Cleaning up my home office quite thoroughly for the first time in decades, I finally dug deep enough to uncover a carton containing my earliest tasting notes from almost half a century of wine-buying trips, primarily to France and Italy. Only a couple of years are missing; they must be hiding away somewhere—maybe in the attic of our office in Burgundy.
     When wine lover Thomas Jefferson traveled a similar itinerary, bouncing along in a horse-drawn carriage, he took notes, too. Curiously, they lack any tales of adventure. No emotion, either. He did compulsively write down the prices of practically everything, which does not make for passionate reading.
     Why his preoccupation with prices? Maybe he had a government expense account? No, he traveled as a private citizen and paid his own way. Possibly to defend his expenses to the IRS—you know, claim them as tax deductions? No, income taxes were not introduced until 1913.
     We do, however, learn that Jefferson, the complicated genius, was up to downing a glass or two of Riesling with breakfast. If that detail warms your heart, you’ve come to the right place. If you are a temperance fanatic, open your Bible and show me where Jesus turned wine into water. No way, José—if you believe the Bible, the son of God was no party pooper. We know Jefferson drank with breakfast, because he listed the time, the wine, and its price in his journal, but he delivers not one word about its aroma, body, or finish. He finds nary a cherry, nary a berry in the bouquet. No numerical scores are bestowed. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where Jefferson and I differ. In my own journals, there is rarely anything about my mood, the weather, or even meals. No, they are nearly one hundred percent hastily scribbled, wine-stained tasting notes. Of course, as I started reading through a few pages from my initial tasting trip in 1974, memories began spilling out from between the crinkles of my eighty-two-year-old brain.
     My wife asked if finding the notebooks might inspire me to write about the old days. So, here I am! Let’s hit the road.
     Fifty years ago, I flew SF→NY→Paris for my first wine-buying trip. Paris! And can you imagine, it was part of my job. I was bushy-tailed, perhaps, a novice in the wine trade, but what with jet lag, far from bright-eyed. Or was it a propeller-driven plane back then? I’d given myself three free days in Paris to recover from the long flight, and I continued that practice on subsequent trips, using those days to enjoy the great city, of course, but also to visit wine shops and restaurants looking for wine leads. My first taste of Raveneau Chablis, for example, was at Le Taillevent restaurant in Paris in 1978.
     Last night I watched Funny Face from 1957. Not a great movie, but when Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn do Paris together in technicolor, a couple of tears welled up as I remembered my first impressions of Paris, the closest thing to love that a city can be. Uncovering the past is proving to be emotional. I’m not sure whether it is normal or not, but good things more quickly than bad bring tears to my eyes. For example, remembering pals like Joseph Swan, the California vigneron, or Lulu Peyraud from Domaine Tempier. Beauty will do it, too, like Paris or Yosemite. I’m not a big fan of Hollywood musicals in general, but in Fred Astaire’s Royal Wedding, three or four scenes are good enough for my eyes to eke out a few drops. And Gene Kelly’s classic singing and dancing in the rain with his umbrella—it feels almost Pavlovian, the way it turns on my faucet. A wine, however, has never inspired tears of joy. Even death has never moved me to tears except when my first kitty cat died. She was a real pal during a very rough period after my first marriage blew apart in the mid-sixties. But normally, between me and death, there’s a wall. It must be avoidance. If I avoid it, it’ll avoid me? I doubt it.

