A Week In Provence - Square Meal

A week in
Provence
Summer is here, so it must be time to crack open the
rosé. Natasha Hughes heads off to Provence in a
Mercedes-Benz GL 320 CDI to find some good examples
124 n www.squaremeal.co.uk

For most people, the south of France
is all about the Côte d’Azur. From
the cinematic glitz of Cannes to
Nice’s old-world charm and the
hedonistic glamour of St Tropez,
it is France’s Mediterranean coastline that
grabs our attention. The region also grabs a
fair few headlines during the summer season,
as the models, film stars and rock ‘n’ rollers
flock there in droves.
This narrow focus is both a tragedy and a
blessing for the stunning hill country
that lies just behind Europe’s most
famous beaches. It’s a tragedy because
the back country misses out on
the lucrative benefits of tourism,
but a blessing, too, because those
independent-minded souls who
venture inland can enjoy an unspoiled
part of southern France.
Even in a fairly big town such as
Grasse, the centre of the perfume
industry, life unfolds at a relaxed pace.
People stroll through the streets
in the sunshine, share coffee with
friends under the shaded awning
of a pavement café, and stop and
smell the roses.
Indeed, smell – often undervalued
as one of the senses – seems to be
indispensible here in Provence. My
nose was assaulted – though in a
thoroughly pleasant way – as I drove
through the wild French countryside. It was
the smell of garrigue, an aromatic scrub that
covers the hillsides and, here in Provence, it is a
heady mixture of wild thyme, juniper, rosemary,
fennel and lavender. With the windows of the
Mercedes-Benz GL 320 CDI wide open, it filled
the inside of my car with the smell of summer.
Mercedes-Benz GL 320 cdI
Natasha Hughes’ verdict: I was delighted
to find that the GL 320 CDI steered like
a nippy little city car. Unlike a city car,
though, it was a delight on the motorway,
gobbling up the many miles to Provence
and back with consummate ease. What’s
more, I’ve never felt so safe travelling at
130kph in my entire driving life.
Top Gear’s Andy Wilman adds: This is the
seven-seat answer to parents who buy
I’d taken the scenic route south from Lyon,
over the foothills of the Alps and down into
Grasse – a couple of hundred kilometres of
long, winding roads that meander slowly up
slopes, only to plunge steeply back down the
other side. It was a rollercoaster ride that the
car handled with ease.
This, I was later told, was known as the Route
Napoleon, along which Napoleon and his army
travelled in 1815 when he set out to overthrow
Louis XVIII after his return from exile in Elba.
Once I’d reached Grasse, I headed straight
for Confiserie Florian on the outskirts of the
town. This pleasant villa has been turned over
to the production of all kinds of flower-flavoured
culinary delights, and I was offered a scoop of
lavender-scented ice-cream before being taken
on a tour of the facilities.
I witnessed boiled sweets being made from
pressed violets, jasmine blossoms turned into
jam, and whole clementines being soaked in
baths of sugar syrup during a long and labourintensive
candying process.
Sweet treats
Needless to say, I spent a fortune in the
confiserie’s shop on floral nougats, sugar-coated
rose petals and other perfumed goodies. Then I
dragged myself away to the other side of town,
where I was booked in to spend the night at the
delightful Bastide Saint Antoine.
The next morning, replete after breakfast
on a terrace overlooking a sweep of forested
hillside, I set out with a strong sense of purpose.
I was on a mission to discover this summer’s
perfect wine for alfresco drinking.
Rosé has come back into fashion in the UK
in the past few years. I’ve long been a fan of
the style – probably as a result of having spent
summers as a teenager in a small village in
the five-seat M-Class and then find their
reproductive organs are still running at full
throttle. The three-litre diesel engine is a
peach, and the fittings are lovely.
Engine: 2987cc
BHP: 224
0-62mph: 9.5 seconds
Top speed: 130mph
On-the-road price: £52,472
Mercedes wine tour
Provence, where winemakers have long taken
pink wines seriously.
To my mind, rosé is the ideal wine for long,
hot summer days, when you don’t want the
hefty alcohol and tannic structure of a big red
wine, but a white just won’t do.
Perfect match
What’s more, rosé works well with the kind
of food most of us want to eat in summer:
plates of charcuterie, char-grilled seafood or
barbecued sausages. It can also be startlingly
good with spicy Asian cuisines – all that fruit and
very little tannin works remarkably well with
Thai, Indian and Chinese dishes. Some wine
critics don’t take rosé seriously, but I think they
are missing the point entirely.
I thought a good place to start my search
would be La Maison des Vins in the small village
of Les Arcs sur Argens. As the headquarters
for the organisation that promotes the region’s
wines, its cellars house examples of the reds,
whites and rosés made by some of the Côtes de
Provence’s leading producers.
