Laure Colombo is the daughter of esteemed Cornas / Rhone producer, Jean-Luc Colombo. As the head winemaker, Laure has a strong connection with the terroir that she is working with. 

This is film is a great intro to both Laure & La Belle De Mai 2012, named as a tribute to her Grandmother who from her restaurant in Marseille, handed down her love of fine food & wine.

 

It is always a pleasure to meet Laure Colombo (you can watch our last interview with Laure by clicking here. Laure talks us through her wine from Saint Peray called La Belle de Mai made from mostly Roussanne grapes but also with Marsanne.

These grapes provide freshness and bite that make them perfect for pairing with richer fish dishes or herbecious roasted vegetables. The Belle de Mai can also be aged to allow for the characteristics to become more integrated and complex without losing its freshness from the acidity. 

The name of the wine, La Belle de Mai, was the name of Laure's Grandmother's restaurant in Marseille and that makes this the epitome of matriarchal wine, as it was this fine lady who handed down her flare for the pleasures of good food and wine.

No doubt we'll be meeting with Laure again, although hopefully it will be in Saint Péray!

Jean-Luc Colombo wines are sold across the UK in different wine retailers. The vineyards are certified organic and Laure says they do use many biodynamic processes.

 Laure Colombo belle de mai still800

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Last week a picture was posted on Twitter of vines in Shabo, a large estate that lies to the west of Odesa on southern Ukraine’s Black Sea coastline. The image seemed benign at face value but the reality, of course, is that the city of Odesa has been bracing itself for attack by Russian forces. 

 

As COVID-19 conspires with the grimmest of winds and rain to force a societal retreat behind our own front doors, the word ennui springs to mind. The muddle of displeasure is pierced when Natalia hands me a large bulbous glass of a liquid I do not recognise.

 

 

Britain’s lamentable exit

On the eve of Britain’s official departure from the EU, my partner and I decided to explore a small town on the Italian Riviera where thewintry cold doesn’t feel so much like cold war bite.

I had warned my significant other that I would be having an inverse departure party, a release of the sanity valve if you like!

 

Sitting inside the ancient castle walls inside the town of Soave, a short drive from Verona in northern Italy, the unique slightly almond aroma of the indigenous grape, Garganega, rises gently from my glass. The castle sprawls up the side of an extinct volcano that gives the region its variant soil structures that mark out the better quality of Soave wines.

 

Tanisha Townsend decided to move to Paris 4 years ago after regularly passing through the city en route to the world’s most famous vineyards. In fact, it was about 2 years ago at the Printemps de Champagne Bouzy Rouge tasting in Reims that I saw (who we shall now refer to as) GirlMeetsGlass chirpily speaking to her web followers on Snapchat.

 

The cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, the final resting place of Saint James, rises out of the landscape, infested with antiquity. The rambling steep streets give way to shafts of dramatic light, emblazoned chapels, and tightly packed tapas bars, dusty, as old novels pressed together in antiquarian bookshops.

 

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