Kennedy Creative Works

Champagne.. Who doesn't love bubbles in some form!?! It's my first time in Champagne and such a pleasure to visit two very different producers. is a cooperative which makes quality wine that is accessible with scintillating surprises. Roman told us about the careful blends, some with a petite amount of my favored Ratafia, and others mostly composed of Pinot Noir.

In the fields Marion told us about her pruning to avoid frost. I was enamoured by her description of "saints de glace" or saints of ice. There's a common held belief that May 13-15 is when the saints arrive and no more frost will come that can cause the devestation of lost yields.

And, then there's .renaut the small family winery, who makes Biodynamic champagne. Alain Réaut generously led us through his vines, digging some earth to reveal rich soils full of cover plants and earthworms. He showed us his composts and talked through nourishing the vines that give us the precious grapes. As his son, Alexandre, the next generation joined us, we all raised our glasses and drank the dry crystalline champagne. Each drop reminding me of the earth and bread, as all of these interconnections we share in common.

I've finally reached a long imagined place : (MJD). While I worked for 2 years at I studied Burgundy but most importantly, the wines of MJD.

You must understand, this is a place with a beautiful history. Their caves date back to 380 AD. Kings of France and Dukes of Burgundy walked these underground chambers.

However, what moves me the most is the Drouhin family has been immersed in the wine industry for five generations.

I greatly admire Maurice Drouhin, the second generation, who served in WWI and WWII. He cooperated with the United States in working with General MacArthur as partvof the resistance. He had been arrested once by the gestapo. The second time that they pursued him, he used a false wall and the caves to escape.

The now famous Hospice de Beaune took him in and hid him until the end of the war. Knowing that his survival was due to their grace, he donated premier cru land to the hospice, and volunteered to help those in need one day a week in the ensuing years.

I felt chills walking within these storied walls with a knowledgable guide. One of my dreams is true.

This statute celebrates the New World working in harmony with the Old, through the work of Gustave Foëx in Montpellier, France... I just finished two weeks at L'Institut Agro Montpellier, an institution and area new to me. The superior school is famed for working through the grapevine phylloxera crisis that devestated the European wine industry in 1863.

There, Gustave Foëx and others tested grafts of American indigenous vines, resistant to the blight, with desired European varietals. So, in 1876 they formulated the way forward from ruin. It also symbolizes a connection between contients and cultures.

Beyond the experimental vineyard, Pierre Galet studied grape varieties there, and the institut houses the historic Amphitheater Pasteur. In learning more about Languedoc wines, I'm moved by some of the current innovators here. More on that in a later post.

In the meantime, take a moment to see some of this beautiful city that has an enduring connection with the new world, in vines and otherwise. And, it's reminder: we've worked through great difficulty before.....................
Cette statue célèbre l'harmonie entre le Nouveau Monde et l'Ancien, incarnée par l'œuvre de Gustave Foëx à Montpellier, en France... Je viens de passer deux semaines à l'Institut Agro Montpellier, un établissement et une région que je découvrais pour la première fois. L'école est célèbre pour le rôle qu'elle a joué dans la gestion de la crise du phylloxéra, ce fléau qui a dévasté l'industrie viticole européenne en 1863.

C'est là que Gustave Foëx et ses confrères ont expérimenté le greffage de vignes indigènes américaines — résistantes à la maladie — sur des cépages européens prisés. Ainsi, en 1876, ils ont tracé la voie pour sortir de la ruine. Cette démarche symbolise également un lien entre les terroirs et les cultures.

En attendant, prenez un instant pour découvrir quelques images de cette magnifique ville qui entretient un lien durable avec le Nouveau Monde, tant à travers ses vignes que par bien d'autres aspects. Et que ces vignes nous rappellent une chose : nous avons déjà su surmonter de grandes épreuves par le passé.

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