If you want to find out about the six terroirs
of the region, staff can guide you through the
diversity of soils, microclimates and grape
varieties found in this sprawling appellation
– east to west, the Côtes de Provence AOC is
about 200km wide.
Alternatively, you can choose to conduct your
own tasting based on the 15 wines available
in the shop – the list of open bottles changes
weekly to ensure visitors always find something
new each time they call in.
I found several interesting rosés (see
overleaf), but I was also surprised by the
quality of some of the whites and reds that I
tasted. Several of the whites, particularly those
based on Vermentino (or Rolle), were >>
www.squaremeal.co.uk n 125

Mercedes wine tour
rich and weighty, but had enough acidity to
ensure they weren’t cloying.
At the bottom end of the price scale, reds,
which are usually made with a blend of different
grapes that might include Syrah, Grenache,
Mourvèdre and Cabernet Sauvignon, were
fresh and juicy. At the top end of the quality
scale, they held their own when compared
with equivalent domaines in the Languedoc or
southern Rhône.
My next stop was the Château Font du
Broc. My initial guess – that the property
dated back several centuries – proved to be
resoundingly wrong. Winemaker Gérald Rouby
told me the entire complex was built just 20
years ago by Sylvain Massa.
Massa, who made his fortune in the tyre
business, decided to invest some of the profits
in international-standard dressage horses
(which live in the paddocks at the bottom of the
property) and 22 hectares of vineyards.
Château tour
Visitors to the domaine can take a tour round
the impressive cellars, which are housed in a
cloistered underground vault, the design of
which was inspired by the 12th century Abbaye
de Thoronet. Alternatively, they can just mooch
around the pretty, manicured gardens, taste the
property’s wines or drop in for one of the openair
concerts held during the summer.
Not far down the road lies the cru classé
domaine, Château Sainte Roseline. This former
convent is the real medieval deal. It even has its
own saint, Roseline herself, who lies mummified
Where and What to taste In ProVence
La Maison des Vins
RN7, 83460 Les Arcs sur Argens
Tel: 00 33 494 99 50 20
Taste (and buy) wines from across
the Côtes de Provence appellation.
recommended: Château Hermitage
St Martin, Grande Cuvée Enzo 2004
(white); Saint André de Figuière,
Cuvée Delphine 2004 (white);
Château Maravene 2006 (rosé);
Château Rimauresq 2006 (rosé);
Domaine Tropez Beraud 2004
(red); Mas de Cadenet Mas Négrel
Cadenet 2003 (red)
château Font du Broc
83460 Les Arcs sur Argens
126 n www.squaremeal.co.uk
in a glass case in the property’s chapel.
You don’t often get to see a preserved saint,
so visitors usually stop for a good gawp before
moving off around the chapel to take a look
at the artworks. These include a Giacometti
sculpture, a Chagall mosaic and a 17th century
baroque altarpiece. The property’s owners are
still dedicated to art – the château is used as a
venue for art exhibitions and is a permanent
sculpture park.
It was raining the next day, when I drove
out to the Commanderie de Peyrassol. But
although I was disappointed by the weather,
Alban Cacaret, who manages the property, was
delighted. There hasn’t been anywhere near
enough rain for the vineyards recently. This was
a drizzle rather than a downpour, but it would
be enough to keep the vines going in a region
where irrigation is forbidden by law.
The commanderie itself was founded in
the 13th century by Christian military order
the Templars. But because the Templars so
terrified the French monarchy, the king, Philip
le Bel, destroyed the order in the early 14th
century and the commanderie passed into the
possession of the knights of Malta. After the
French Revolution, it passed into private hands.
These days, the 700-hectare property is used
to grow vines and truffles, hunt boars and host
concerts. It is also the site of a permanent art
exhibition – clearly, art and wine go hand in hand
in this part of France.
It was still drizzling steadily as the
Mercedes-Benz climbed the hill up to the
Château Mentone, a property accessed
Tel: 00 33 494 47 48 20
www.chateau-fontdubroc.com
At the time of writing this article,
the current cellar master,
Gérald Rouby, had only held his
position for a few months.
However, if the barrel samples
I tasted on my visit are anything
to go by, his 2006 red wine
should be potent and heady,
without being over-extracted.
château sainte roseline
83460 Les Arcs sur Argens
Tel: 00 33 494 99 50 30
www.sainte-roseline.com
recommended: Barons de Sainte
Roseline Blanc 2005 (white);
Rosé 2006 (rosé).
commanderie de Peyrassol
83340 Flassans sur Issole
Tel: 00 33 494 69 71 02
www.peyrassol.com
recommended: Château Peyrassol
Rosé 2006 (rosé); Commanderie de
Peyrassol Rouge 2004 (red)
château Mentone
401 Chemin de Mentone
83510 Saint-Antonin-du-Var
Tel: 00 33 494 04 42 00
Email: info@chateaumentone.com
www.chateaumentone.com
through an impressive pair of wrought-iron
gates and a wonderful alleyway of plane trees.