• • •

Today, reading the notes I wrote on my first full day of the trip—May 3, 1974—I see that I entered a wine shop in the fifth arrondissement behind the Jardin des Plantes at 20, rue Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire. All these many years have passed without my realizing what a momentous event it turned out to be for my career. How much I learned, how much it influenced me. I’m disappointed in myself—how could I have forgotten?
     And I’ll never know why, given my lack of experience and inability to speak French, the proprietor, Monsieur Jean-Baptiste Chaudet, generously opened at no charge so many great bottles for tasting and devoted such a big chunk of time to me, just me, of all people.
     For starters, alongside an expensive Meursault from Burgundy, he poured a far cheaper Touraine-Amboise blanc from the Touraine—a wine I’d never even heard of. However, when I lowered my handy sniffer into first one, then into the second of the two glasses, lo and behold, it was the lowly Touraine-Amboise that captivated me. Chaudet clearly preferred it, too—that was the point of serving them together. Anyone who has followed my career knows that I took Chaudet’s lesson to heart. It was like a stone hitting the water, and the ripples from it have not ceased issuing forth. It was not that afterwards I disdained the grand appellations. In fact, I gained a reputation as a Burgundy specialist within a few years and worked with grands crus from gifted talents like Jayer, Raveneau, Maume, Coche-Dury, and Ponsot. But I ventured out into the backwoods, too, and felt like a pioneer discovering the fabulous riches of an unknown continent. I found that I preferred a perfectly made so-called “little” wine to a mediocre version of a great appellation. In France, grand cru refers to the vineyard, the land. Not the wine. You might find a masterpiece from Chinon or Cornas and a disappointing Chambertin. In fact, my experiences include exactly such incidents.
     I also left Chaudet’s with the address of a winemaker in the Beaujolais region. It took me several years, but a decade later I showed up to taste. The winemaker’s name was Jules Chauvet, who later became known as the father of the natural wine movement. His wines were fabulous. Dazzling creations. I had never experienced anything like them—their cornucopian fruit—and haven’t again since. I mean, of all the wines bottled without SO2 that I have tasted (many of which I import or imported), none truly resembled Chauvet’s. For example, I love the Morgons from The Gang of Four—Foillard, Breton, Lapierre, and Thévenet—sometimes wines greater than Chauvet’s. However, they don’t taste like Chauvet’s. Vinifying without SO2 is not as simple as deciding to vinify without SO2. It requires insane meticulousness, for one thing. Maybe the fact that Jules had a second job played a role. He was also a biochemist on the faculty of the University of Berlin. He knew his wines down to their molecules, and as I learned, that’s what it takes to produce a perfectly correct 100% natural wine.
     So, after visiting Chaudet—sorry, it must be confusing, Chauvet the vigneron and Chaudet the wine merchant—after visiting Chaudet, I was never content to look for wines only where everyone else was looking, and later I would be the first to import natural wines into the United States. Not a bad first day in France!
     Oh, but that’s not all. Monsieur Chaudet ended our tasting with a 1957 Bâtard-Montrachet, a 1961 Meursault “Clos de la Barre,” and finally a triumphant bottle from the Hospices de Beaune: 1955 Meursault “Charmes.”
     And I left with a copy of Chaudet’s little book, Marchand de Vin, even though I couldn’t read French. Once I could understand it, I read it, and here is where this could be interesting for you. Monsieur Chaudet wrote about lesser-known white Burgundies. Listen closely: “And sincerely, I began to prefer them to the grands crus, because they are lighter, more ethereal, and thus, easier to assimilate. I am, I must say, a big eater and I like to quench my thirst.” He points out that he can drink more wine, “not put the brakes on,” and drink much more cheaply from white Burgundies outside the grand cru zones. I grew to see what he meant, and ever since have offered my clientele a large menu of so-called “lesser” Burgundian appellations. See the list of current offerings at the end of these reflections.
     Chaudet’s great wine shop was torn down less than two years later—some sort of urban renewal political ploy. The new building is ugly as hell and houses yet another pharmacy. At sixty-five years old, Chaudet was not up to starting over elsewhere.

• • •

An unprofessional amount of Beaujolais.” That is how I described my wine consumption at dinner that night alone in a bistro across the river from the original Notre-Dame. I’d never eaten oysters, but there they were, listed as the first course on the menu du jour. Therefore, a platter of raw, living, breathing oysters appeared and was placed before me by a slick-haired, bow-tied waiter. Come to think of it, I’d never even seen an oyster. Those six before my eyes on the half-shell were quite large, but what did I know? I picked up knife and fork and began cutting the slimy beasts into triplets, you know, bite-size pieces? It was difficult with those damned half shells in the way. Hack-sawed Oysters On The Half Shell, anyone? I sort of liked them. I didn’t dislike them. The waiter in his black vest and half-waist white apron walked briskly up to my table. He had about twenty years, thirty pounds, and a lot of dining experience on me. He’d come to pick up my platter, of course, but instead of whisking it away he hesitated, staring down at the clutter.
     “Massacre!” he whispered. Yes, he was capable of whispering with an exclamation point. I did not speak French but quickly figured out that massacre means “massacre.”
     Later I learned to love the slimy little beasts and launched Oyster Bliss to teach my clients to open their pleasure zone to Chablis and oysters, and I learned to observe experienced diners at table before digging into whatever was placed on the plate before me.
     That first evening, my first cassoulet followed and the pitcher of Beaujolais flowed and cheeses followed that. Followed by chocolate mousse. Menu du jour. Vive la France!