in Avignon and built a summer residence at Châteauneuf, planting vines around it. The ruined castle still crowns the village, surrounded by a sea of vineyards. The area gets around 300 days of sun and, at Beaucastel, more than 120 days of mistral each year. The wind dries the grapes after rain, keeps disease away and concentrates the fruit.

The famous rounded stones, the galets, were carried from the Alps by the ancient river. They store heat by day and release it at night, but the Perrins stress that what matters most lies beneath: clay that acts like a sponge, holding moisture and giving the wines balance and freshness.

Thirteen grapes, blended separately

Châteauneuf-du-Pape is known for allowing a blend of many varieties. Besides the dominant Grenache, there are Mourvèdre, Syrah, Cinsault, Vaccarèse, Counoise, Terret Noir, Muscardin, Picpoul, Picardan, Bourboulenc, Roussanne and Clairette. Beaucastel grows all thirteen classic varieties, picks and vinifies each one separately, and builds the blend from them like a painter with a palette.

The house is unusual in giving Mourvèdre a big role. Châteauneuf is at the northern edge of where it ripens, but when it does, it brings freshness and complexity and becomes the backbone of the wine. Grenache, which tends to oxidize, is balanced against reductive Mourvèdre, and Syrah's acidity against the floral lift of Counoise. The blend ages in large old oak rather than new barrels. Among the whites, a Roussanne Vieilles Vignes comes from what the family believes may be the oldest Roussanne in the world.

A family of pioneers

The family bought Beaucastel in 1909, after phylloxera had wiped out the area's vines, and replanted all the traditional varieties. Jacques Perrin turned to organic farming in the 1960s and biodynamics in the 1970s, when everyone else was chasing yields. When he died in 1978, his sons Jean-Pierre and François, ten years apart, had to run the estate together almost as strangers. Their mother held the family together.

Today nine family members work in the business, each in a role that fits their talents. The family also keeps ten percent of every vintage in its cellar as insurance, and in a weak year such as 2002 it chose not to release a red Beaucastel at all.

Parker, climate and freshness

Thirty or forty years ago, fully ripe vintages were rare; today the challenge is to keep wines balanced. Hear why Robert Parker did so much to make Châteauneuf-du-Pape famous, why the style is now moving toward more freshness and less alcohol in a warming climate, and how the Perrins compare blending a family to blending a wine. The episode also shows how the next generation is being brought in.

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