There may be no art here, but owner
Marie-Pierre Caille’s recent restoration of the
château shows she has an eye for beauty. She
has big plans for the winery, too, although at
the moment the focus is on the tasting rooms
housed in a former chapel.
Tasting and more
I ended my visit to Provence with a tasting
at the Château de Berne, owned by British
businessman Bill Muddyman, who decided
30 or so years ago to set up a domaine
dedicated to the ‘art de vivre en Provence’.
The result is a complex that includes a winery
and tasting room, a top-notch hotel with two
restaurants, a cookery school and a venue for
seminars.
Guests can learn to taste wines or blend
perfumes, ride quad bikes round the estate,
play tennis or simply kick back and enjoy the
local hospitality. Life at the Château de Berne is
all about the appreciation of the many sensual
pleasures that life can afford.
The same can be said of Provence – and its
wines. It’s unlikely that the region’s reds
or whites will ever become world beaters
and, although the top rosés are among the
best of their type in the world, they are
wines to be enjoyed in the here and now,
rather than cellared for analysis some years
hence. And, despite what the wine snobs
would have you believe, there’s nothing
wrong with that. SM
recommended: Château de
Mentone Blanc – both the 2005
and the 2006, although there’s
not much of the 2005 left (white);
Château de Mentone Rosé 2006
(rosé); Château de Mentone
Rouge 2004 (red)
château de Berne
Route de Salernes
83510 Lorgues
Tel: 00 33 494 60 43 60
www.chateauberne.com
recommended: Cuvée Spéciale
Rosé 2006 (rosé); Cuvée Spéciale
Blanc 2004 (white); Cuvée Spéciale
Rouge 2002 (red)

THE TEAM AT LA BASTIDE DES MAGNANS
THE MERCEDES-BENz GL 320 CDI ouTSIDE CHATEAu MENToNE
CoMMANDERIE DE PEYRASSoL’S ALBAN
CACARET AND NATASHA HuGHES
Where to eat and sLeeP In ProVence
La Bastide Saint Antoine –
Jacques Chibois
48 Avenue Henri-Dunant
06130 Grasse
Tel: 00 33 493 70 94 94
Email: info@jacques-chibois.com
www.jacques-chibois.com
This small but perfectly formed boutique
hotel, housed in an 18th century bastide,
is also the location for Jacques Chibois’
two-Michelin-starred restaurant. A delight
for all the senses.
La Bastide des Magnans
20 Avenue de la Resistance
83550 Vidauban
Tel: 00 33 494 99 43 91
www.bastidedesmagnans.com
The shady terrasse of the Bastide des
Magnans is the ideal spot for a long, lazy
summer lunch or dinner. Portions are
large, but the food is delicious. Luckily,
you can sleep it all off in one of the pretty,
individually decorated rooms upstairs.
La Vigne à table
RN7, 83460 Les Arcs sur Argens
Tel: 00 33 494 47 48 47
Housed in the same building as La
Maison des Vins, La Vigne à Table is
much more than a simple pit-stop for
refuelling. It serves unexpectedly classy
food based on seasonal ingredients, and
a great wine list.
château Mentone
401 Chemin de Mentone
83510 Saint-Antonin-du-Var
Tel: 00 33 494 04 42 00
Email: info@chateaumentone.com
www.chateaumentone.com
A highly sophisticated chambre d’hôte
housed inside a delightfully restored
château. Each room has its own theme
– and there’s even a small private chapel
for weddings. The on-site winery is worth
a visit. Dinner by arrangement.
Bruno
Campagne Mariette
83512 Lorgues
Tel: 00 33 494 85 93 93
www.restaurantbruno.com
You’ve got to have a larger-than-life
personality to get away with calling your
restaurant simply ‘Bruno’. Good thing
chef Bruno Clément has as much charm
and chutzpah as he has girth – which is
considerable. If you love all things truffley,
this is the place for you. Chances are
you’ll find much to like in Bruno’s
six-roomed hotel too.
château de Berne
Route de Salernes
83510 Lorgues
Tel: 00 33 494 60 43 60
www.chateauberne.com
Your sat nav will need to be working at
full efficiency to help you find the
Château de Berne, but once you have,
you won’t want to leave. After a visit to
the sophisticated winery or a ride round
the estate on a quad bike, check into one
of the tastefully decorated rooms (each
named after a fruit or vegetable).
traVeL tIPs
Eurotunnel can be contacted on 0870 535
3535 or www.eurotunnel.com
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